I've never done it but I know it can be achieved (at a price). It depends on your budget, more Torque & BHP = more £$. A cheap way around it that may be good for 200BHP is using pistons from a 8v boxer engine which will bring the CR down to around 7.5:1. You could then use moderate psi to get good power. Anything more than 200 BHP and I doubt the stock bottom end and pistons would stand up, or the transmission.

Manifolds will be a big hurdle because I know of no one who has a ready made solution therefore its going to have to be purpose built = £$, unless you can fabricate yourself.

Your budget is the main constraint. With a large budget of say £15000 you could have 400BHP using ahmotorsports 2.0L conversion, low compress. pistons, EMS and intercooler and of course serious headwork. Don't know what you do about the gearbox though. You can do anything, all depends on your budget.

 

These cranks are only 3 main bearing, are pretty bullet proof but prob wouldn't allow for too much power I would imagine, although your biggest issue like modifying most engine's is the transmission, especially alfas, wait especially 33s ...

Cant remember where I found these pics, but i think this 1.7 i.e gets around in a sprint, fair f*cking exhaust manifold!

I didn't know you could get 2.0 out of these puppies!?

 

AH motorsports do indeed claim they can get 2L out of a 1.7L block - I reckon that is **** well near impossible unless they are creating new blocks from scratch as there just isn't much meat to bore out!

I really think turbo'ing an Alfa boxer isn't worth it, as London_Alfa already mentioned. You are far better off spending the money on handling and improving engine breathing.

I do have some literature that states that Alfa Romeo had actually started work on a 2L boxer engine when Fiat cut the project short in favour of the inline 4's that went into the 145/146/155's etc. Whether or not they built a unit with a 5 bearing crank is anyones guess (but probably not). Alfa really should have continued with the boxer series, they could have refined it a lot more and we wouldn't see so many **** Subaru WRX's on the roads

~Benjamin

 

To London Alfa:

Are you shure that 1.7 8v pistons will fit to 16v engine? I have such engine in my garage. My point is to gain about 220hp. I think it will be enough.

Tp hughqv: Maybe you have link about this engine build process ?

Thanks in advance

 

Those pics that hughqv sent are from a Finnish sprint and actually it's a 1.5 8v... We have a Finnish Alfa Romeo forum where the builder has told something about the project but I assume that you guys don't understand Finnish...

 

It'd likely be cheaper to buy a wrecked subaru wrx, with it's awd dif's, gearbox, and it's 5 bearing engine.

It would be way more reliable, probabably be cheaper to fit, and you'd have the off the shelf support for parts...

But then it wouldn't really be an alfa. But if you turbo a 16v engine, your going to be prone to breaking other bits, like gearboxes, especially with 4x4.

Also, depending on what 4x4 gearbox you have, whether it's from a permanent 4 or a quattro wagon, you could have more reliability issues, especially in the case of the former, with it's viscous being source from a fiat panda initially, its' already running nearly twice the power it was designed for.

And the quatrro wagon bits, containing a locked rear dif, road driving could be difficult..


lenus.

 

You can indeed use 8v pistons in a 16v engine. The block is exactly the same you see, only the head is different therefore the pistons are interchangeable.

With regards to the AHMotorsports 2.0l conversion it is genuine. The extra capacity is achieved by using a specially built crank which gives a longer stroke as well as larger pistons.

I think awesome things are achieveable through turbocharging a converted 2.0l 16v if done properly. As I said before it is the gearbox which is a big constraint. AH Motorport have achieved 260 bhp using a normally aspirated 2.0l 16v. Could even go with 2 turbos!

What is the most ammount of HP that any one has ever put through a 16v gearbox? Perhaps everyone should post the max they have ever put through one of these transmissions.

 

There is alfa rome sprint with 1.5 turbo engine. It seems he gain 180hp~ and using standart gearbox, just the clutch is custom.
Some links:
http://logic.no-ip.info/alfarom/html/projekt.html
http://logic.no-ip.info/alfarom/html/motor.html

 

That last installation was reasonably well executed, great work for a DIY job. But the unequal length headers may be an issue and it is not obvious if he has lowered the compression ratio. Also running boost through carburetors is probably asking for trouble - too much boost and you start blowing petrol out through the seals, and how about tuning?! Using carbs is probably asking for detonation unless he is running quite low boost.

What about supercharging? Has anyone seen a supercharger fitted to a 16V boxer? One issue I've heard with boosting the 16V is that pressue is lost through the seals where the Dellorto throttle bodies are.

The headers in the pictures that HughQV posted are a work of art!

~Benjamin

 

not a 16v but.. a fair rats nest at that.

 

Hm.. Intresting. How much I could boost the engine with 7.5:1 cr. I'm afraid the car will be not sensitive with acceleration with low boost and I can burn the pistons with big boost. I checked out all alfa's with turbo and it seems that all of them have 8:1 cr. What do you think about this?

 

I think Lenus is on the money here, lets face it WRX 5 bearing technology and jap reliability is a tough combination to beat!

 

Hi Guys,
I am looking for some advice, I was in the middle of building a turbo charged 16v engine for my 1985 built 33, when we discovered the chase wasn't up to the job. Now I was thinking if I have to get a new body, I should get the best possible one out there. I was wondering about the potential of the QV permeant 4's. Are these cars up to running high HP (200), how do they handle on tarmac, or am I best off going for a normal 16V.
Any thoughts?
Cheers Rueben

 

Best off going the normal 16v

the p4's are terrible at reliably putting down high hp.

lenus.

 

Hi Guys,
I am looking for some advice, I was in the middle of building a turbo charged 16v engine for my 1985 built 33, when we discovered the chase wasn't up to the job. Now I was thinking if I have to get a new body, I should get the best possible one out there. I was wondering about the potential of the QV permeant 4's. Are these cars up to running high HP (200), how do they handle on tarmac, or am I best off going for a normal 16V.
Any thoughts?
Cheers Rueben

 

My brother in law built a supercharged peugeot engine using a toyota supercharger which works very nicely. It's sitting in a 404 which has been modified from the ground up for this engine and the insane power it produces.

Getting back to the original question, 1.7 QV engine is probably a good candidate for the small supercharger and link ecu. It should be a simple matter to mount up and plumb in the supercharger and wire in the ecu. Given that this engine has a map sensor and lambda probe, throttle sensor, ping sensor and crank position sensor it should be relatively easy to tune with the link ecu. Boost is programmable so you could have as much or little as you wanted without needing to massively re-engineer the motor. Probably run the stock compression even with just a small amount of boost.

Could be a fairly straight forward mod. http://www.alfa-pages.co.uk/enginebaymp32.htm and a nice drive if the setup were conservative. Too much boost could be an unhappy experience trying to keep the wheels on the road. Can you get a limited slip diff for these things?

You might have seen this but if not, read on... http://www.alfasprint16v.fws1.com/index.html the perils of too much tweaking.

 

i rekon keiths on the money - the other advantage with supercharging is there is less risk of detonation, you can run higher compression and you keep low end torque

 

I've allready in the midlle of my 1.7 16v charged project. At first I was considering of getting turbo, but then I decided to intall a supercharger from MB slk. I decreased compresion rate til 8.8 by installing metal gaskets of 3mm tall. I think with a boost of 0.5 bar (or maybe even 0.7) we will have about 220hp and crazy torgue ;]

 

My experience on other engines is there will be massive torque and and as much power as you need but you will require a third party ecu to manage the blower. Resist overdoing it or be prepared for diff/gearbox rebuilds. I think standard compression is OK for low boost applications as drivability is maintained but torque increased.

Keep us posted on progress Active.

 

One of our friends has a Supercharged 1.7 16v IE race car, although it isnt running currently as it dropped a valve in september last year. it sure can be done! the main problem for him is getting the power down to the ground, the best setup for him is 16x10 racing slicks.

 

Is he a member of the Alfa club? It isn't the flying pizza box is it?

 

Yes thats the car. its a beast when its runnnig!

 

what kind of supercharger is he using ? **** clk supercharger is so big. It's very dificult to fit it under the hood..

 

"Flying Pizza Box"?

Pictures and clarification needed, thanks

 

Im only running here from personal opinion not solid fact, but i dont think the 16V shell is a very good start for any serious project. It looks great, but its not that stiff. I know when ours is jacked up its hard to open the doors. Granted mine has had a hard life, but friends cars exhibit similar symptons - one has shown me where a small amount of paint has cracked off from body flex on the track.

If you want to build a hot boxer I personally think a 2 door sud or sprint would be the ideal base. Espicially if its all apart a few bracing bars and/or cage would make for a strong, light shell which would be great for a high powered boxer engine.

I know its not Alfa but i cant beleive the torsional rigidity of my X19 Fiat. At the moment its just a shell undergoing resotration, and the other day i went to change the jackstands. I noticed that it was only sitting on 2 of the 4 jackstands (FR and RL) yet it was rocking between the two of them. It doesnt droop at all, and it doesnt even have a roof!

 

on another supercharged note a friend of mine at uni was involved in the buildup of a supercharged boxer for an open race car. I havnt seen the car driving, but have seen a video of the engine running and it looks amazing. Its running massive boost, somewhere nearing 20psi think and last time they tested it, it used 22 litres per hour of fuel at idle! Next time I see him I'll get him to sign up as a member here and maybe he can give some insight into this nuts boxer?

 

I had a similar experience with my Sud and jackstands, it sat stripped for several months and I noticed it was only using three of them and it never changed over those months....and yes the 33's do flex a bit and so too do Suds when jacked up, all that weight right up in the nose.
As for the Supercharged boxer guy - Jono, he was a regular Poster here on the BB, his name was KABOOM, haven't heard of him for a while now....be good to hear what hes up to with his boxer projects.