Please tell me everything I need to know about a 2006 Solstice engine.

So, on a whim I just picked this up for a pretty reasonable price. Bought by a guy 10 years ago up in Michigan for a project but never used because it was too tall. It beat around his shop, he moved it twice, once from Michigan to SC, and he was tired of it taking up space. 

I'm probably going to re-power the Dirtson (1978 B210) with it and run it in Lemons.  The problem is I don't know anything about them. 

So, what do I need to know. There are a couple of huge plugs that go to nothing and several small ones as well. I'm going to need to figure out where they go and if they are necessary.  Where is the best place to chase down information besides asking you guys a ton of questions. 

Mine took 14psi of boost from a home brew setup while having over 100k miles without a sweat. Stock it was a just under 180hp and really didn’t feel like a sports car motor, but it always did what was asked. Unfortunately that’s about all I’ve got. 

Is that an ecotec?. If so, they need some help with oiling.  A number of people are swapping them into miata and similar.  It seems it takes a few races to sort them out without blowing them up.

Once sorted, they are great!

It's a 2.4 ecotec and a Colorado trans.

They're bulletproof

Suprf1y said:

It's a 2.4 ecotec and a Colorado trans.

They're bulletproof

That's what I thought it was.  Cool!

You might want to ask some of the people that have swapped them into miata and such what they had to do to make them live.  I know of at least 3 teams that blew them up in their first or second race.  

Since those first few races, all 3 of those teams have not hurt another engine.

It's weird how some normally reliable engines are blow uppy  in lemons and champcar and some not so reliable engines last forever.

Ecotecs have never struck.me as particularly reliable, but you can sure hear them thrashing away from a good distance.

If it's like every other 2.4 oiling problems usually caused by sludge. 

dropstep said:

If it's like every other 2.4 oiling problems usually caused by sludge. 

It only has 8600 miles on it. Sludging shouldn't be a problem yet. 

There were eco's with problems, though very few in the big picture, this was not one of them.

They are generally very stout motors. You should be able to make about 200/200 with a header and a tune

Nice find, it's not often a low mile engine like that is for sale. 2006-2007 LE5s like that one have forged rods.

Anyone know what these go to. 

I'm guessing one goes to the fuse/relay box that is usually mounted under the hood. Not sure about the other. BCM?

Can I run this without a BCM? 

Will any GM fuse/relay box plug in or are these plugs vehicle specific?

In 08+ they went to powdered metal rods, I believe all the other eco's are forged

We are building an 07 Solstice base for lemons, it is in the garage now, I’ll check for those plugs.  

If anyone knows what the needed engine mods mentioned above are, that would be nice to know. 

Pretty reliable engines, used in all sorts of GM cars, so no parts problems.  Ho hum results from tuning by computer, although drivability can be improved a bit. There is only 8-12 bhp to be found that way.  The turbo 2.0 is a lot more exciting - factory tune with 290 bhp/290Tq and better gas mileage than the 2.4.

Sonic said:

We are building an 07 Solstice base for lemons, it is in the garage now, I’ll check for those plugs.  

If anyone knows what the needed engine mods mentioned above are, that would be nice to know. 

Lemme see what I can find....

This engine is also used in the Polaris slingshot.

There are turbo kits out there for the 2.4 aswell.

Big red one is the underside of the fusebox.  You will probably find that all the power supply wires for injectors, coils, alternators and so on all terminate there.  The other one does look module-ey.

I very much doubt it will run without a BCM, unless it can be removed via HP tuners or similar.  Even on the one ton GM trucks that have no security, the ecu still wants to see an "Enable" signal from the bcm, which is triggered by a key turning the factory ignition switch.

Rob: thanks!

Confirmed the red one goes to the underhood main fuse box.  The other goes to a harness that goes through the firewall, after that I don’t know yet as I haven’t stripped the interior.  

Heres a picture of the wiring harness area. 

https://forum.champcar.org/topic/19807-teach-me-how-to-keep-an-ecotec-together/

I asked and got some answers.

Jer on that forum is a board member of champcar and could help if you ask him specifics.  Nice guy!

Thanks for the info. 

One of my friends has hundreds of hours of endurance racing on his 2.4 with no issues. He does recommend changing the valve springs every 50 hours if I recall

Best power adder on the NA engines is probably a supercharger.  Cost around $5K, get it up to around 300 bhp.

In reply to wspohn :

I think you can do a little better than that with a good tune, but you should be able to supercharge one for peanuts. I'm seeing complete supercharged SS Cobalts for well under $1000 lately.

One of those would make a great a challenge car.

Isn't this the same motor used in the Pink Panther MG?

ecotech was used in the last saab turbos?