• Hello Guest, welcome to the initial stages of our new platform!
    You can find some additional information about where we are in the process of migrating the board and setting up our new software here

    Thank you for being a part of our community!

Andrewhans 240 LS Swap, Going for 8's

And the sum bitch blew up again lol. I made the mistake of cleaning the car, changing the oil and prepping the car for a track outting at Fayetteville again. Gonna put up pics soon.

Frustrating part is that I didn't change ANYTHING from the tune that I drive the car everyday. I put almost 1200miles on the engine last month alone beating the daylights out of it with big highway pulls, rolling burnouts and just having a good time. Take it to the track and the first pass off the trailer it goes 10.1@136mph while pedalling twice. The topend felt very weak and after reviewing the datalog I see I was pulling about 3.5 deg of timing due to MAT. Oil pressure was rock solid and perfect. I actually happened to glance at oil pressure in the middle of 3rd gear and was holding steady around 60psi.

Target timing was 14.5 but bc of air temps the engine was seeing only 11deg. 210deg air temps at the top of 3rd, 11.6-11.8 AFR, 21psi boost, 73% content rating. I'm leaning towards a combo of hot air, choked exhaust side and the d585 coils possibly starting to auto discharge. I should have held on to my last set of coils that worked without issue. This set came with the L33 and had almost 140k less miles on it so I figured they would be better to use.

I'm not blaming them but I am suspect of those coils. A good buddy of mine is going to send me a set of "dumb" coils to try and eliminate the chance of it happening again, if that was in fact happening, it's worth the effort to me for sure considering it's a free swap. I'm sending him my d585 coils to use on his wifes budget 4.8 s10. I'm also going to send off my injectors to Erik Derr to get flow tested and cleaned since they have now survived 2 engine failures.

Also have another engine on the way. Managed to find an 08 4.8 non VVT non DOD engine with 209k miles. Gonna leave the rest of the setup the same and step down in cubic inch to hopefully let the turbo work better. I loved my first 4.8 and am going to be excited to run another one.

Figured I'd update you all again lol. Doesn't seem to be many people watching though haha
 
Last edited:
Hole in the block. Found this within about 5 min of it being on the trailer.
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-XgdWzmq/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-XgdWzmq/0/5b4b6273/L/20191026_160408-L.jpg" alt=""></a>

A piston should be here
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-3ztCNBz/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-3ztCNBz/0/dafc5cd9/L/20191027_151838-L.jpg" alt=""></a>

Plug readings. E85, 11.6-11.8, timing was 14.5 deg but bc of high air temps 3.5 deg got pulled(210 deg at top of pull), 73% E content
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-stDmwFc/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-stDmwFc/0/79ae7599/L/20191027_141458-L.jpg" alt=""></a>

Wrist pin boss ripped out of piston
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-KHhrczr/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-KHhrczr/0/bf47e913/L/20191027_151830-L.jpg" alt=""></a>

Motor out and on stand, about 3hrs of work to get here
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-kNjRD3N/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-kNjRD3N/0/64dae008/L/20191027_140353-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
 
shoot, we watchin'.

so what intercooler core you gonna go with? what are you running right now?
 
shoot, we watchin'.

so what intercooler core you gonna go with? what are you running right now?

Currently running the vs racing 12x31x3. I think it's a 600hp core. I am WAY past the limits of the intercooler in all honesty. Based on boost, timing and air temps I think I was north of 750whp while on the highway and airtemps were cool, 22psi, 15deg, 11.7AFR. Currently there aren't funds for anything besides getting the car up and running again. I will force myself to keep the temps down by manageing the boost target. Probly going to set it and forget it at 18psi or so and just leave it alone.

I'm leaving the country for a minimum of 1 year starting in March and need the car driving and reliable so I don't need to worry about the shop that is going to be storing it for me.

While I'm gone though I will probly have them redesign the intercooler and fit a treadstone TR1245 intercooler in there. I may also have them adapt a gen 2 billet 7875 from VS Racing on there as well. The rest of the system I'm pretty happy with. It's a very responsive street setup.
 
Last edited:
Yikes. That reminds me, I need to figure out why my Goldbox MAT sensor always says exactly 70 degrees.
 
mm treadstone. I have a treadstone core in my v8 wagon, it does well but it's also a bit small (hindsight and what not), it still doesn't get really super hot. The ebay intercoolers seem to be more along the lines of about 3/4 what they're rated at, whereas the garret/treadstone/precision cores seem to be a little bit under rated.
 
So I managed to find another L33 in the junkyard. $120 for a complete shortblock L33. No real changes this time around besides switching to the "dumb" coils and upgrading the intercooler.

My buddy that runs a speedshop was able to get me a TR1245 Treadstone core at cost so I bit the bullet and purchased it. Can't wait to see this work of art in person. Going to need to cut a good amount out of the core support to make it fit but I'm going to do my best to get it to fit.
 
I've heard two different sides to the random discharge story. What's your dwell set at in the ecu? what's it saying in the datalogs going down the track?
 
3.5ms and a 1ms spark duration. I think they might have been getting weak and letting go early when they were approaching 4.5ms total time.

I also noticed on the batt voltage compensation it was adding 4% dwell between 13.3 and 12.0v

A few things combined may have lead to this in the ignition coils.

<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-mCX637j/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-mCX637j/0/bb30b063/L/20191110_083803-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
 
Love this car and the simplicity behind it. Can't wait to see that monster of an intercooler.

Thanks. Me too! I'd love to stop fixing the damn thing at this point haha. Hopefully this time I can enjoy it for the next 4 or 5 months before I go back overseas. Really dont want it to break again so I probly won't be putting it back in the 9's this year.
 
Thanks. Me too! I'd love to stop fixing the damn thing at this point haha. Hopefully this time I can enjoy it for the next 4 or 5 months before I go back overseas. Really dont want it to break again so I probly won't be putting it back in the 9's this year.

That's understandable, definitely need to enjoy it while you can. Are you PCSing or deploying?
 
3.5ms and a 1ms spark duration. I think they might have been getting weak and letting go early when they were approaching 4.5ms total time.

I also noticed on the batt voltage compensation it was adding 4% dwell between 13.3 and 12.0v

A few things combined may have lead to this in the ignition coils.

<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-mCX637j/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-mCX637j/0/bb30b063/L/20191110_083803-L.jpg" alt=""></a>

drop your dwell to 3 and discharge time to like .5
I'm not really convinced that was your issue though, a lot of the guys that really had problems with it were running much higher dwell
 
drop your dwell to 3 and discharge time to like .5
I'm not really convinced that was your issue though, a lot of the guys that really had problems with it were running much higher dwell

I agree for sure that these aren't aggressive settings by any means really. The main reason I'm suspect of them is because my last set of d585 coils, 367k miles, prior to this worked flawlessly and as soon as I switched to this set, 220k miles, that came with the damaged L33. I've had ignition issues almost the entire time with those coils. Mainly under bigger boost numbers, 18+ psi. Problems I never had with the original set of d585 coils.

Plan moving forward is to install the set of square truck coils I got from 73amc in exchange for my heat sink coils. Gonna turn up the dwell to 4.0ms and leave the 1.0ms ignition time. My thinking for that is the square coils are weaker but won't self discharge so I will try and make up the ignition energy with a SLIGHTLY longer dwell period than the d585 coils had. I think 4ms is still well within the realm of a safe dwell period. I've read about max effective dwell being around 4.8ish ms. Over that there wasn't a measurable increase in spark energy.

I am curious as to the rational of dropping the discharge time from 1.0ms to 0.5ms? Honestly interested in the reason there.
 
Last edited:
I agree for sure that these aren't aggressive settings by any means really. The main reason I'm suspect of them is because my last set of d585 coils, 367k miles, prior to this worked flawlessly and as soon as I switched to this set, 220k miles, that came with the first L33. I've had ignition issues almost the entire time I've had this recent set of coils on the car. Mainly under bigger boost numbers, 18+ psi. Problems I never had with the original set of d585 coils.

Plan moving forward is to install the set of square truck coils I got from 73amc in exchange for my heat sink coils. Gonna turn up the dwell to 4.0ms and leave the 1.0ms ignition time. My thinking for that is the square coils are weaker but won't self discharge so I will try and make up the ignition energy with a SLIGHTLY longer dwell period than the d585 coils had. I think 4ms is still well within the realm of a safe dwell period. I've read about max effective dwell being around 4.8ish ms. Over that there wasn't a measurable increase in spark energy.

I am curious as to the rational of dropping the discharge time from 1.0ms to 0.5ms? Honestly interested in the reason there.

I'll have to dig around and look, I forget why the discharge time is even really an option, it had something to do with older coils iirc
 
Got the new intercooler in with some trimming. Decent option for the high powered redblocks/whiteblocks/LS's out there if you don't want to move the radiator or intercooler location.

Treadstone TR1245 Intercooler

<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-NcG2cKP/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-NcG2cKP/0/040c0ec5/L/20191116_150359-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-zXw2BD5/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-zXw2BD5/0/4b04b176/L/20191116_150442-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-8r9cVv8/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-8r9cVv8/0/5ff88ede/L/20191116_190321-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-kQrXvPJ/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-kQrXvPJ/0/3514ac87/L/20191116_190348-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-G8Qw5SP/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-G8Qw5SP/0/b9f180b6/L/20191117_114959-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-CjW3TjB/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-CjW3TjB/0/79eedbf5/L/20191117_115006-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-g8MWKH5/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-g8MWKH5/0/57d227a0/L/20191117_115018-L.jpg" alt=""></a>

Also had a final message for the engine before I set it in its new home lol
<a href="https://andrewwurdinger.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-Ps45XjG/A"><img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/Volvo-Project/i-Ps45XjG/0/630edcc4/L/20191117_112937-L.jpg" alt=""></a>
 
Last edited:
Back
Top