XS Power K04 Manifold for 210/225 S3

Welly

Welly

335D Driver :-)
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Morning all.

I have taken delivery of an XS Power/Relentless K04 Exhaust Manifold for the S3 210 and 225. Basically, any car with the K04-022.

Same goes here as did in my other thread http://www.audi-sport.net/vb/a3-s3-forum-8l-chassis/102665-email-xs-power.html. I will be reviewing this, giving XS Power some suggestions on where it can be improved etc, therefore making it a well worthy buy.

Initial thoughts are good. Very well made, and nicely welded together. My main concern, as was always going to be is the turbo flange. One of the flange bolts holes would be very tricky to get to. And I mean very tricky indeed. I have a mate who is going to knock me up some studs to wind into the turbo for testing purposes and then I will go from there.

I have managed to bolt it to the turbo to mock up the fitment. All the flange holes are spot on which is a good start.

I will update this thread as things happen. Didn't have much working time last night as her indoors wanted me to watch Eastenders. Deep joy.

Photos:

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10.jpg
 
badger5 said:
looks like a challenge that one bolt/stud fixing
you tried it in situ onto a head yet welly?
Click to expand...

Not yet, I was going to try it on one of your spares to see what fitment was like. When are you back anyway dude?

And, more to the point, what are you ****** doing on here? :lmfao:
 
badger5 said:
back saturday, back in w'shop sunday

... and i am sad.. cant stay away or switch off car stuff
Click to expand...

LOL, I know that feeling. OK - will pop up and see you on Sunday for a natter about the above.

PS. You're out of milk.
 
interesting know Bill has showed me the 034 motorsport manifold it will be interesting to see how this works out
 
I am at the unit until 4ish today mate and from 10 till 4 ish for the rest of the week if you wanna pop over..

<tuffty/>
 
Shiney mate, liking it.

I see they slotted the one hole, at least that's easier. It's what i was going to do to fit one to mine before i bought a cheapo cast one instead.

Nail it on mate, nowt to lose
 
I remember a tig art manifold like this... was a real ball ache to fit with the engine in situ,
I remember the only wat realy was to fit the turbo to manifold, then mani to the head ... then the head to the car.
That bolt on the flange involved some chopping and welding of a spanner to get a nut on. BUT it was a pain and kept coming loose.
Hope this works out.
 
Looks a good piece of kit, lets hope yoiu can work your magic welly as i think my manifolds cracked :(.
 
Good evening good peoples.... we have some developments on this.

It is fit-able.

Well, potentially at least. I have managed to fit the manifold to the turbo off the car with success. Not easy though. And not possible with OEM equipment.

Lets start at the beginning. The issue with this manifold was always going to be one thing in particular. The turbo flange. Bolting the thing to the head should be easy by comparison to an OEM one as there is endless room to get hands/tools through.

Permit me to demonstrate:

9a.jpg


2a.jpg


This particular hole in the flange will be the hard one, as access is nil.

Totally impossible to get an OEM bolt in here. There is no way it can be done. End of.

As mentioned earlier in the thread, I had a good mate of mine (he's on here also but I don't know his name as he is new), George, knocked me up some CNC machined Stainless Steel studs for a mock up assembly.

He produced the following (good lad :thumbsup:)

17.jpg


Just the job for fitting this sucker.

Studs are wound into the turbo flange, and then the manifold mated on top. These first attempt studs are actually a little shorter than they need to be. Between 3 and 5mm needs to be added to the top to allow the nut to clamp down to the stud properly. He is going to do me another 2 sets of 3, one with 3 mm added and one with 5 mm added and then I will decide what's best to use.

Anyway - 3 M10 nuts required for this - the first 2 being easy to fit on and tighten. The third, being the one pictured above is a fiddle to get the nut on and threaded. However, it is do-able and you can also get a 17mm spanner in there to tighten the nut up. Tight as a gnat's chuff though. I will be 'manufacturing' a special tool for doing this, as I think it can be made easier with the correct bodge.

At this point I think it is only fair to mention that XS Power's claim that the downpipes they supply (that haven't historically fitted with the OEM manifold) do fit with this tubular one as they stated.

Here are some photos of the turbo and manifold bolted together properly.

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This is the one that is a bit of a biatch to get to....

16.jpg


All points go.

The only real way to test this is to use it and see what happens with prolonged use. Potential failure will be highlighted then.

I will be checking the fitment to a 1.8T head on the weekend so will get back to you with that info.
 
Does anyone know if you can get a high heat thread lock? Loc Tite's highest temp stuff is ~500 degrees.
 
Welly said:
Adding to that, I will be buying one of these for fitting the manifold.

VW AUDI SEAT KKK K04 TURBO GASKET on eBay (end time 12-Sep-10 14:55:42 BST)

I am hoping that it will deal with the expansion of the stainless steel better than a metal OEM gasket.

The saga continues....
Click to expand...

I had one of those weld itself to my turbo and mani and blow through the middle, i had to scrape and file to get the residue off,lol

Stuck a used OEM one ( as its all i had) and she is fine atm.

But seeing you are going to be dropping it off biweekly to reweld, changing the gasket won't be a problem....LMAO

Hows that silly expensive pipe? Fitted?
 
Byzan A4 said:
I had one of those weld itself to my turbo and mani and blow through the middle, i had to scrape and file to get the residue off,lol

Stuck a used OEM one ( as its all i had) and she is fine atm.

But seeing you are going to be dropping it off biweekly to reweld, changing the gasket won't be a problem....LMAO

Hows that silly expensive pipe? Fitted?
Click to expand...

Hopefully not..... :(

But like I said, that's the only way to test it to be fair. Use and abuse.
 
i have the same manifold on my a3, it's been on for about 6 months now i'll take some pic's for ya. the problems i found were like you said the one nut that you cann't get to. but i also found it moved the turbo back so i had to get new oil line's made up. oh and it gets ****** hot, i'll try and put some pic's up tomorrow
 
The same manifold on an A3? Is your A3 K04 equipped dude? Anyway, pics would be great if you don't mind.

Impressed that you've been using it for 6 months without issue.
 
audi upgrades
i took some pic's for ya, i'll try and put them on after. yes it has got a ko4 on it, the only worry i have is like i said it gets very hot and there's lots of bits and bob in that area. i think am going to try and get it coated next summer, like i said you might have to get longer oil line's made up but am not 100% because your old manifold is nothing like mine
 
ricko said:
i took some pic's for ya, i'll try and put them on after. yes it has got a ko4 on it, the only worry i have is like i said it gets very hot and there's lots of bits and bob in that area. i think am going to try and get it coated next summer, like i said you might have to get longer oil line's made up but am not 100% because your old manifold is nothing like mine
Click to expand...

It'll be fine on the S3, it's designed to have the K04 as standard, where as your engine layout isn't.

Pics still would be good though. :thumbsup:
 
well i know that now lol. I cann't work out how to post the ****** picture's cos i is well fick an dat. could i email them to you i think i can do that:wacko:
 
ricko said:
well i know that now lol. I cann't work out how to post the ****** picture's cos i is well fick an dat. could i email them to you i think i can do that:wacko:
Click to expand...

Create an account with photobucket.com then upload your images n it will give you an IMG Code then just copy n paste that on here.
 
Did you notice any gains from the new manifold? From reading up about after market manifolds ( different car ive got but still probably the same on others) is that they take away torque from the bottem end and put it right up the top of the rev range, being good if you've got a race engine that revs high ? This is the reason im now selling my after market one and staying standard. On n/a that is, dont have a clue whether the same applies to turbo's though?
 
I ****** DID IT:p i can now add computer skills to my c.v
 
the head flange was fine but i did have to skim the turbo flange. gops this is my engine bay not whelly's had it all in stalled for abit now
 
this is getting confusing lol. i know you didn't think it was whelly's. the fella before you called gops said " it looks good whelly, had a test drive yet"
 
lol this has been a funny read since you joind in hahaha
 
LOL, WTF is 'Whelly'? lol

Anyway, some issues have come to light with this - 5mm warp on the manifold flange makes this manifold unsuitable sadly.

I will be getting in touch with XS and having a chat about it, see what can be done.

Turns out the pipes are stainless steel, and very well made. The flange however appears to be cast, and is magnetic making it clear that whatever material it is, it isn't stainless steel.
 
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