4AGE 16v vs 4AGE 20v, cost/performance.

[BARWICK]

Hi guys,
Im looking at dropping the 4A-C and wanted to know what your experiance was with each of the 4AGE engines:

cost of conversion
performance capacity
best way to get the car legal with the new engine

Thank you in advance for your help.

Kind regards

[Rice86]

Your from SA, so about making your car legal seems much more easier the any other states when compared.. Seems like it anyways

16v, you can have complete JDM setup which is direct bolt on, makes life easy
20v, no complete RWD setup from standard *water pump system*, dizzy will hit the firewall

16v would be easier then 20v, the hardest part would be electrical side of things for both conversion without 16v JDM looms
20v would be aftermarket ecu, standard ecu is possible though not many people go this way for 20v for some reason I don't know about..

That's about much it, everything else is pretty much the same for both engine.
16v and 20v can make same peak power with a lot of money.
20v has more puff from standard and itb as standard.

16v with quads sounds much better then a 20v, it just does!

depends where and who you buy the engine off, 16v 4age - $500 to $1500 complete RWD engine+ECU+loom
20v would be - $600 to $1000 standard form (front wheel drive), both are general price range, look around here or get it from local import wrecker

[Matt]

Sam q off here sells allot of good bits which makes the 20v much easier to do than it used to be... You can use stock ecu with a dizzy relocation kit which puts it at the front of the engine which is still under R&D (hurry up sam) and his water kit looks good too. Wiring isn't that scary either, sure it is a little harder than a 16v, but not stupidly hard. Main reason most ppl go after market ecu is they ditch the dizzy setup due to the clearance issues, whatever you do don't bash your firewall to make it fit. It looks ugly and i'm unsure of the engineering side.

From my experience with the 20v and i've owned a quite a few of them (mostly fwd tho). The blacktop is a much nicer / free reving engine. To me the difference in the 20v's is similar from getting in a bigport vs smallport between the two. You'll spend 2-3k on enhancing a 16v to get it to perform about the same as a healthy blacktop. Silvertops have more torque , but if you keep the revs up to a blacktop it doesn't struggle.

Budget wise are you doing most of the work yourself or are you relying on someone else?

[FoldKing86]

Personally having all 3 versions of the 4age, unless your after really high killawasp go 20v silvertop.

If just a general run around blast for fun dont care about lowish killawasp or the odd engine rebuild then go smallport.

Cost of each well that depends on to much to list, legality i wouldnt know in SA but most places would be bigport with rwd accessories as it came in that chassis, would be the easiest.

[BARWICK]

Thanks for your help guys. I am planning on doing most of the work myself hopefully. Has anyone done the conversion themselfs and if so can you remember a rough estimate of how much it cost, just in parts (no labour)

[Rice86]

weird question, nearly everyone on this forum has done it themselves or had a 2nd hand man to help

Like said the conversion is not hard, getting the car started after is the tricky bit because it requires thinking
If you have an engine crane then you'll be fine with any labour work required

the amount of money you will spend depends on what parts you already have and DONT have...

AE86: $1000 - $27k JDM Black edition
16v 4age: $500 - $1500
ECU: $100
16v Loom: $150-$300
20v 4age: same
Aftermarket ECU: $1500
T50 gearbox: $300-$500
S Diff: $20...
T Diff: $300
JDM T Diff: $1500
2 way LSD: $1000
JDM Front Brakes: $300
15x8.5s Wantanabes - $2500
Panda Paint Job: $100-$10 000
Trueno Front: $2500

something like that

[EpicXTC]

When you put it like that, it makes me want to go grab a new ae86 and do a JDM conversion



If you want to go the 20v, but dont want to get a dizzy relocation kit, you can do what one of the owners of my car did and just bash the firewall in. >.>

[Gunner]

without aftermarket ecu you'll be looking around 4-5k to do 20v properly (with rwd conversion bits) with aftermarket ecu push it closer to 7-8k (ecu unit, coils, wiring, tuning) 16v is a fair bit cheaper at 2-4k depending on how yo go about it.

[Sam-Q]

I think the best bang for buck is a silvertop with a new ECU. Will slaughter a blacktop on the original ECU and any unmodded 16V. 20V engines have a bad rep for low end power because of their base tune. Although I am not a big fan of the idea I am developing a dizzy kit as Matt said but having some issues with the design, it's a really annoying part to make.

Adaptronic ECU's seem to be the go thing at the moment, however the initial cost is higher going with this option.

[evil86]

rice86 is on the money. best bet is wait for someone to offload theirs or buy one with it and offload the shell later, save you time looking for all the parts and moneys in the long run