Time to upgrade the TD5.

[robbotd5]

Gday all.
With a caravan arriving in June I am wanting to upgrade my 04 TD5 Disco manual. I am thinking a bigger intercooler with silicone hoses, upgraded exhaust manifold (to stop warping) ECU upgrade and a better exhaust than the original. My questions are, can you all recommend products/people to see for such modifications. The Van's tare is 2100kg.
Regards
Robbo.

[canblogerra]

Mine had sheared three of the outside head studs when I took it off. I found the mod fairly easy to do with an angle grinder - I started with a small wheel, then a bigger one to get the reach and finished off the edges with a sharp file.

[Narangga]

ASE do a very good intercooler. They now sell on ebay or you can get through TRS Adelaide. Very happy with mine.

ECU upgrade can be done via Tombie, TRS (mine) or a number of others. Not sure who you would want to go through being in Canberra.

Hoses you can get through any number of suppliers. I bought mine a couple of years ago when they seemed to be a bit thin on the ground here in Australia so I got them from Td5 Alive in the UK.

I know nothing of manifolds and exhausts so will leave that for others to advise you on.

[disco_thrasher]

Give me a call if you want/need help in getting your parts ect,,,
Regards Kelvin

[robbotd5]

Has anyone had any dealings with Bruce Davis in Sydney.
Regards
Robbo

[eckolsim]

Bruce Davis is a Disco guru.

I had my intercooler and ECU done there and have been very happy since.

[robbotd5]

Give me a call if you want/need help in getting your parts ect,,,
Regards Kelvin


Bruce Davis is a Disco guru.

I had my intercooler and ECU done there and have been very happy since.
Thanks for that. What sort of power/torque are you getting now.
Regards
Robbo

[Hamish71]

My two cents worth:

Intercooler and hoses from td5 alive in the UK. Price will amaze you due to exchange rate. You will get both for well under a locally made intercooler. Quality and fit is outstanding. www.td5alive.com (http://www.td5alive.com)

Exhaust manifold....get the grinder out and slot it. Its an easy job, done in half an hour if you have a grinder and a vice....and a bit longer if you dont have a vice to hold it steady. Then drill out the outer two port mounting holes. Leave the centre port mounting holes stock to locate the manifold correctly.Then send it off to get ceramic coated. Jet Hot did mine www.jet-hot.com.au (http://www.jet-hot.com.au)

Exhaust....several options.

1. Leave it stock, but remove the "cat", and replace the bellows type flex pipe with a stainless braided hose type. Remove the centre muffler. This will give you a higher flow, 2.5" system. (maybe $250)

2. If you want to go all out, go to any decent truck exhaust place, and get them to do a mandrel bend 2.75" system. (maybe $1300)

Dont go to 3". Too big, there have been turbo overspeed problems reported. Whether these are true or not is irrelevant, 2.75" for a 2.5TD is big enough.

If exhaust place gives you grief about removing the CAT, ask them to make a flanged straight pipe insert for your exhaust, and a matching flanged insert using your stock CAT. Dont buy a new hiflo CAT unless you honestly plan to leave it fitted. Tell them the non-CAT part is for when you are doing off road comp stuff on private property.....then go home, remove the cat section, put it on a shelf, insert no CAT section.
(Note: yes, all you greenies can now say "but what about the planet?"...I have my fingers in my ears, stop wasting your breathe).

ECU...I have used TD5 Alive, Mike (Tombie), and Kelvin (Disco Thrasher) on TD5 ECUs. We dont talk to Kelvin anymore ever since he decided a RRC is better than a Disco....(only kidding). All three will give you a good tune. The local guys will provide better more responsive service. I cannot rave highly enough about both Mike and Kelvin in terms of how far they will go to make sure you get what you want. Service is above and beyond. They put any other vendors on this forum to shame. Not that all vendors here are bad, but these guys are that much better.

All of these guys can give you enough torque to leave your transmission wimpering in the corner in a puddle of its own fluids....its not about who can give you the MOST torque. Its about who can give you a usable tune, that meets your towing needs, runs smoothly, efficiently, no smoke screen that is sympathetic to your equipment. With stock transmission, that means a max of about 380nm. Tell these guys your mechanical set up, your towing/driving needs, and they will advise a tune.

So, in summary....order an intercooler and hoses from TD5 Alive and it will be at your front door in a week. Do the manifold when you can afford to have the car off the road for a week while you send it out for coating...or buy a straight spare from a wrecker. Exhaust will be a day at a good place. Once you have everything fitted, and running, contact Mike or Kelvin. Both will have a tune for you in about 48hrs. Then you need a nanocom to do the install.You can run around on the stock tune as long as you like. It will be better than you have got now. But do the tune after everything else that you plan on doing to the induction, engine, exhaust.

The only business you have to physically visit is the exhaust place, assuming you can handle a set of spanners to remove/replace the intercooler, and can get access to a nanocom.

TIP: Buy a 38mm Viscous Fan Hub Spanner before you do this work.....I think TD5 Alive do these as well.

http://www.aulro.com/afvb/members-rides/106557-hamishs-d2a-overhaul.html

[robbotd5]

I find it quite disapointing when I ask for advise on upgrading my TD5 and I only get a responce from only one of the vendors on this site (thanks Kevin). A BD upgrade is looking all the more appealing.
Regards
Robbo.

[pohm66]

Hi Robbo,

Going through the same excercise for the same reason myself...looked at up to a D3 but the $$$ jump was to big...

As not towing 3.5t thought a few $$$s thrown at Grimmy would give me the extra torque needed for easier driving

Anyways have decided on:-
larger intercooler
extra in line transmittion cooler
silicon hoses - BAS
boost box - BAS
EMS1 - Nata.net.au
Nanocom
As mine is a 99 - NNN ecu from TRS
stage #2 map from DiscoThrasher
free-er flowing exhaust
destressed manifold that I'll get ceramicd
will probably exhaust wrap down from the turbo to keep temps down in the engine bay.

Did look at a VNT but to take full advantage of the uumph really need a manual or to invest more $$$ into the auto to 24 spline and maybe larger torque convertor.

hope this helps.....

[Tombie]

Nice list..

But ceramic coat the pipe, don't wrap it :)

[pohm66]

Nice list..

But ceramic coat the pipe, don't wrap it :)

Okay Tombie... you have me curious....why not wrap it???

Was looking to wrap down to where the piupe goes horizontal.....

[Tombie]

Okay Tombie... you have me curious....why not wrap it???

Was looking to wrap down to where the piupe goes horizontal.....

Simply - Rust

The wrapping holds water and sludge against the piping causing damage.

The TD5 on short runs doesn't dry it out enough.

[pohm66]

OK... thanks....

What's your thoughts on turbo heat shield covers again to keep engine bay temps down....

[scott oz]

We’ll I haven’t got a Dico TD5 but a TD5 110 (2001). I’m not towing but was looking for more torque better economy or no worse. Importantly I also wished to enhance the longergivity of the engine and components with any modifications I do.

I also believe that the average person will not pick/recognise a 10% increase in HP. Going from 100 HP to 110 HP; a lot of placebo in many modifications.

One of the first mods I did was a chip upgrade and that certainly was a noticeable difference. Whether you get the “advertised” increase without before and after dyno’s? But my experience is their is a noticeable performance HP and torque improvement.

After I did mine I found that my fuel consumption improved about ½ L Per 100k’s? I do a lot of Sydney traffic driving so I believe the torque aided this improvement? I also found on the freeway the Def was more responsive and also up hills seemed to be a gear higher??

I removed the cat converter and the center muffler. Sounded a lot better. “Seemed” to improve performance (Placebo?) fuel economy no recordable difference.


I haven’t done an intercooler upgrade so other than the above I haven’t done any modes to alter the engines performance.

Crank case breather. Removed this and vented to outside. EGR (exhaust gas recirculation) removed along with removing the butterfly valve in the air intake. No noticeable effect. Now there is no hot contaminated air entering the air intake at all.


Engine mods. Following advice from the forum I modified the exhaust manifold ground out the webbing didn’t elongate the bolt holes but enlarged to 11m from memory the center to 10mm for the increased stud size.

I added a gearbox oil cooler to ensure the gear box is able to work hard and keep cool.

I increased the oil capacity of the transfer case to ensure the transfer case could maintain temp while working hard.

I removed the water cooler from the EGR system and rerouted the coolant pipes to reduce the number of joins and also at the same time it standardised a number of pipe sizes. At the same time reduced the workload on the radiator.

I’m now looking to exhaust wrap the exhaust /engine pipe in particular to reduce the cabin/engine bay temp. Some say this increases performance see first paragraph.

Just my2c worth

[Hamish71]

OK... thanks....

What's your thoughts on turbo heat shield covers again to keep engine bay temps down....

If you are worried about under bonnet temps, take Tombie's (and mine) advice. Slot your manifold, dissassemble your turbo, and then send the turbo housing, manifold, and first section of your exhaust pipe of for ceramic coating. Temps will be down, efficiency of turbo increased, protects against rust, and looks BLING. I did it for performance and bling first, temp and rust second. Temp not really an issue unless you plan on mounting a second battery near the turbo. I DONT, but i did mount a Provent there.