HPtuners

[rfmarz@frontiernet]

I only hope that you guys who are doing the experimentation and development- that normally is done by the mfg.- get the fairly ideal set up and then post the whole program so that us lazier, poorer and less motivated can acquire the benefits of your labor. I think what you guys are doing is amazing!

[silver]

[quote="rfmarz"]
I only hope that you guys who are doing the experimentation and development- that normally is done by the mfg.- get the fairly ideal set up and then post the whole program so that us lazier, poorer and less motivated can acquire the benefits of your labor. I think what you guys are doing is amazing!
[/quote]


I never said donations weren't accepted

[04Redline]

Hello to all,
My name is Shaun, Im coming from the Saturn Ion Redline side of this motor, the Lsj. 
I am an avid user of the hptuner program, and a fellow gear head. I own a 2004 Saturn Ion Redline, currently making 311whp and 296 ft. lbs of trq. My setup consists of a 2.6 pulley, methanol injection, ful header, downpipe, and exhaust system. All stock internals for now. Fully Hptuned by myself on mixed road courses and street tuning.
Heres a vid of my car in action:
http://s134.photobucket.com/albums/q115 ... LVideo.flv

Aside from working on my own car, I work on other ppl lsjs as well, anywhere from installs to tuning.

Heres some of my accomplishments:

Zoolanders car: 2.9 - 42.5 lbs injectors - 2.5 inch exhuast - My custom tune - thats all!
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q115 ... G_0715.jpg

P24ricks car: 2.8 - 60 lbs injectors - 2.5 inch exhaust - Add on heat exchanger (intercooler) - intake - my custom tune - thats all!
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q115 ... G_0846.jpg

Johnny's car: 2.7 pulley - 60 lbs injectors - 2.5 inch exhaust - Add on heat exchanger - my custom tune - 286 ft lbs of trq - thats all!
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q115 ... MG0088.jpg
And his movie...
http://s134.photobucket.com/albums/q115 ... e_0001.flv

Im pretty much here to lend a hand in any performance inquiries or tuning advice, you may want or need.  Im no stranger to these cars, and im not too sure you Atom fellows have someone who knows these motors well. If theres any questions at all, please dont be a stranger and feel free to ask away, If i dont carry the answer, im sure i would have no issues getting it. Hope i get to help many of you here. 

[positron]

we talk alot out our arses.. but we mean well..

[bolus]

Welcome Shaun, and thanks for the offer of help.  You may have read but our main problem is of cooling.  The Atom has a tiny heat exchanger and we dont have room to put in something like a cobra HE.  My car runs 190F AIT2 on the track with a 2.9" pulley

do you do any professional tuning?  If so you may gain some customers from the Atom community

[04Redline]

Thank  you for the warm welcome. wasnt expected to get bombarded with this many personal messages, but i asked for it, lol.
As far as tuning is concerned, No im not professional by no means, i simply learned it the way anyone would. Messing with a  little bit here, and a litte bit there. But ive tuned well over 20 vehicles now, from street tuning to dyno tuning. So Im no stranger to these cars. As for heat, I will be tuning a semi local Atom in my area. So i can get a very good view of your predicament or you all can send me pictures. I can see if theres a simple solution, Snowmobile radiators make great smaller "solutions" to cobra heat exchangers. From a Polaris if im not mistaken.  Either way, im not here to make any money off of what i do, just trying to help out and pass along some knowledge that i can share to you all with.

[Lane]

Welcome Shaun.

To add some info regarding the heat issue that was brought up, here's what the Atom has upfront for supercharger cooling.  Looks a lot like a transmission cooler:


I believe someone had commented that the Ariel Atom Experience track cars had been upgraded to use a larger unit that closely resembles the car's radiator.  This photo had been posted previously by a member who had also made the upgrade:


(My apologies for not crediting the original posters of these photos.  I had snagged a copy of them in the past without making note of whose they were.)

A related thread on cooling can be found here: http://forum.atomclub.com/index.php/topic,6785.0.html.  If more discussion is warranted on this issue, it'd be best to do it in the other thread instead of continuing to take this one in that direction and off-topic.

It sounds like there's a lot of speculation but not much hard data on what piece of the cooling system is the bottleneck - laminova, pump flow, radiator, etc.  I currently have some questions in to some very knowledgeable people on this topic and will report what I find out shortly.

[04Redline]

Wow, No offense but that cooling system is weak...
Ill take a look today at his setup, looks to me if you have any room further back, i dont see a reason why u cant upgrade to a larger HE and stand it up. But then again, I dont own an atom....
As far as your cooling system goes, I sure hope it isnt connected to your radiator system, if it is then i can understand why u have such high iat2 readings. Our cars radiator systems and intercooler systems are seperated.
Rad system - your basic thermostat driven Front mount radiator driven system.

intercooler system - Front mount intercooler, to a lower intake manifold, to built in laminova cores, to water pump, back to front mounted HE.

The intercooler is rather sturdy, and so long as your intercooler pump is wired the right way, it should last you a very long time. We have the second best water pump on the market, only bested by some higher quality marine pump, (very loud to boot)
Pressure isnt really an issue. So long as u keep the hose length down to about 10 feet total, you should be ok. At least according to some math from a local redline. (i need to really find that thread again)
Everything about the cooling system is ok. In your cases it may just be your HE and not having enough fluid to keep it cool.
The big bottle neck in the cooling system is the lower intake manifold. The cooling area to the laminova cores i believe or only a mere 18mm wide, and produce alot of pressure drop from within the manifold itself. The reason why our m62s cant produce alot of boost without it causing too much heat is strickly because of this. Inside the intake manifold there roughly 20 psi, bieng pushed with a stock pulley, but after the pressure drop and the air bieng recirculated again and again, heat begins to produce, making smaller pulleys more trouble then there worth. I have a local machinst over in oxnard looking into the porting of the cooling slots that lead to the laminova cores to see if it cant help solve the problem. Im sure boost will drop, but my guess would be about 2.5 psi. But the heat issue should also be aleviated some. Ill post some pics later tonight after i get home from work/tuning my local atom. Im sure you would all be impressed. Ill also take note, and tons of pics of your cooling system and learn as much as i can in the short amount of time that ill be with the car.
Ill address this better when i get home, talk to you all soon.

[Terry Kennedy]

[quote="04Redline"]
Wow, No offense but that cooling system is weak...
Ill take a look today at his setup, looks to me if you have any room further back, i dont see a reason why u cant upgrade to a larger HE and stand it up. But then again, I dont own an atom....
As far as your cooling system goes, I sure hope it isnt connected to your radiator system, if it is then i can understand why u have such high iat2 readings. Our cars radiator systems and intercooler systems are seperated. [/quote]

The systems are separate. Some Ecotec Atoms have a dual-pass end plate while others have the stock single pass. The intercooler pump is the stock LSJ one. With the engine in the back and the intercooler radiator in the front, there's more length than in a stock Cobalt / Ion LSJ setup.

[rfmarz@frontiernet]

Welcome to the forum, Shaun! I looked at your car. They just don't LOOK like they make in excess of 300 whp! Awesome.

[04Redline]

Thanks guys!
Well today i had a chance to work on my very first atom...i must say, what a pain in the butt. LOL
I got about 3 hours of sleep, and a 5 hour day at work. Then a nice trafficky drive I was ready to work on a car. It was definately not one of my better mechanical days.
Our Job was to swap to a smaller pulley and tune the car. We got the stock pulley out, and got it in about 2/3 of the way in, before my Bolt and nut stripped while tightening down the the new pulley. So needless to say, after dicking around with the car, i felt it was a huge fail on my part for not bieng able to complete the job. Oh well, it will be finished next weekend ( i hope) My buddy wants to go to another track day! LOL
Here i am enjoying the Atoms company!
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q115 ... MG0214.jpg

God i love that car.

I had seen your puny Heat exhchangers....Just wow...
Only thing i can see is modifiying the intake system to the side of the car, and put a larger heat exchanger in its place.

http://www.seriouswheels.com/pics-2005/ ... 80x960.jpg

This is a lotus elise motor, made by toyota, notice the placement of thier intercooler. I propose why not add a larger unit than what the factory supplied you with. A cobra HE in the intakes place would be great im sure. You can simply reroute the intake system to the driver side of the car, and either leave an open cone, or devise some type of sealed air box, with velocity stack effect to help with air flow.
Personally, i would run modified autozone honda intake pipe to a quality filter. Im sure it will thorw off your tune. But not enough to make a huge difference. Gm is all over this tune, and make it super safe. On top of relocating and adding a larger HE, i would highly suggest a larger resevoir. Nothing against your fill tubes, but it makes having to bleed the system not very fun.
http://images.mustangandfords.com/proje ... ervoir.jpg
bad image i know. But replace the fittings to 3/4 inch adapters, have some type of breather, ala radiator system so the ystem can bleed itself out.
I hope i was as clear as i can be, its 1:36 am here, Ive been up since 3:30 so if it doesnt make sense im sorry, lol

[Terry Kennedy]

[quote="04Redline"]
Well today i had a chance to work on my very first atom...i must say, what a pain in the butt. LOL
[/quote]

Once you get familiar with the car and have all the right tools on hand (there aren't that many oddball tools, but they make the difference between pleasure and pain) it isn't bad at all.

[quote="04Redline"]
I had seen your puny Heat exhchangers....Just wow...
Only thing i can see is modifiying the intake system to the side of the car, and put a larger heat exchanger in its place.
[/quote]

Some people have done that. Personally, I like the sound of the intake right there, and it is part of the character of the Atom. In the Top Gear video, Jeremy Clarkson says "This is the engine air intake right here and I can feel it sucking my brain out".

In the 500HP Atom, Ariel has retained the air intake in its original location but added two side scoops down low for cooling.

[rfmarz@frontiernet]

04Redline, whose black framed Atom is that?

[bolus]

I had offered to help with the build of a new HE that would sit in the hoop but got no interest
http://forum.atomclub.com/index.php/topic,6723.0.html

Either that or Tom at Unique Fabrication will build a side scoop with side mounted HE

[04Redline]

Terry, Yes thankfully my host had all these little oddball tools. I personally think if i had gotten more sleep it would have been more enjoyable...but noooooo i just had to stay up late, i learned my lesson well.

Rfmarz, The black framed Atom is owned by member named Nick, in the los angeles area.

Bolus, This is exactly i what i was talking about! I think that is a perfect spot for your intercoolers. Its in one of the highest spots on the car and well get a huge amount of air flow to drop those temperatures. Unfortunately i can understand why some ppl would not like to do it. You lose one of the Atoms features its known for. But in your defense, im all about function over beauty. If i owned the car i would most definately jump right in and relocate an intake system for cooler IAT2 temps.  Id rather have effieciency and the ability to upgrade my car further over the placement of a noise.
An Atom is a sexy beast of a car, Now a modified Atom with the possibility to throw any size pulley at it and be able to retain cool IAT2s even sexier.

.....But of course, theres always meth/water injection... I dont know where u gentleman tap for the nozzle. But if you want amazing cooling ability. It should be via a plate under the blower, or directly tap the intake manifold. Just something else to add.