ca18de + ca18et

[Sky_kiD]

I was wondering if this was feasable

I'm going to be building an s12 with a ca engine, but in north america we dont get the ca18det. So i was wondering if its possible to take the head off the ca18de and put it on the ca18et. Would this work? what sorta problems would i run into? any links / experience with these engines would help thanks ^_^

[s12turbo]

This has been attempted by someone at club-s12. The problem with this hybrid swap is that even though you get twin cams the CA18ET is still weaker internally than the CA18DET. The bottom end of the CA18ET is weaker than that of the CA18DET. It would not really be beneficial to swap the heads because the power gain will not be as much as you would think. There are guys on club-s12 with close to 200hp with CA18ETs. This is about the limit on the stock fuel system anyway. The CA18DET has been proven to be much stonger and many guys in the UK swap the CA18DET bottom end onto their CA18ETs so that they are stonger. They stick with the ET head because it gives more torque at lower rpm and at least one such individual in the UK is putting out 320 hp from this said swap.

[SATSUJIN]

Why not just get a CA18DET? I can get long blocks for $250... I'm currently working on putting one in my AE86!

[s12turbo]

That is kinda the point i was making. That the CA18DET swap is better than just putting a DE head on a CA18ET.

[style54109]

If you could find the the pieces though, and they were pretty cheap, you could just swap the heads. Unless you are trying to go for an all-star here I think the one that is more cost effective or that you desire, you should go with.