Umm, "the experienced tuner" you speak of is one of, if not the best and best known unichip tuner in the states.

 

I've been at 440whp or more for 18months, and i don't putt around or garage the car all the time. In those 18 months I've put nearly 30K miles on. So 440 seems capable without issue. But it all depends. If it wasn't a risk everyone would have 440 and there would be no issue.

 

Man, I wish I had your rods.

 

I wish everyone could of had my luck, its such a joy and fun as hell. Not to be had by few owners but by everyone that puts FI in, everyone should have that result.

 

Another bad case wishful thinking. Don't you think that with all the stuff the professional tuners know about FI, if it was THAT safe, then at least the ones that do a lot of cars would have come up with a warranaty. Like you pay them a grand or 1500$, and should your motor ever blow in the period under warranty, they source and install a replacement motor for you under warranty. They'd give you an option to pay for a build-up, but a new core and install will be covered under warranty.
The tuner would have a specific package, which is the only way to obtail a warranty. All the places that need to be accessed to either raise the boost or change tuning settings will be sealed, tempering with the seals results in voiding warranty.
Only certain problems (like broken rods, etc) would be covered. Problems resulting from neglect (like not watching your oil) will not be covered under warranty.
If 20 people buy the package b/c the warranty was the reason that they went to this shop, and not another, the tuner will get 20-30K in warranty sales. If 1 out of 20 blows, big deal, the tuner still got a crapload of $$ for nothing for simply signing the warranty paper.

It took me 5 minutes to pull this idiocy out of my ***. Don't you think that people that have been doing this for living for years wouldn't have come up with this by now? I am having some suspicions that what we know in the forums is only a small percentage of what is really going on as far as blown motors are concerned.

 

I don't agree, because the tuners are not the manufacturers of these engines. They tweak and tune according to their experience. Inconsistencies that are allowed from the factory cannot be assumed by a tuner and he/she should let you know of the possibility of a failure. I'd be skeptical of a tuner or the installation if he/she warrantied something like this.
If the tuners had manufactured the parts or engine then i'd assume they better have some kind of warranty or guarantee on those items because they have the upmost knowledge of the consistencies and durability of those parts and have their credibility and reliability riding on this journey.

MY 2 cents worth.

 

I agree with you on this one.
But still, if FI would be so safe on stock internals, selling this extra responsibilty would bring good dividends to the tuners, both in terms of money for the warranties sold, as well as attracting more customers, who'd be willing to travel further to take advantage of the warranty. It would also help them to move more stuff along with the FI kit (like extra cooler setups, engine management unints, etc, etc).
But I think that it will never happen, mainly b/c the incidence of blown motors is underreported here. Like for example, months ago, as I was speaking to SSR-engineering, he has informed me that at least half a dozen of their TT kit were sold by them alone. So where are they, if only like 2 or 3 people on these boards are using them.
What I am driving at is that there is a LOT of 350z related stuff that goes on outside of these forums and we do not know everything that is happening. And I don't believe that each and every member that suffers a blown motor goes on the computer and informs us about the engine failure as the first thing when he gets home.
Or maybe I am just being too paranoid about FI on stock block. But either way, I am not touching the FI until I am ready to purchase a fully built motor.
To anyone who is like me, if in ANY doubt about the stock block holding up, then don't go FI. Period. The frustration of a blown motor plus the constant anticipation of a boom each time you touch the gas is not worth anything, at least in my opinion.

 

Agreed, there are many that remain silent for whatever reason. It is not 100% safe any trustworthy tuner should mention that. Especially to the young members or those of this board that don't have as much opportunity. Depending on which tuner and how aggressive the user wants it, you'll see different percentages. My tuner installed 9 Turbo kits, 2 being built later on. Out of 9, 3 of them went boom one went twice. The Vortechs have been way more reliable, only 1 let go out of i don't know how many they did, around 15-20.

 

Thank you!
You know, if the vortech did not sound like a banshee on crack, my FI desicions would be so much easier...

33% chance of a BOOM...
Kind of makes one a bit cautious of FI'ing stock block, doesn't it?

 

Yeah, one big thing that bugs me about the vortech is that loud annoying idle sound it has ... when its under full throttle it sounds awesome, and so does the BOV, but the idle is just too annoying IMO (from what I've heard in the videos).

 

From what I heard, the weird sound at the idle goes away if you bumpe the idle to about 800-900....

 

It seems some people get it worse than others.

 

S/c's stay in one piece because they make such low TQ, less stress on internals. Id put my $$$ a well tuned Vortech/ATI would last longer than any well tuned turbo kit.

 

The reason turbo setups blow up is because people get greedy. SIMPLE. Is no one listening? You are overpowering the rods.

Turbos are more efficent, true, but a S/C will still blow an engine no worries with the right pully.

 

If you can't stand the heat stay out of the kitchen, simple as that.

You can also argue that once you have that build motor and everything is tuned perfect what if you loose traction and hit the wall...400whp on a Z is hard to master and unless you track it there is no reason to have that much power.
There are so many could be's involved as long as you know the risks are are willing to accept them and prepare you'll be happy otherwise stay with a stock car

 

here's an opinion from a long time VR-4 (highly modded) owner and a new Z owner:

I'm interested in making a lot of power some day, but I will wait for further development from all of the tuners. 350-400WHP seems to be some sort of limit, where beyond that the number of problem experiences has increased greatly (not saying there are no problems below that power level either, ie: N/A motors blowing). For 400rwhp and no guarantees your motor will last, it's not worth it for me to go through the trouble right now.

However, if you've got the money and you're OK with everything you've read on this forum, I'd say go for it by all means.

Me? I'll sit back and watch the show.

 

Well, I think the bottomline is simply money. The more money you have the more risk you can take. I think most ppl going FI have enough spare cash to cover all expenses involved and really don't worry as much about blowing a motor. I just finished my TT setup and my FI journey starts today. If my motor blows this weekend I'll be really pissed but I planned on building the motor anyways and have money set aside just for that occasion. There's absolutely no way I'd go FI unless I had enough money to cover every worst case scenario.

 

Going FI on my G was a horrible investment. lol. I had my car tuned by Sam at GT with a pretty conservative tune @9psi for 406 rwhp on a greddy kit with Emanage ultimate and fuel return system.
Long story short, I bent all 6 rods and I'm getting my built shortblock engine done up there right now. I'm not sure if I wanna turn up the boost some more or just leave it alone. I know I need 550 or 650 injectors but I'm starting to doubt a built engine with stock heads will be able to handle all that power.
Sam said the engine could handle 15 psi but I don't think I wanna push that much. Does anyone know if i'll have issues at like 13 psi? And how much whp could I get out of it (realistically)?
I keep reading things about 'head lift' on built engines so I'm doubting turning up the boost. Maybe someone can chine in and help me out with these questions while Sam is outa town!

 

I was planning to run 12 psi on a built block. I thought this would be a good number. I was also going to do alot of research before I ever got to this point. I'm sure you could do the same.

 

ya that's what im trying to do too. I don't wanna turn it up 3 psi and get bigger injectors and retune everything just for another 60 hp though