Vacuum Line/"T" alternatives

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Thu Jun 04, 2009 3:43 pm

Ok I am really getting sick of all my damn vacuum lines. Especially the "T's." Just too many of them and they suck.

Was doing a boost leak test and the breakaway one was leaking pretty bad.

The main part that sucks about our car is all the different port sizes.

I took some pictures of my vacuum lines and how its currently set up:

Top of vacuum solenoid:

Far left of vacuum solenoids. Number 2:
(Green line goes to the very back of the turbo by the chargepipe. Black line goes to the WGA)

Middle solenoid. Number 3:
(All empty don't need them)

As you can see the ports are very very small for the solenoids.
Far right solenoid. Number 1:
(Bottom vents to atmosphere. Red line is capped with screw in it. Usually goes to the UPP, but since I have an aftermarket hardpipe its not needed. White line goes to TIP sensor)

Port C on Synapse BOV vac line (Boost only source)

....leads to this:

Now on to the T's.

Ports A&B for Synapse BOV go to T. (Upper right of picture)
Just a fYI ALL the T's LEAD to the Throttle Body as shown

^ Breakway T that was leaking, bad product, was leaking out of the seams.

Could I just get a vacuum block in place of all those T's, since they all lead to the throttle body?

The only problem with that is all the different port sizes everywhere. Do they make straight fittings with different sizes on each side, so I can step up from a skinny vacuum line to a fat one?

Sorry for the long pointless picture rant,

I just want to get rid of these annoying leaks and simplify things.

bone-yard-racing · Post by **bone-yard-racing** » Thu Jun 04, 2009 6:19 pm

Yes a vac block could replace everything. Try a turbo for one its really compact and gets you like 6 ports its the only mechanical thing I like about that car.

Adionik · Post by **Adionik** » Thu Jun 04, 2009 11:28 pm

Make sure to zip tie all that shit

mopar4life · Post by **mopar4life** » Thu Jun 04, 2009 11:37 pm

I needa ziptie my shit...I usually have pretty good boost though..

esteinmaier · Post by **esteinmaier** » Thu Jun 04, 2009 11:43 pm

What I would do in your situation is get a nice piece of thick square aluminum bar about 6 inches long. Drill press right through the center, and put barbed fittings on either end to replace that lame little plastic barrel in the brake booster line. Then tap as many ports as you want into the side of it, and you will have a strong clean signal to all of it instead of running the reference lines off the same tiny little vacuum line as your pneumatic actuated devices such as your BOV.

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 12:06 am

bone-yard-racing wrote:Yes a vac block could replace everything. Try a turbo for one its really compact and gets you like 6 ports its the only mechanical thing I like about that car.

Uhhhh what? Didn't really make any sense...

Make sure to zip tie all that shit

As you can see its all ziptied except for the areas where the vac line was super hard to get on. Some places vac lines didn't fix some leaks so I had to get little hose clamps int eh past.

What I would do in your situation is get a nice piece of thick square aluminum bar about 6 inches long. Drill press right through the center, and put barbed fittings on either end to replace that lame little plastic barrel in the brake booster line. Then tap as many ports as you want into the side of it, and you will have a strong clean signal to all of it instead of running the reference lines off the same tiny little vacuum line as your pneumatic actuated devices such as your BOV.

I have no problems with that green piece. It has a checkvalve in it too I believe. I have no problem with that piece at all.
So you are basically talking about making a vacuum block?
Probably would rather just buy one.

Here is the OBX one. $45 shipped.
Notice how it comes with a bunch of barb fittings that are the same size.
Problem with that is the other end is smaller. Like going to my BOV and FPR. Now if all the ports on my BOV were that size it would be great.
My buddy has this one for his Zx2 he is building. He has all push lock fittings for his... Wish I could do that. But I don't want to take the barbs out my turbo to replace them. Could strip something. Its $31.50 shipped but doesn't come with the fittings.

I could just cap off the front and back since I won't need those huge ports?

esteinmaier · Post by **esteinmaier** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 12:10 am

You want to use the biggest port you can going to the IM. Anything less will reduce the accuracy of any reference line and slow down your BOV. That OBX block looks like it's using standard NPT to barbed fittings, and you can get a selection of them at your local home depot.

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 12:37 am

esteinmaier wrote:You want to use the biggest port you can going to the IM. Anything less will reduce the accuracy of any reference line and slow down your BOV. That OBX block looks like it's using standard NPT to barbed fittings, and you can get a selection of them at your local home depot.

Well shit, stock they aren't big at all. I don't think I could use a 3/8'' on each end man. Thats huge. The port on the TB is a lot smaller than that I believe.... I could be wrong though. The PCV system goes to the intake manifold. Those are the huge 3/8'' fuel lines in the pict, I have a catch can and a checkvalve. I doub I could splice any of my vac lines into tha thuge shit.

I connect to the TB.
Yeah thats why I was considering the OBX since it might be cheaper in the long run since it includes all the fittings. I had to get a 90 degree fitting for my S3 AGP WGA and it was like $4.50 for one fitting.

hul kogan · Post by **hul kogan** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 9:00 am

Golden Eagle makes a nice vacuum block. I happen to have a brand new polished one sitting in my basement. Definitely a quality piece.

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 11:25 am

Yeah I saw those on eBay.

bone-yard-racing · Post by **bone-yard-racing** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 12:12 pm

MyNeonSaysHi wrote:
bone-yard-racing wrote:Yes a vac block could replace everything. Try a turbo for one its really compact and gets you like 6 ports its the only mechanical thing I like about that car.
Uhhhh what? Didn't really make any sense...

Turbo FORD sorry I forgot the "D"

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 11:14 pm

Oh gotcha! I was like WTF is he talking about.

So pretty much any turbo ford vehicle has one? Specific years or models so I can search on eBay?

Right now I am leaning towards the OBX one. Looks like a nice unit.

bone-yard-racing · Post by **bone-yard-racing** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 11:21 pm

84-88 Thunderbird Turbo Coupe
84-86 Mustang SVO
85-89 Merkur Xr4ti

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Sat Jun 06, 2009 12:31 am

Thanks. I found an SVO one. But I am not sure if it will work.

I like how there are different sized ports.

Donkeypuncher · Post by **Donkeypuncher** » Sat Jun 06, 2009 1:14 am

Ahh, the svo mustang, I always liked that car for some reason.

bone-yard-racing · Post by **bone-yard-racing** » Sat Jun 06, 2009 6:55 pm

That is the one. There is no reason it wouldnt work you may need to cap a few of the extra ports but you will have to do that with any tree you get.

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Sat Jun 06, 2009 8:52 pm

Not sure if that is plastic or metal

bone-yard-racing · Post by **bone-yard-racing** » Sun Jun 07, 2009 10:46 pm

Plastic

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Mon Jun 08, 2009 1:17 am

Well I won it on ebay. $11.86 shipped. We shall see what its like when it arrives.
this is hopefully how I will have it set up.

Kevin_GP · Post by **Kevin_GP** » Mon Jun 08, 2009 11:47 am

MyNeonSaysHi wrote:Well I won it on ebay. $11.86 shipped. We shall see what its like when it arrives.
this is hopefully how I will have it set up.

For 12 bucks you can't go wrong, but you are capping half the ports. From my experience the caps crack and cause leaks over time, so just keep an eye out for that.

bone-yard-racing · Post by **bone-yard-racing** » Mon Jun 08, 2009 12:56 pm

Being plastic you could cut the ports you dont want off and melt the holes shut with a soldering iron or torch using the cut ports for filler

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Mon Jun 08, 2009 3:04 pm

Yeah I will keep an eye out on the caps. I boost leak check my car regularly so no worry on that.
Would rather not melt the areas that I don't use. That would look ghetto and could go wrong specially if the plastic went inside of the hole and caused an obstruction in there. Or it didn't seal all the way. Thats why vac caps should do well. I will keep that as an idea though, thanks.

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:05 pm

Well I got the Ford SVO vacuum T installed.

Using the stock blue plastic line for the S3 fuel rail since one end is bigger than the other.

Can barely see it but I went with a different checkvalve. I have been using the Bwoody checkvalve for some quite time now. Well I heard about nissan checkvalves how they were really good... So I went to the junkyard and got around 3 of them. I noticed more air would come out of the nissan one then the bwoody one and the port was a tad bit bigger on the nissan one. Could not blow out the other end on both which is good.

Did a boost leak check, everything came out good. Put it all back together.

Car now idles at around 17.2 (vacuum) according to the scan gauge... Usually it was around 18.5.
Maybe its because of the nissan checkvalve? I am going to swap them out and see if it matters might get rid of the checkvalves all together. Did some WOT pulls car pulled hard. Was in the lower 10's most of the powerband (RICH) then it would go up to around 10.9-11.1 by redline. Car is Stage 3 by the way. Full exhaust, bigger intercooler, cti chargepipe, 255lph walbro.
Edit:
Put the Bwoody one back in and I noticed my DIY catch can going to the valve cover from the intake. I had the arrow pointing towards the cam cover before so I turned it around and now its pointing towards the intake.. Now have 18.5 at idle again.. Not sure what did it.

MyNeonSaysHi · Post by **MyNeonSaysHi** » Sun Aug 02, 2009 6:15 pm

Kevin_GP wrote:
MyNeonSaysHi wrote:Well I won it on ebay. $11.86 shipped. We shall see what its like when it arrives.
this is hopefully how I will have it set up.

For 12 bucks you can't go wrong, but you are capping half the ports. From my experience the caps crack and cause leaks over time, so just keep an eye out for that.

Bingo.
I noticed they started to crack etc and it was a pretty ghetto setup, but not as ghetto as having a bunch of T's.

So I got the P2R vacuum block. It did not come with any fittings but I expected that for the $35 shipped price tag.
I spent around $14.50 for brass fittings at the hardware store.
2- 3/8'' Hex Plug
1- 1/8'' Hex Plug
2- 1/8''HB X 1/8"MPT Barb fitting
2- 1/4"HB X 1/8"MPT Barb fitting
Put a nice line of liquid teflon around the 3rd from top thread on each one and tightened it down tight.

Here are various picts:

^Mock up of the fittings and where I want them before teflon

Mounted on battery tray. ^

All vac lines hooked up.

Intake on, still need to put in a couple connections and straighten out catch can.

neonslg09 · Post by **neonslg09** » Sun Aug 02, 2009 10:05 pm

looks good. get it done and do a leak test again

glasswars · Post by **glasswars** » Sun Aug 02, 2009 11:14 pm

i like this thread.

SRT-Wannabe · Post by **SRT-Wannabe** » Sat Jul 16, 2011 3:33 pm

i would like to revive this thread, i'm currently having that same problem with vacuum lines, ill post pics tomorrow, but im lost in some of these terms, can some1 make this a little more indepth? this is my first turbo car and im no expert

[EDIT - here's the pics. how do i get p2r vacuum block to work with stock setup? i would like to get that p2r vacuum block for my stock setup and already have it when its time for upgrades. what would be the best way to cap this but leave it for future upgrades so to speak. anyone ever used a p2r vacuum block on a stock srt? the hose to my TIP sensor is toast and i need to cap or replace without getting that whole vacuum line setup which is like $127

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ZeroChad · Post by **ZeroChad** » Sat Jul 16, 2011 3:55 pm

Mcmaster Carr sells vacuum manifolds for pretty cheap. You just need to buy whatever size/style fittings you want to use with them.

http://www.mcmaster.com/#air-manifolds/=d7dsyv

SRT-Wannabe · Post by **SRT-Wannabe** » Sat Jul 16, 2011 4:00 pm

ZeroChad wrote:Mcmaster Carr sells vacuum manifolds for pretty cheap. You just need to buy whatever size/style fittings you want to use with them.

http://www.mcmaster.com/#air-manifolds/=d7dsyv

the standard one seems right for me, but i've never done this before and are pretty lame to the terms on what and what not to do. need serious help/education