breathegood

I haven't looked too deep into the cost of parts alone, but I recently got a quote from my tuner: parts + labor to install and tune is ~$5600 (N/A, rods, pistons, stock crank rebalanced, arp main and head studs). I think this works out to close to $3000 in labor and tuning. If you want a stoker, crankshafts can get as expensive as you are willing to pay.

MachineHead155

Well I've always known there is a risk. The engine doesn't even have to be FI. I've seen NA motors go up in smoke (though that usually only happens when the owner is severely beating up the engine).

My question is, how HIGH are the chances? Has anyone come on to this board and complained about grenading their engine at the power level I'm looking to make? If so, was it caused by a bad tune or something else? Have you personally seen anyone or known anyone who blew their engine even at below 450rwhp?

I'm just trying to get down to the nitty gritty on how much of a risk I'm really taking. Obviously I'll have a back up plan should something go wrong. But I still want to do everything that is humanly possible to avoid such a massive headache such as a blown engine. Yes there will always be a risk, but some risks are worth taking just to have a little fun. Am I right?

Brenspeed, I sent you a message.

Riptide

There aren't any statistics out there if that is what you're looking for.

I saw a post from JDM mentioning they had an s197 blow up on their dyno at 360whp. There is a risk, noone knows exactly how big of a risk it really is.

Obviously having a good tune helps. There is a limit regardless of how good the tune is. Mechanical things have physical limits and you can only put so many psi through a stock engine pretty much no matter what. Some people are unlucky and get an engine that just can't take much. Others have ones that seem to put up with a lot more power.

It's a roll of the dice, at least up to a point.

BruceH

......

MachineHead155

Just so everyone knows I've made a final decision. That decision is that I'm going to save up for a couple more years and get my engine stroked right off the bat. It just seems too damn risky. I'd probably be looking at a bill twice as high if a rod is thrown through the block as opposed to just forging from the get-go.

I won't have time to call around until this weekend to see what I'm looking at in terms of labor, but the general consensus seems to be that labor will be around $3000 give or take and the stroker kit itself will be about $2000 with a grand total of roughly $5000. Does anyone disagree?

breathegood

You might get away with $5000 if you source the parts yourself at exceptionally good prices. The $5600 quote my tuner gave me didn't include a new crank, which you will need if you are going to go the stroker route. I would probably budget more like $6500 to get it done right. Maybe more depending on what crank you and your tuner think is best for your application. There are always incidental costs that really add up. If you manage to pull it off for $5000, apply the leftover towards heads.

FWIW, getting to know your tuner and finding out what he recommends given your ultimate power goals is the smartest thing you can do. Just make sure you find someone with lots of experience working on similar cars. Internet forums provide a wealth of information, but can't really give you anything more than sympathy when something goes wrong. A good tuner will be able to get you going again.

Riptide

I have to admit I've read enough reports around here and elsewhere of blown engines w/boost (even just 10psi or less) that it's kinda given me the heebeegeebees.

dysan

The best advise I can give from just having my stock motor bored, forged and stroked is get the estimate/quote in writing and signed/dated. I went into my build expecting around $6-7k and it ended up over $11k and with other things that needed replacing it's over $13k now.

If I were to do it again I would just buy a shortblock rated for what I need.

MachineHead155

Seriously though. Buying a short block and having it installed professionally would probably be A LOT more expensive. Not including the price of the block, how much would labor be? Around the same? More?

ShaneM

Woudln't the short block be cheaper, your shop will have to do all the same things to the short block he would have done to the other motor, he just won;t have to replace the bottom end, pistons and such, or am I completely off. You can get the ford racing forges aluminator SB for boost for like $4k according to some of the guys around here and livernoise has a stroker short block for right at 5k. Hell i talked to livernoise about doing an entire engine for me ready to drop in the car when it got here and the bill was like 13k with stage 2 heads timed and new covers.