lost in canada
Member
any one seen or done a duramax boat. any suggestions or ideas
duramax on a boat
- Thread starter lost in canada
- Start date
i built a duramax boat. only one i know of besides the two previously mentioned. did a thread on here some time ago and lots of naysayers poo pooed it as a viable power plant. a while back there was a big thread on here documenting thrust numbers from various setups. i have thrust tested this boat, and i am aware of the differences between measuring devices, suffice it to say, it compared with the top numbers in that test. fuel economy is double that of the big block i had before. i'm from wisconsin but run it mostly in manitoba for duck hunting. it's been an awesome setup.
crowhater
Well-known member
I looked into building a Diramax boat for some time but turned from the idea because of the issue of finding a stand alone wiring harness. The factory harness is slaved to the transmission and everyone wanted a small fortune for a stand alone set up. As far as tuning I can do that my self, I purchased HPtuner software for tuning my C6 and it also works on Duramax. I have been toying with tuning on my own Duramax truck and have surpassed the levels of my PPE tuner. They have also made great strides in engine modifications on the Duramax such as head work, cam shaft, etc. I have seen with my own eyes a duramax that can turn 4000+ RPM and hold together at those levels. The other issue is the high EGT levels when turbo boost increases but this to has been tackled. You can use a bigger inner cooler, or a CO2/N2O spray bar system, or water/Meth injection. A factory LLY duramax engine can run sustained at 600hp and 1000# of torque with a few minor modification and a proper tune.
Just a couple years ago it was said you could not haul a load with the PPE tuner set at level 5 because of EGT temps but I do it all the time. Gone are days of being stuck in traffic while hauling my airboat because it would take to long to get around slower cars. My truck will pull my boat as fast as I care to haul it. I love the advances we are seeing in the diesel world.
Just a couple years ago it was said you could not haul a load with the PPE tuner set at level 5 because of EGT temps but I do it all the time. Gone are days of being stuck in traffic while hauling my airboat because it would take to long to get around slower cars. My truck will pull my boat as fast as I care to haul it. I love the advances we are seeing in the diesel world.
Yes I concur that the most daunting first task was the wiring harness. Using the service manual schematic I was able to make it run using efi live tuning software.
The e.g T's were an issue at first, but utilized a bigger turbo, different exhaust manifold, and some work on the up pipes, and exhaust, was able to manage egt's without injecting anything.
The e.g T's were an issue at first, but utilized a bigger turbo, different exhaust manifold, and some work on the up pipes, and exhaust, was able to manage egt's without injecting anything.
crowhater
Well-known member
duckyager said:
This is a 10.5 car that I helped a friend work on. It started with a SBF and a 116mm turbo and we swapped that out for a 598 BBF and a 119mm turbo. It made 2700hp at 16 pounds of boost. His best time was a 4.5 sec 1/8 before a guy made him a cash offer he could not pass up. Making the power and tuning was pretty easy, the hard part was trying to put the power down on a 10.5 tire.
A big turbo like this would really pull your EGT temps down but the spool up would be slow until you got some load on the engine.
I think a smaller twin turbo set up like this one we put on a Camaro would do a better job. The whole kit ran 10k but should cost less for an airboat engine because the fabrication would be much easier. The running would not be that hard but you would need to run ARP head studs and a good set of head gaskets and that will run close to 1k. I also think a slick idea would be to mount a spray bar spray system on the innercooler that used water. You could have a suction pick up at the back of the boat, and small holding tank. When boost comes on it would spray a water mist through the cooler and the prop thrust would help. As the holding tank dropped in water level you could have a float switch in the tank that turns on you suction pump to fill the holding tank back to the correct level. In your tune you set your safety levels so your waste gates lower boost if the EGTs get to high. An aftermarket system like FAST would be a better fit than the factory CPU because it would give you more parameters to work with. It would take a bunch of work but a set of water jacketed headers would be big pimping. Tig a skin around the whole header and circulate water around them with an electric pump. A thermal switch could control the pump and a radiator would displace the heat from the water. If they can use jacketed exhaust on an inboard boat engine there has got to be a way to do it.
