Ba Turbo. 'grenade' Engine. True Or Not?

[patrol_maverick]

Long story short;

I have bought a BA series 1 Barra turbo to put into a Nissan Patrol. I have to get the ECU flashed to make it a stand alone unit. I have been emailing a tuner about the ECU and have been informed that the BA engine is a 'grenade' particularly if you start modifying the exhaust before the cat and don't tune to compensate for it.

Is this the case, or is he just trying to sell me a tune? I'm a mechanic and I know there will be issues if it's ridiculously modified without a tune, but how sensative are these engines to minor changes? I thought they were reasonably bullet proof.

I won't be thrashing it. I'm building it for offroading and towing, so it needs to be reliable.

I plan on running a stock BA engine & turbo, stock tune, and an FG exhaust manifold & dump pipe (due to space restrictions), and most likely a single 3 inch exhaust and probably no cat.

So back to my question, Should I be worried about it being a grenade or not?

Edited 24/02/14 11:12 AM by patrol_maverick

[jacobmitchell92]

Will over boost without a cat and then go bang

[patrol_maverick]

Why will it overboost without a cat? I thought the boost was ECU controlled via a solenoid.

[gsd112]

dont know but it will. A mate put a 100 cell cat on his ba a few days before getting a tune and it was overboosting and going into limp mode. Got a tune and all good.

[matsfgxr6turbo]

These engines have a wastegate problem mainly wastegate is too small and once the cat and exaust is derestricted they generate too much exaust flow for the stock wastegate to handle which then causes a run away boost control issue witrh boost rising with rpm until the engine goes boooooooooooom!

[_Velocity_]

Get it tuned and it should be right mate. There's some good tuners in NSW. Money well spent and will be the icing on your turbo Barra cake.

[discostig]

The ECUs aren't like the jap ones that can tolerate wild boost changes for some reason. Limp mode or boom without a good tune in them.

There are stock bottom end BAs getting around these forums tuned by a couple of people that run big numbers, far more power than I am getting from my BFII...but they obviously know what they are doing and keep a close eye on things. Usually because they are smart and also tuning their own personal car.

[Boganspeed]

Aren't the early conrods made of cheese ?

I guess it's not a problem if you don't push it.

[discostig]

That's what makes them so impressive!

[Boganspeed]

And tasty