- For fans of the RB26 and the 2JZ, there are arguments that have raged
for years about which model's superior.
And when it comes to the import drag racing scene, the 2JZ seems to have a distinct
advantage with a number of teams already in the five second bracket.
We're here with Dom from Tony Rigoli Performance, who's trying to show that
the RB26 is still a stout competitor.
So let's get into this, the RB26, you're no stranger to that particular engine and
particularly in the street car world, we see some pretty stout examples
of both, for a start can you tell us why you think the 2JZ has kind of made
its way into the five second bracket so quickly?
- Yeah well I guess in America they've been running them for a long time and so there's
been a lot of development.
Whereas it's kind of the other way around in Australia, the guys, a lot more RBs
that people are playing with.
So yeah they are years and years ahead of us in that respect.
- In terms of the engines themselves, the RB26 obviously in stock form a 2.6
litre with twin turbos, not that that's meaningful when we start modifying them.
The 2JZ in stock form has a capacity advantage with 3 litres but again, when we
start modifying these engines, really there are no rules or limits so can you give
us a rundown in your own personal experience, where the pros and cons of maybe each lie?
- Yeah well I mean you've got to bring the capacity up on the RB26 to kind of make
it comparable.
I think boost for boost, a 2J to an RB, I don't believe there'd be a lot of difference.
But then again I could be wrong.
A lot of the guys are pushing the limits, pushing big boost, massive turbos
to get into that five second zone and we're sort of still heading that way.
- If we back things back to a sort of a more street level, I've got probably more
experience with modified RBs than 2Js but from my own angle, and this could be
somewhat controversial, I see that maybe the RB26 in stock form is a little bit more
fragile, there's certainly a few parts that are key that need to be changed if you want
to build a reliable RB26, do you think that's fair to say?
- Yeah that's correct, the blocks aren't, they're not strong, they crack,
so that's why you sort of go to a different block.
We still run the Nissan block but we run the RD which is a diesel block and it makes it
a lot stronger.
That's where we're getting the extra power from.
Now we want to get into this engine in a bit but one of the sort of elephant in the
room if you like has been that over the last few years we've seen more and more teams
go the billet route in terms of the engine block and certainly that seems to have been
one of the things that's made it so much easier for teams to make power reliably.
You've just mentioned you are still on the cast iron, albeit the RD block.
So where are the limits in terms of power in your opinion on that RD block,
at what point do you need to step to a billet block?
- Yeah we actually haven't found the limit yet so that's where we're sort of venturing now.
So we're already up to like 2150 horsepower on that cast engine.
Once we do a turbo change we want to try be at about the 2300, 2400.
And that's when we're going to find out how much more that block's got left in it.
- So where abouts are you now in terms of capacity with this engine?
- It's 3.2 litre.
- Is that about as far as you can realistically push it?
- You can get a 3.4 kit for them but you're sort of over stroking it a bit, I sort of
personally like the 3.2.
- And in terms of the engine internals to make it reliable at that sort of power level,
can you give us a bit of a rundown on what you've got there?
- Yeah well we run the spool crank and then I run my own piston and conrod combination.
They're not shelf parts, we've developed them over the last few years.
- Now the bottom end of the engine, really though is there to just support
the power realistically, it's the cylinder head and the turbocharger that really seem to
be the key to getting the performance out of these engines, regardless what engine
you're talking about.
Can you give us a bit of a rundown on the cylinder head package on the engine?
- Yeah well we run a Rams cylinder head, so it's CNC ported and then I run my own
custom grind camshaft in it.
All the valve train's Supertech, that's basically it so it's still pretty basic but probably the most
you can do to it without going to some crazy port design.
- And you mentioned 2100 horsepower, I assume that's at the wheels or at the hubs?
- At the hub yeah we're 2140.
- And what sort of boost pressure are you using to get that?
- 78 pound.
- So at that sort of power level, what's the sort of maintenance schedule on the engine,
in terms of how long do parts last at that sort of power level, what parts are needing to
be replaced to keep everything reliable?
- Yeah well this car's still too new so we're still ironing out bugs but when we used to
run this combination in the 300ZX, every third meeting we'd just drop the pan,
just have a quick look, if it needs bearings we'll put 'em in but sort of just stay on
top of that you know.
The rest of it's been pretty good, the block we did two full seasons with it before
we replaced it.
- When you're up at that sort of power level, that's actually pretty impressive reliability.
Now you just mentioned the 300Z so this chassis is new for you, this combination but the engine
itself has been run in a 300Z, can you just talk to us about the differences between the
300Z chassis and what you've got now with this 350Z?
Yeah the 300ZX was like an Australian built car and it was only a 3/4 chassis, still body.
- For those who aren't familiar with that term 3/4 chassis, can you give us a bit of an idea
of what that is relative to a full tube chassis?
- Yeah it's got all the bar work but in the front area of the car for the class,
it leaves all the factory chassis rails in the front and firewall and stuff like that,
whereas a full chassis like this car it doesn't have any of that.
You're not starting with a car, it's made up.
- So is the main advantage there weight with the full chassis car being lighter or are there
other advantages around the freedom of design of a full chassis car?
- That's what it is, the design, the bar work, the wheel base and then comparing that car
to this car, this car's American built and they do much better chassis than we do in
Australia.
- They've been doing it for a while now.
- Yeah that's correct.
- Alright the 300Z, what sort of ETs and mile an hour were you running in that?
- We finished up with a 6.60 at 220 mile.
- That's not shabby for a 3/4 chassis car.
Where do you see this going, obviously it's relatively early days with the 350Z,
is a five second pass possible with the RB engine in it?
- Yeah our goal is to try run a five, whether we're going to get there with it
or not, but I do want to try do it on the cast engine.
I believe that a 2J's done it in a cast, so we can go straight to the billet but
there's no challenge there for me to do that.
- I know a lot of people, rightly or wrongly will argue once you go to a billet engine,
is it really an RB or a 2J or whatever it happens to be so there's definitely a badge
of honour if you can do it with the cast engine.
Now you mentioned you're at 2100 horsepower at the hubs right now,
to step up, I mean obviously it's not just a case of winding more power in,
there's a lot more to it to get down to a five second pass but what sort of power level
do you anticipate you'd need to be at in order to get a five second pass?
- Well this car here, last meeting we had in it, it was on about 1800 horsepower,
it wasn't a clean run and it did a 6.62 at 213, now it's on 2140 horsepower, if we can
optimise that, there's no reason why it can't run a 6.2, 6.3 the way it is and then that's
when I think we're going to start looking for more power.
So we're not really going to start looking for more power until we're sort of in the
vicinity of that you know.
- And once you've sort of got some consistency around that 6.2, 6.3 area, I think it's probably
also reasonable to mention for our viewers that while it might sound, when you're only
2-3/10ths away from a five second well you're pretty close, it must be easy, bit there's a
world of difference between a 6.20, 6.30 and then a five second pass?
- Yeah well I think it's going to be easier for us to make the power than to apply it to
the track and actually tie it all in.
- Now I just want to talk about the rest of the car because you've just mentioned
making the power's one thing, getting it to the track is a completely different deal.
Starting with the drivetrain with the car, so what are you running in terms of a clutch
and a gearbox for this?
- So I run the Liberty five speed and I used to run, it was like an East West clutch.
- So this is a proper drag racing slider style clutch?
- Yeah like an adjustable.
Now we've gone to the EZ clutch with the air shifted Liberty so that's all new to us again.
- So again for those who aren't familiar, the air shifted Liberty is what's referred
to as a clutchless box so it's actually seamless so there's no need for a torque reduction
for the gearshifts?
- Yeah no there's none and now we're on a paddle shift so the shifts will be sharper.
My arm's getting a bit old.
- Is there an advantage in terms of ETs with the paddle shift versus actually
pulling a lever or is this just a case of being able to keep both hands on the wheel
for better driver control?
- Well you're not controlling it, the car drives itself so it's more consistency.
I guess if you're a little bit more fit then you can be on point.
- Now getting one of these cars to perform properly with an adjustable drag racing clutch
like you've just mentioned is really a lot of it is the clutch, getting the clutch set up
for the track and adjusting it between each pass.
So how much of a challenge is that and have you got a guy whose specific job is setting
up that clutch?
- Yeah one of my crew guys, we're both learning together as we go.
So he'll get in there and adjust it.
You're basically just adjusting it to bring it back to where you were to do your next pass
and then you sort of discuss, what changes do we need to make?
- So you're adjusting that clutch as well based on the track conditions as the track
changes during the day?
- Yeah but it's more like maintaining what you've got so 'cause it's a slider clutch and
it wears, you'll always need to bring it back to where it was and then you make
the adjustment so a lot of the times like in the old car, we had a setting that was,
you know we didn't very rarely play with but you are always chasing that perfect
clutch setting.
- Now we haven't talked about the electronics package in the car.
So what have you actually got controlling the engine and your data analysis et cetera?
- Yeah everything's controlled through an Emtron KV16.
And then we just run two MMW CDI boxes.
- So that CDI, that's capacitive discharge ignition?
- That's correct yeah.
- And what are you using for a driver display, is there anything in there?
- It has the Emtron dash as well.
- And you're using the Emtron as a central logging hub for all of your data?
- Yeah it runs everything, it's doing basically everything, just one unit, we plug into it.
- Perfect look been great to get some insight into the car there Dom.
Obviously still fairly early on, hopefully we get a good weekend this weekend and
look forward to seeing you push a little bit closer to those 6.20s, 6.30s.
If people want to find out more about TRP where can they go to?
- They can go to trpracing.com
- Perfect.
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