Hi uno lovers, i've just posted a thread and pics on turbo collective about bleed valves, as im fitting my new techniclutch and lightened flywheel before xmas and want to turn the BOOOOST!!! up, but theres to many valves to choose from, idealy want to fit under the cig lighter ashtray flap on the mk2's so is adjustable from the cockpit, then a friend of mine said the proper way is the performance actuator, which way do i go, what is everone using, your experiences, also thinking of putting a fpr on and have seen one on ebay with a built in pressure guage under uno turbo section, just that there seems to have been a few probs with the usual boost valve setting up overfueling etc, and that ones got the guage, anyone got one

antsuno2 said:

Hi uno lovers, i've just posted a thread and pics on turbo collective about bleed valves, as im fitting my new techniclutch and lightened flywheel before xmas and want to turn the BOOOOST!!! up, but theres to many valves to choose from, idealy want to fit under the cig lighter ashtray flap on the mk2's so is adjustable from the cockpit, then a friend of mine said the proper way is the performance actuator, which way do i go, what is everone using, your experiences, also thinking of putting a fpr on and have seen one on ebay with a built in pressure guage under uno turbo section, just that there seems to have been a few probs with the usual boost valve setting up overfueling etc, and that ones got the guage, anyone got one

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You start going above 1bar, then you are asking for trouble without internal mods. Ist thing is to check your block is not warped as a lot left the factory warped and never performed right. There are lots of Uno and Punto engines with turned up boost which then left their bottom ends all over the road. I cannot warn you enough.

Andy.

i know i'l be a shade under 1 bar, engine is fully rebuilt with 6k under her belt, with a spare 56k full spares car behind her, its time to play!

Andy, what do you class as modified internals?

with the correct fuelling and turbo there's no reason for you to push 1.4bar with extra oil coiling and larger ic. UT bottom ends are very good and they are good because they are well balanced and have great oil systems. ie piston oil spray nozzles a must for high preformance and heat transfer. i speak mainly for the mk1 bottom end but the mk2 must be simular.

sumplug said:

You start going above 1bar, then you are asking for trouble without internal mods. Ist thing is to check your block is not warped as a lot left the factory warped and never performed right. There are lots of Uno and Punto engines with turned up boost which then left their bottom ends all over the road. I cannot warn you enough.

Andy.

Click to expand...

???

No mk1 blocks will poop their pants at 1.2 bar unless they have been totally abused. Fact, they're as hard as nails!

Between 3 of my friends they experienced 4 cracked mk2 blocks but as we know the mk2 block wasnt design to be used for a turbo application, it was a modified tipo unit.

Now i dont mean any disprespect to mk2 owners, there are loads in this country and even more abroad running massive power without any problems so it does make me wonder how well the ones the crack have been looked after in the past. I've not heard of warped blocks from the factory but maybe there is truth in that!

Tom

oldskoolmk1unoturbo said:

Andy, what do you class as modified internals?

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This is from Sporting Fiat Club.
You cannot use unleaded in your Uno T unless it has the later red, black or green spot on the ECU.
Modification
In General
What sorts of power and performance can you expect? Here we are going to focus on the initial steps of tuning to bring the cars up to around 130 - 140bhp at the flywheel. Beyond this point tuning becomes increasingly expensive, and it is recommended that you try cars with this level of performance before considering moving on and up the tuning ladder. Because of its light weight, a well sorted and lightened Uno with 135bhp will have a top speed around 140mph and a 0-60 time around 6.5 seconds. After this point diminishing returns set in – remember we are dealing with a 1300cc engine – and a small volume turbo. Its single overhead cam head has reasonably shaped chambers and relatively large valves to begin with. So additional modifications to get beyond 150bhp become increasingly drastic and expensive. A well tuned road car can deliver 180-190bhp but the engine will need to be completely rebuilt – pistons, head, large turbo, intercooler, engine management, injection system, fuel system, clutch, and gearbox.

What’s the max power limit? Well around 225bhp DIN, using the Punto GT (same SOHC engine design) and its six speed box. But above 190bhp the engines become increasingly temperamental. At 220bhp, because the engine stops flowing any more air, increasing the turbo size/ boost just raises temperatures to the point where everything important starts melting. You will also be sacrificing all the mid range torque for a very narrow power band. OK for sprints and drag races, but turbo lag kills the fun almost anywhere else. Some enterprising SFC members have looked at using the new 16-valve 1242cc head as a basis for tuning. In fact the 8-valve and early 16-valve Fiat twin cam engines share a common design background with the SOHC engine and offer a better tuning route for the adventurous or over-wealthy.

The Strada 1500 gearbox on the Mark 1 Uno and the early Tipo box on the Mark 2 Uno are good for about twice the torque originally intended. Again around 150bhp at the flywheel – after this you will need to be gentle or go for the more expensive competition derived alternatives. There are many Italian alternatives. If you transplant into the Uno please remember to retain the equal length drive/ intermediate shaft style of layout in the original. This design does a lot to reduce torque-steer. The Uno Turbo Strada box is the most advanced of the standard range – in particular with its use of ball race bearings where previous versions had solid ones. So easy swaps are not available.

You must improve the braking and handling of the standard car before tuning the engine. The brakes and suspension set up – even when new – are marginal to the car’s standard performance. Upgrade them first.
Uno Turbo History Revisited
Although the Uno arrived in the middle of the “Hot Hatch Era that was the Eighties” – it was in fact de-tuned for production. You can’t say that about any of its rivals now can you! The story goes like this… IHI-Warner of Japan were commissioned by Fiat to design the turbo engine for the Uno, while Fiat/Abarth got on with designing the car. IHI’s experience with the Uno and Fiat was small, and Fiat’s experience of turbo road car solutions was also limited. The engine package was finished first, apart from the Marelli/Bosch engine management & ignition solution. Eventually the system spec was built around a nominal 1bar turbo boost pressure.
When the prototypes were assembled it was clear the whole thing worked very well. Now we don’t know whether it was the risk of needing to extract grannies from tree tops (who’s only sin was to sneeze hard while driving their Uno T). Or the likelihood of successive layers of Uno Ts piling up outside difficult bends. Or component longevity in the face of poor fuel quality and indifferent servicing from mechanics. Or the difficulty in selling more expensive performance Fiat/Lancias if the cheapest in the hot hatch range comprehensively blew them all into oblivion. The precise reasons are shrouded in Fiat mists. Suffice to say it was decided to reduce the performance of the Uno Turbo for production. And the cheapest way to do this was to lower the boost pressure to 0.6bar.
What you have available then is an engine/turbo basically engineered for 1bar operation, but operating at 0.6bar boost. We are going to discuss the ways of safely and reliably putting this back to 1bar.

Suspension and Handling
The Uno Turbo suspension is common to both Mark 1 and Mark 2 cars. The general layout will be familiar to Punto and Cinq/Seicento owners too. In the case of the Uno Turbos the rear brakes are disc rather than drum based.

The Uno uses MacPherson struts at the front and rear. The front struts have a cone shaped coil spring slightly offset to provide more stability under heavy braking. The rear suspension is mounted on an ‘H’shaped beam axle connected to the body at its front ends from which it can pivot. The shock absorbers are connected to their top mounts at the axle line, but the coil springs are located forward of this point on the beam arms towards the front pivot points. There is an anti-roll bar at the front of the cars, routed around the back of the engine bay, and located on the bottom of the front bulkhead.

Lowering:- How low can I go? Well the Uno is high as standard and its possible to go down by a ridiculous 100mm at the back and about 60mm at the front, and still get 15 inch rims on (with 45 profile tyres). But at this level the car will drive like a manic go cart - skipping around over the slightest uneven surface and you’ll find most of the interior on the floor. No fun to try and drive it in a straight line at all. The car may look cool, but you won’t. At 35mm – 40mm lower front and back you’ll still have some suspension travel left and the car will stop and corner to match its performance. At -40mm the front valence will still hit a house brick laid flat on the road – and you should note the intercooler and oil cooler are just behind that valence!

Strut Braces: These bolt across the suspension turrets and do stiffen up the chassis – especially the rear one that can also pass as a luggage restraint for the boot space. OMP do a front one for £50 and a rear for £20, but Eibach and Momo used to stock them as well. The Momo Italian front version was routed around the back of the engine bay (rather than straight across between the top mounts) and doesn’t get in the way as much.

Springs: Available in different heights from standard, usually between 20 and 60mm. Obviously the spring rate will be much higher for the shorter springs. Consider going to coil over set ups, with adjustable spring platforms straight away. As the standard conical shaped front springs are expensive – so switching to standard size and shape springs is cheeper. Spring choice includes Eibach, Pi, Chassis Dynamics (Avo) and many others (see below). Spax and Avo do 35mm lower spring sets. They both improved handling without sacrificing too much quality, about £80 - £100 for the Uno T. Please don’t try chopping standard springs! It is an MoT failure point, and puts too much strain on the remaining standard springs. They are now also at the wrong rate for the height. If the ride feels too harsh then Jamex and Eibach provide rising rate springs – but they are more expensive.

Shockers: Match with the springs and buy as one package to get the best results. Then your new shorter springs won’t fall out at full extension (another MOT failure). Koni, Avo, and Leda make decent adjustable sets, for track days the Konis are probably better. Italian options will relieve you of more money. Expect to spend about £400-500 and don’t skimp on cheap sets that can’t last or perform (see table below).

Bushes: Do replace all the suspension bushes. Its possible your Uno still has original bushes - probably like marshmallow now. So change for new or preferably uprated ones. Stiffer springs and shocks will put more strain on the bushes. A combination of Superflex, Truflex, Powerflex and Pex are available to kit out your Uno T. Don’t neglect the anti roll bar bushes either.

Anti-roll bars: The standard one is OK. In fact for near the limit driving the Uno could do with a bit less understeer – and this would suggest stiffening up the rear suspension against roll rather than the front. Eibach make stiffer ones for about £150 but this isn’t really necessary until all else is re-newed. Do uprate the front anti roll bar bushes and rear axle pivot bushes – this is to provide more accurate alignment under fast cornering rather than cause any changes to the car's handling.

Brakes: The Uno will benefit from larger front brakes and callipers. This will often mean adopting 4 pot calliper systems. In this case, to avoid much longer pedal travel, change the size of master cylinder at the same time.The master cylinder is located on the passenger side of the engine bay, operated by a remote bar so the exhaust manifold cannot contact it in the event of rearward engine movement. A bigger brake disc may also mean increasing the wheel diameter to 15 inches too. 14inch and 15 inch wheels from the Strada Tipo and Lancia ranges will fit – with spacers – as the Uno offset is different. All Fiat Lancia and Alfas have the same (unique to Italian cars) bolt centres. But to use most of these wheels you’ll need to look at converting from bolts to nuts to secure the wheels. The choice is yours!

Let’s discuss a range of tuning options based around the initial stages of tuning:

Step 1 Look to lighten the load of the engine brakes and suspension by reducing the weight you’re carrying. Choose light weight options (starting with wheels, and exhausts), be generally aware of how much weight you are saving or introducing with all your choices. Much of the performance advantage of the Uno comes from its relatively light weight. Keep it down!

Step 2 Induction – cold air is best and the engine bay is very congested. So start by moving the battery to the boot in a battery box. You can have the spare wheel compartment modified to fully fix the battery/box in place. This allows you to box off the old battery area with aluminium sheet so it gets cold air from the headlight area in front. Into this you can place a large cone filter for the air intake. K&N and Pipercross can supply the filter. Make sure the 'boxed volume' is atleast six times the volume of the filter cone itself.

Step 3 Wastegates - The air then flows via the turbo into the engine. A wastegate controls the boost level and on the Uno is not adjustable. This is were we have more than one option, and there is some debate over the best way to go within the club. To increase boost we can fit a bleed valve between the turbo compressor housing and the wastegate. Use either two or three way valves. The 2 way bleed valves are simpler whereas the 3 way ones can bleed off air. This can affect the turbine blades in our small turbo for both better and worse, sometimes causing stall and jiggle at the wrong moment – that’s why there’s a debate. 2 way valves are OK.

Step 4 The Intercooler – optional to begin with, is a change of intercooler. The Uno’s is tough but small. The Mk 2 has a slightly larger one, but neither gets a lot of cooling airflow in their positions. The next size up would be the Delta 4WD version - costs about £40 second hand – exactly twice the size of the Mk1 standard intercooler. It's easier to fit using its own mounts from the donor car. About twice the size again would be a Cosworth (that's 4 times the Mk1) – an early Sierra Cossie will cost about £60 second hand - and make sure it doesn’t leak! The Cossie at four times the Uno’s size is difficult to fit – and increases the circuit travelled by the air. Try and keep the intercooler as small as possible for your particular uses/ temparatures. Spray systems onto the intercooler can help too. Try a big reservoir in the boot area. Screen washer pumps are fine - use lawn sprinklers with adjustable fine jets from a DIY superstore. Trigger and switch from the EMU.

Step 4 Dump valves – if you insist on changing the dump valve for its noise try a Bailey twin piston dump valve. This goes TISHH and doesn't seem to cause too many other problems. I prefer to keep the short little cha-cha-cha-chat heard from the standard one at 1bar boost (providing its working alright).

Step 5 a) Now the main mods for ‘stage one’ can begin. Your engine and clutch have to be in reasonable condition. Also check you are getting full throttle by having someone press down the accelerator, and observe that the plenum butterfly is fully open. There's no point in tuning the car if you aren't getting full throttle and more than half the cars I see have stretched throttle cables so replace it! Now on the side of the Plenum Chamber is a pressure cut out switch. The standard cut out operates at 0.86bar. And it loses accuracy as it ages – cutting at lower pressures. So the switch terminals must be electrically isolated. Detach it and make sure the terminals are secured completely electrically isolated (very taped up).

Step 5 b) If in doubt go to someone who knows what they are doing! Next there are adjustment screws on the Marelli engine management box to close the tolerances (gain) on its outputs. These are further closed. The fixed map of the system is valid up to about 0.9-1bar boost. Smooth running and timing has to be checked.

Step 5 c) On the end of the fuel rail is the standard fuel pressure regulator, it must be in excellent condition, along with the fuel pump and injectors. We have heard of problems replacing this with a ‘rising rate’ regulator – that effectively increases both the fuel flow & pressure with increased fuel demand. The FSE Power Boost Valve is one of these. But it is easy to swamp the Uno’s fuel system, so although this product can increase the fueling rate from 1:1 to 1:7, a maximum of 1:3 is about the limit for an Uno. A power valve like this is designed to combat the dangers of the mixture leaning out at high revs – by ‘throwing’ more fuel through the injectors from increased fuel pressure. If it works, we are dumping a not very accurate amount more fuel into the engine at any high fuel usage point. The rest of the rev range will suffer from an over rich mixture, including at idle, if the pressure is no longer normal. As a result your engine’s fuel metering can be way out! On the Uno there is no mechanism to compensate - so this can result in really rough running.

Step 5 d) You must only use Super Unleaded (that’s 97 Octane – not anything else). It is advisable to use an octane booster as well. Millers and Castrol are two amongst the good ones.

Step 5 e) Spark Plugs – after quite a bit of testing on different cars, we think the NGK triple electrode plugs suit the Uno Turbos well – both for power, smoothness and emissions. Unfortunately you can’t get the right grades etc from Halfords. (See the alternative suppliers table below).

Step 6 Head Cams & Gaskets – the combustion chamber shape is ok for this level tuning. Providing the engine is in good condition (the valves and piston rings should be ok for 90,000 miles if the engine has been well maintained.) The Fiat head gaskets will be fine for up to a 1bar boost. On changing the gasket make sure new stretch bolts etc are used. The cast iron valve guides will wear around 100-120,000 miles budget for a head re-build then. This is a good time to look at gas flowing the head around the valve stems, and shaping the ports. The Mk1 head has bigger inlet valves. But the Mk2 camshaft and then the Punto GT camshaft provide further performance gains before resorting to high lift cam solutions.

Step 7 Exhaust System – Is heavy and restrictive. If you want maximum power though forget the fashions for massive bore exhausts. The engine is too small to tolerate it without big power losses. For cars delivering under 150bhp use an exhaust bore the same or very slightly larger than the manifold bore – just over 2.2 inches. Over this power output a bore of 2.5 inches is about it - i.e. for race applications. Choose single box systems with short tail pipes. The tails pipe bore should not be more than 0.5 of an inch wider then the main bore. Any bigger and you will start to lose performance - you have been warned! Powerflow or Longlife, with outlets all over the country will make you up a stainless steel exhaust for around £300. OMP do one with no silencer!

As it says there, one of the biggest gains on the engine is gasflowing the head. If you turn up the boost, you create heat and thats what kills the engine, Standard coolers are not very good and cannot cope with extra heat.
And with more boost and fueling, many never have the engine set up properly and so the fueling is all over the place and as i have said before, many go bang!! Hope this helps.

Andy.

The Strada 1500 gearbox on the Mark 1 Uno and the early Tipo box on the Mark 2 Uno are good for about twice the torque originally intended. Again around 150bhp at the flywheel – after this you will need to be gentle or go for the more expensive competition derived alternatives. There are many Italian alternatives. If you transplant into the Uno please remember to retain the equal length drive/ intermediate shaft style of layout in the original. This design does a lot to reduce torque-steer. The Uno Turbo Strada box is the most advanced of the standard range – in particular with its use of ball race bearings where previous versions had solid ones. So easy swaps are not available.


But they're old now and my 'D' plate used to eat its strada derived box for lunch, i think i got through 3 rebuilt boxes! This was one of the main reason i bought an 'F' plate and since have had no problems what so ever with my box.

Thanks for the info mate, could be a sticky??

Tom

ive ran 2 bar (29psi) before thru my UT. didnt really mean to, but was running it for about a month lol. my ut runs 21psi all day long no probs. but then again, my engine been rebuild to take it

Dunc

That’s my uno hahaha