Transcription
Now, two to three years ago, I made a video on how to make XYZ horsepower on your WRX and STI. And a lot has changed since then. I made that video prior to Cobb's Green Speed changes, and a lot of other tuning changes that have come out since then. And this video has been highly requested from a ton of people to make an updated version post Green Speed. So that's what we're going to be doing today.
This video is going to cover how to do 300, 350, 400, 450, and 500 wheel horsepower in a WRX or STI EJ base. And this is opinions aside. I know some of you guys are still salty with Cobb. This is opinions aside. Cobb had to do a crackdown because of EPA shenanigans going on. An Accessport is what you would buy as the consumer, plug into your car, and you can flash maps on it and read data and everything like that. On the tuner side of things, they have a program called Access Tuner, and Access Tuner is what is used to build the maps that are then put on the Accessport and then flashed onto the car. So Access Tuner prior allowed tuners to be able to remove O2 sensor codes, TGVs, air pumps, evap, all of the emissions compliant things.
In this video, we're going to cover a couple different tuning options. As going through this, stock ECU ref flashes, which is going to be your Cobb Accessport, your ECU Tech, things like that. You've got open source, and we also have the standalone route. So as always, modify your car at your own risk. If it blows up, it's not my fault. If you decide to do any of these modifications, something happens, it's not my fault. It's all on you. Assume risk, assume liability. Be the ball. Be the ball.
Let's get into the 300 wheel horsepower range. We're going to start out in this category and just work our way up. So this is going to be using a stock turbo, stock VF52, stock VF48, stock VF39, any real EJ-based turbo. The TD04s on the older cars may not meet this, so you might want to look into a VF39, VF48. So for tuning, Accessport still totally usable at this power level. Accessport, open source is what I would suggest you use, or even ECU Tech if you wanted to go that route. There's no need to look into standalone options at this point or anything like that.
So ref flashing the stock ECU, you're totally fine at 300 wheel. For an intake, I would suggest the Cobb SF intake with the box. If you are going to go to an alternative intake, try to get one with a box if you can. It will actually reduce your IATs a decent bit by keeping out all the hot air that's in the engine bay and not just heat soaking your intake. You don't want a boost controller. And to be honest, every boost controller you buy for the most part from any manufacturer are all the same. They all come from MAC. MAC valves. Cobb, Grimmspeed, Comp 23s is one of them that is not a MAC valve that I understand at this point. They have like an anti-surge crazy one, but for the standard like 3-4 boost controller, they're all going to come from the same parent company, MAC. So just pick, pick whatever one is the cheapest, pick whatever one you want.
Here's where things change quite a bit. You're going to need a downpipe. And Cobb used to be the go-to for catted downpipes on these cars. If you want to go catless, you can go catless, but good luck trying to find a tuner. A lot of tuners won't touch emissions deleted vehicles anymore, but if you can find one, so be it. From what I understand, the EPA requires there to be the same amount of catalytic converters in a downpipe as they came with from factory. Subaru came with two. What you're kind of left with from what I have seen, um, is TurboXS. They make a catted downpipe, as well as Nvidya. Now keep in mind, the Nvidya and the TurboXS do not use GESI G-Sport catalytic converters. So you still may throw a P0420 code for catalytic converter efficiency. Uh, you can also go the route of having a custom downpipe made with a G-Sport cat. I have noticed that the G-Sport cats do not throw P0420s often. They will every now and then, but they do not throw them the frequency that lesser quality catalytic converters would. So I'm going to say a catted downpipe. You can also look on Facebook Marketplace for used ones, such as Grimmspeed, old ones, Cobb, old ones. There's a handful out there still. Whatever catback you want for the car, single exit, quad exit, dual exit, side exit, hood exit. I, I wouldn't do hood exit, but pick whatever catback you want. And then lastly, for this power goal, I would obviously suggest this on most cars, either an IAG air oil separator or a quality catch can setup. Radium makes some really good catch can setups as well that I, I actually use one on the RX7. Um, I've used them on a couple cars in the past. So that's going to wrap up the three. Obviously, a tune. A tune is going to go with all of these. I don't feel like I need to say that, but obviously, yes, you are going to need a tune for all of this.
So that's really going to wrap up kind of the 300 wheel horsepower range. Um, that's still keeping all emission stuff. As we go through this, you will be retaining emissions equipment. Um, if you choose to go open source or you choose to go standalone, you may remove those at your own will. Just keep in mind if you have a state inspection, a visual inspection, or they go to scan the car, you may end up failing.
So, 350 wheel horsepower. This is where things change a little bit. We're mainly just going to add on to that list we had. So to go over it again, tuning options, pick whatever you want. You're still fine on an Accessport. You can open source, you can go standalone if you want at this power level, but there's really not a need for it. Uh, that Cobb SF intake with box or equivalent intake. You get the Grimmspeed one with a box, whatever one you want, just make sure you get an intake with a box. You're going to get that three-port boost controller. Cobb, Grimmspeed, MAC, doesn't matter. They're all made by MAC. Kind of downpipe, like I said, Facebook Marketplace, find a used one. Nvidya, make your own, um, or that TurboXS is another option. Whatever catback you want. The IAG air oil separator. Again, this is where things change. We're going to add a fuel pump on this one. So you're going to want an AEM 340 LPH fuel pump. This will be fine on Flex Fuel and on pump gas for this power rating. You were not going to need to do any of that, and this should just be a drop-in pump. You do not need to hardwire it at this point. Top mount intercooler. Grimmspeed, ETS are really good options. If you find another one that you like, just get an upgraded top mount intercooler. At this point, you can totally make 350 wheel on a stock STI top mount if you choose to, but just for efficiency reasons, it's not a bad idea to upgrade that intercooler.
For this power level, I would suggest you get, if you don't already have one, an OEM STI bypass valve. And what you're going to do is you're going to put it in a vice and you're just going to crush it a little bit, just to put a little bit more tension on the spring that is inside of that bypass valve. That will help it to hold more boost. If you do not want to buy a bypass valve at this point, if you do not want to crush your OEM one a little bit, you can go ahead and buy a bypass valve. Cobb, Perrin, Grimmspeed, get whatever one tickles your fancy. Go ahead and install it on your new fancy top mount intercooler and you'll be good to go there. If you have a WRX, I would highly advise you swap it out though, cuz you have a plastic one. I wouldn't, I wouldn't use the plastic one unless you have an old WRX and it is a metal one.
ID 1050x is if you have a side feed car. I would highly suggest you run a side feed to top feed conversion kit. Or if you already have top feed, obviously use top feed fuel injectors. There's no sense in you upgrading a side feed injector to a bigger side feed injector because if you want to make more power later, you're going to go to a top feed anyway. So 1050x injectors, top feed. If you're already side feed, convert it over to top feed. You don't want to swap out your up-pipe at this point. I would suggest Grimmspeed, Perrin, whatever brand up-pipe you want. This is going to be an internally gated up-pipe. So there's no need to go to an external gate at this point. The older WRXs and some like Legacies and Outbacks and whatnot had catalytic converters in the up-pipes, and when that catalytic converter ultimately dies because it will, it's going to send catalytic converter material through your turbo, and you do not want that. If you have an STI or a newer car, you're not going to have a cat in the up-pipe, but at this point, it's still a good opportunity to swap it out.
And then lastly, you're going to want a turbocharger. My pick for 350 wheel is going to be an FP Blue. You can get the standard size. There's no, no need to go to the 10 cm yet unless you really want to or you're planning for more power in the future, but an FP Blue will get you there, no problem. Turbo inlet, at this point, to a Perrin 2.4 inch silicone or a Samco or whatever tickles your fancy for turbo inlet, just get a silicone one. I guarantee you, if you're already doing these modifications, it's probably a higher mileage car and your stock turbo inlet is probably already deteriorating where it makes up to the turbo. New spark plugs, baby. NGK 239s, one-step cooler plugs. You want to get those swapped out. IAG oil pan. So some people are going to say, why not Killer B? Why did you swap to IAG? And if I mention companies in this, this isn't to throw shade at any companies. This is from my personal experience building hundreds of these cars at this point to tell you what, what products I use for these power levels. At this, for an oil pan, I have seen frequent cracks in baffling on the Killer B pans. They are still a good pan, but if you ever go to take that pan off, you're probably going to see the baffling on the inside where it's welded to the pan cracking. Now you can go and reweld it later on. Um, however, I would just get the IAG pan. The baffle literally bolts into the oil pan itself, so you're not going to have to stress any cracking. And that's obviously going to be with the oil pickup and the windage tray as well. Coil aluminum radiator. It's literally what we use in all the cars. I've got one in my 2.5 RS here that we're STI swapping. Good radiator. The stock ones are plastic, so you'll probably see the end tanks start to wear and crack over time. I would also consider adding in an AEM oil pressure gauge as well as an AEM AFR gauge, so that way you can monitor your oil pressure and your AFRs as you're driving.
Now we get to move into the fun 400 wheel horsepower range. This is where I raise a red flag for you guys on stock engines. Can you push your stock engine farther? Obviously, yes. Have I done it? Obviously. Have many others? Yes. A lot of people have done it. It can be done. If you're looking for reliability out of the car long-term, I would suggest you start looking into a built motor. Um, even RA blocks. I mean, anything. People are going to yell at me. Personally, what I send an RA block past 400 horsepower? Yes, I would. It's not a big deal for me to swap out my own engine. I do them all the time. It would take me a day. For somebody who doesn't want to have to go back in here and do this multiple times, I would advise you start looking into a built motor at this point. But that is entirely going to be up to you.
Going back over some of the same stuff as before is applicable. Tuning options, whatever you want. Open source, Accessport, both are still fine at this power level. If you're doing any heavy driving, track driving, it might be a good idea to start looking into a standalone at this point, so that way you can get some more control and safeties in the engine. For the intake, I still suggest the Cobb SF with the airbox. You can look into other options if you want. That is just my go-to. Actually, I have one right over there for another car. Then have build boost controller, whatever one you're feeling, whatever catback you want. The IAG air oil separator or a good quality catch can. Fine on an AEM 340 LPH fuel pump at this point for Flex or pump gas. Pump gas, you'll be totally fine. For, uh, for turbo on this one, we're going to go with an FP Blue with a 10 cm upgrade, an FP Green, a BB500, or a BCP turbo. Any of those options are really good options to get you to the 400 wheel horsepower range.
This is where your injectors are going to differ. If you're planning to do this on pump gas, ID 1050s will be totally fine. If you're going to be doing this on Flex Fuel, you're going to want ID 1300s. Now, with Flex Fuel, if you're using Cobb, though, it's not going to work. So at this point, if you're going Flex, I wouldn't use Cobb. I don't think Cobb has come out with the next-gen Flex Fuel setup yet. For, I know they do for the newer cars. If you have a VA or 2015 plus, I think it's actually 08 plus STI or an 08 to 14 WRX, I believe they have a next-gen Flex Fuel sensor kit out. You can get that and it'll work. If you have an older Subaru, um, like 02 to 07, technically if you want to include WRX, I would probably look into IBR and like maybe open source or something along those lines. You're going to want fuel rails at this point. I would get IAG, um, Radium, Cobb, whatever fuel rail tickles your fancy. Process West, whatever fuel rails you're like, damn man, I like these fuel rails, I'm going to get these fuel rails. I like these fuel rails, get those fuel rails. You are going to be doing fuel lines at this point in your engine bay only. You're going to be doing -6 feed and return in the engine bay coming off of the hard lines that are up in the corner. You're going to route all your feed lines and those are going to go to your fuel pressure regulator, which is going to be an Aeromotive A1000. It's a quality air, it's a quality fuel pressure regulator that's not crazy expensive and it works vastly well. And at this point, you can, you can set up your fuel system in series or parallel. It's not going to make too much difference on power. Personally, my preference is parallel, but you can do series if you want. Parallel is the fuel line's going to come out from the firewall, it's going to go into the engine bay, it's going to go to a Y, then you're going to have two lines coming off that Y feeding each rail, and then you're going to have a return off of each line going to your fuel pressure regulator, and then your fuel pressure regulator is either going to go to a Flex Fuel sensor or it's going to go back into the hard line in the engine bay to return that fuel to the tank. So either option will be fine.
At this point, this is where I'd advise you go to something like a front mount intercooler, like this. This is a Perrin front mount intercooler. Uh, you can do Perrin, ETS, Cobb, Grimmspeed, whatever you want. Uh, for core thickness, if you're planning to make more power in the future, I'd get like a 3 and a half inch, four inch core. If you're going to stay at that 400 wheel horsepower range and you find a good deal in like a 3 inch, a 3 inch core will be totally fine. You are going to want an exhaust manifold. ETS, Killer B, Grimmspeed. My preference is either the ETS or the Killer B. Both of them work just fine, and if you want to make more power later, those headers will do it. The Grimmspeed is an interesting one. It's an equal length, unequal length design, and it sounds good. It's good material. I've used it before. Quality header. Would consider doing a hybrid speed density if you want to at this point. It's cheap enough. That is where you take the temperature reading and you move it from the intake to the intercooler, so that way you're actually getting true and more accurate readings, and you still have the reliability of being able to use a MAP sensor on a daily driven car, which I'm assuming you're still going to be daily driving. For that, you can get Visconti Tuning or iWire. Both of them will work, or you can build your own. You don't even have to buy a kit. You can buy an IAT sensor, weld in the bung, and then just wire yourself. It's two wires.
Now we talked about this one. You are going to need a clutch at this point. The ACT HDSS, HDSS would be my suggestion with a stock resurfaced flywheel. Wheel. You can go to a lightweight flywheel if you want, however, stock one will get you there also. Uh, that Grimmspeed Perrin up-pipe, that Perrin 2.4 inch silicone inlet, the bypass, do Cobb tuning, Grimmspeed, those NGK 2309 spark plugs, the coil aluminum radiator, the AFR and the AEM gauges, or the AFR and the oil pressure gauges are good additions.
Welcome to the 450 wheel horsepower. We're here to make some sauce. So at this point, built motor. I'm telling you, do it for reliability's sake. You, you can talk to a builder for your needs. You can order one online. If you want to build your own, a quick little build breakdown for a DIY engine if you want to build your own: OEM STI nitrated crankshaft, Manley H-tough connecting rods or Brian Crower rods have been my go-tos, King P-Max rod and main bearings, Manley 8.5 to 1 sport compact pistons. For cylinder heads, a set of GSC S1 cams, Brian Crower stainless steel springs with Ti retainers, or you can do GSC, uh, GSC valve stem seals. JE Pro Seal head gasket will be totally fine at 450 wheel. ARP 2000s or 625 Plus.
For tuning options, I would consider standalone if you're going to be beating on the car, tracking, anything like that. Some really good, they have really good affordable Link ECU options. They've got Mtron. You can get a Haltech Elite 1500 for deals because they're phasing out a lot of the Elite Series and moving over to the Nexus and the R line. Like this car has an R3 in it now. You can still use an Accessport at this point if you want to, or open source tuning. If you do opt to go with a new computer, you can do some of those free range things that we talked about earlier.
All right, for modifications, I'm going to blast through the stuff we've already talked about. Cobb SF intake, Cobb, Grimmspeed three-port boost controller, uh, catted downpipe or catless depending on what you're using the car for. If it's off-road, uh, whatever catback you want. IAG AOS or a catch can. I would swap that AEM 340 out for a Walbro 450. You can use a stock hanger. If you have an older car like this, if you don't, you can get something like this, which is a Radium dual hanger, which is never a bad investment because you can put two fuel pumps in that one. Or in some cars, you can do three or four or whatever the crazy amount is. But the Walbro 450, if you have an older one, you can retrofit the stock hanger to make it work. If not, I would look into something like that. FP Green with a 10 cm upgrade or an FP Black would be my turbo suggestions on this one. ID 1300s for Flex, plus an IBR Flex Fuel sensor kit like we talked about earlier. Uh, the fuel rails, IAG, Cobb, Radium, -6 fuel lines. I would probably do them in parallel at this point. Uh, Aeromotive A1000 fuel pressure regulator. ETS, Perrin, Grimmspeed, Cobb for intercooler, exhaust manifold. ETS or Killer B would really be my suggestion here. A hybrid speed density conversion. iWire, Visconti Tuning. Uh, ACT XDS clutch. This time it will hold a little bit more torque than HDSS will, and you're not sacrificing really any drivability from the HDSS over to the XDS. We are going to look into external wastegate options. PLM still makes an external wastegate up-pipe. You're going to want their 38mm option with a TiAL 38mm external gate. For blow-off valve, you can get whatever you want. You can go full speed density at this point, without any issues. Run hybrid speed density, either, either option will work. Um, you can run either a bypass valve or a blow-off valve at this point. Most people really choose to go blow-off valve. My personal favorite is the TiAL Q, but you can get whatever one sounds the best. You are going to want the 3.3 inch FP inlet or the 3 inch BBR hard inlet for your turbo inlet this time. Uh, 8mm phenolic spacers will help get that fitment a little bit easier under the manifold. NGK 20309 spark plugs. Coil radiator. Fluid damper crank pulley is one that I would consider at this point, especially if you're opting to do a built motor. I would highly suggest just getting the fluid damper. AEM AFR gauge, AEM oil pressure gauge, and that should comfortably get you in the 450 wheel horsepower range without really any issue.
Now jumping up into the 500 wheel range. It's going to be everything from the 450 with a couple changes. Same, same thing. You're going to want built motor again. I'll, you can go back in the video if you want, go look at those recommendations I gave you. Uh, for tuning options, I would probably get away from Cobb if you can. I'd get away from open source if you can, and I'd probably go to something like a plug-and-play Link ECU, a Haltech, an Mtron, something else that gives you a little bit more control. Now, can you still do all this on a Cobb Accessport? 100%. Yeah, you, you still still can without any issue. I've started leaning towards having more control over the car with standalone. I mean, at this point, I think I have a standalone in all of the cars. This one's got an R3, the RX7 has an Elite 2500, the other STI has, uh, an R5. So I mean, I, I mean, I like my house intake at this point. Get whatever you want. You can stick with the Cobb SF with the box. I, I still, I would still use the Cobb SF with the box. I like that intake. Catted or catless downpipe depending on what your computer options are. Uh, three-port boost controller. IAG AOS or catch can. Like we talked about, at this point, I would highly suggest you get the Radium dual hanger. They have this version for 08 plus or 08 to 21 STI, 08 to 14 WRX, and then I actually have one of the Radium ones for this car, um, which is a different style than that, but it will still allow you to run two Walbro 450s, 525s, 535s. Um, you're going to need it. You're going to want it. FP Black, 10 cm upgrade. This is the turbo. This is my turbo of choice on this. I, the FP Black has been my favorite stock location turbo out there, for response, for fitment, for power band. It's an, it's an awesome turbo. Highly suggested. If you are on an aftermarket computer or you are not using Cobb, I would advise you get an AMS intake manifold at this point. Um, it gives you a lot more. I don't have an engine in here. It gives you a lot more clearance, um, to be able to get an inlet under the manifold to the turbo without having to struggle. If you are still using a stock manifold, like we mentioned, those 8mm phenolic spacers will help you fit all of that under the manifold a little bit better. ID 1700 fuel injectors is what I would be using here. Um, if you're using Flex, if you're on pump gas, you can still do 500 wheel on pump gas with ID 1300s without issue. We did 460 on an FP Black on 1300s at like 70% injector duty cycle, and it had more head room in it, but we stopped there. That was a stock engine car. Fuel rails, IAG, Cobb, Radium. The, the feed and return lines, -6 engine bay only. Parallel is what I would do for that setup. Aeromotive A1000 fuel pressure regulator. Front mount intercooler, ETS, Perrin, Grimmspeed, Cobb. Exhaust manifold, get whatever one you're, you're feeling. The hybrid speed density or full speed density from iWire or Visconti Tuning. The ACT XDS clutch will still be fine at this power level. That PLM external wastegate, 38mm up-pipe with a TiAL 38mm external wastegate. That's going to be the MVS, I believe. The TiAL Q blow-off valve or whatever one you're feeling. The BBR 3 inch hard inlet, hard inlet, or the 3.3 inch FP soft inlet. The NGK 20309 plugs. Gap those down. Talk to your tuner what they want you to gap them to. Um, gap those down. The coil radiator, the fluid damper crank pulley, and the oil pressure and the AFR gauge. So that should be able to get you to these power levels, whatever power level you're shooting for, no issue at all. I've used most of these setups on my own personal cars and customer cars in the past, and they've all proven very efficient. I mean, we had my 07 STI on pump gas and Flex, on Flex Fuel, we had a BB500 turbo in that car, and I think we did like 430 wheel horsepower. We did stock motor pump gas, FP Black, and my 05 STI did 460 wheel on that. I mean, I've used a ton of these options on a ton of cars in the past. And even like my hatch, my old WRX hatch when it was Green Speed compliant, and that car, what we did like 440 or something. Might have been a little bit less. That's a JB400 car. We did four, it was a high fours or something like that. So these setups do work. I will say, if you are curious on any of this stuff and you already have a tuner in mind, it never hurts to talk to your tuner. The lists that I give you guys is from my perspective. These are proven lists that we've used in the past and we know work.
So with that, I hope that I hope that helps you guys are not completely limited and restricted on tuning options. There are tips and tricks you can do to still be totally fine. So with that, that's all I got for you guys on this one. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about this, please feel free to drop them down below. So with that, if you like the video, you know what to do about it. Hit that like button. Turn it black, blue, green, yellow, purple, silver, and whatever color it turns for you. But the color of the day is blue for this little turd, which I got to get back on and build the fuel system for this car. If you're not subscribed and you want to be, I will put it in one of these corners. And with that, I will catch you guys in the next one. So peace out, homies. Woo. [Music]