It’s dyno time for the Trolvo in this episode of Carnage, as we find out if the upgraded camshafts have been worth the effort.

Last episode, Scotty finished installing a pair of bigger 272/278 Kelford cams in the head of the 1JZ, which had just had a refresh from the JZ wizards at G-Force Race Solutions. They decked it, gave it a mild porting job and converted it to shimless buckets, and also installed Kelford valve springs to match the bigger cams.

There was a hiccup in the process when Scotty accidentally snapped the exhaust camshaft while he was torqueing it down. It’s a common problem for JZ engines, but thankfully Goleby’s Parts express-freighted us a new cam, and Gerardo from G-Force stopped by the workshop to guide Scotty through the complex installation procedure to avoid a repeat incident.

With that done, Scotty threw the rest of the 1JZ back together and fired it up with zero issues. However, before he could head to the dyno, there was one more go-fast bit to install from Haltech.

So, this episode kicks off with Scotty mounting and wiring in a Haltech switch panel. The two rotating switches are used for boost and launch control settings, meaning they can be adjusted on the fly from the driver’s seat without plugging the laptop into the Elite 2000 ECU.

With that done, it was time for the Trolvo’s appointment with Zane Heath at Maxx Performance. The new cams mean this little 1JZ is capable of 8500rpm, and Scotty wanted to see 30psi pushed through the mill for a goal of around 550rwhp.

The difference from the camshafts was immediately obvious, with power up significantly across the board on the same boost as when the car had standard sticks.

However, with any project, there’s always a limiting factor, and this time it was the turbo. We found that with the extra flow from the upgraded head and cams, the turbo was only good for around 25psi before it became inefficient and stopped making power.

The turbo on the 1JZ is a GCG-built GTW3684R, and is a spare taken from the twin-turbo LS1 combo that originally powered our Mazda MX-5. We threw it on when we first built the Trolvo simply because we had it lying around, and up until now it’s done a fantastic job, especially considering it was never designed for this engine combo.

Nevertheless, even though we didn’t reach the 30psi target, the 531rwhp (395rwkW) best we saw from the Trolvo is nothing to snort at. This car has already run a PB of 10.95@125mph with the unopened engine and around 464whp (346rwkW), so we expect the ETs will dip significantly the next time this thing hits the strip.

The plan from here is to race the Trolvo as-is and see how deep we can run into the 10s. Then, in the New Year, we’ll look at upgrading the turbo and shooting for even more power!