SubUrban Gorilla: 1000 lbs of torque & Louisiana Mud Race!

Today on Xtreme 4x4, Ian and Jessi build the twin turbo motor for their suburban Gorilla. Plus, how about a race where half the time you can't even see the course mud racing Louisiana style.

Welcome to Xtreme 4x4 where today our ultimate to

monster, the suburban gorilla gets its ultimate power plant. That's right. Our diesel has been a long time in waiting from design to prototype to the finished product. And today

our Banks twin Turbo

Max is going to be assembled right

here on the show.

If you remember we called G

Banks to help design the first ever twin Turbo

Dima

diesel for our to monster.

He came to the extreme shop with a pile of parts and his chief designer Bob Road

together we built some prototype parts and then those parts came here to Gale Banks. Engineering in

California

has been building performance engines for years and his skills really began to shine in the offshore boat racing world for his 930 horsepower big block Chevy gas engines became the staple in winning boats. Then he made the switch from salt water to the salt flats where his creation set records and helped solidify his relationship with the original equipment manufacturers.

And now,

Banks engineering is looking into the future

and they see diesel fuel as the answer and they're using the diesel engines in some rather unique ways.

Whether you've got a Chevy, a Ford or a Dodge.

We're after it,

we're finding the limit. We're finding how much those engines will do that come in those trucks. I believe diesel is the future of fuel, especially in lighter vehicles

to find the limit to find out how they'll endure. We've been running a racing program pretty extensively here for the last five years. We've built four different trucks to run in four different types of racing.

The Sidewinder

Duramax type R, this is a world class road racing vehicle powered by a diesel engine twin turbo

about 750 horsepower capable of close to 200 miles an hour, which is plenty fast for a road racer. This is the sidewinder D Max type D for drag race. And what we're doing there is we're pushing the total horsepower limit of the

Duramax. The white vehicle back here is a Donahoe Banks off road stock, full class truck. We've done pretty good with it so far.

A diesel running against gasoline everywhere else at the Henderson 400

we took a second

in the process. We beat the truck that won the class

in the Baja 1000.

The first one we did is this one right here

and that's the bank's sidewinder Dakota.

This is the world's fastest pickup truck. Plus we drive it on the street.

Guys. Go to mcdonald's with a damn thing.

Now,

when it comes to building your

Duramax,

I got to say, I think you came to the right place for that too.

You guys are in for a treat because most of you have seen inside of a gas engine. But for some odd reason, there's this big mystery about the inner workings of the diesel engine, but not after today,

Banks has taken everything he's learned about building killer gas motors and is applying it to the diesel, like lightened rotating assemblies, ported and polished cylinder heads and different cam profiles. Basically all the technology and you when you're building a killer small block or big block Chevy

and we're going to take that and apply it to

our gorilla motor

and what we built today will soon be available. Turn key from Banks power.

It all starts with this cast iron deep skirt

to

block. This one has already been home with the to

play.

The can be

have been intalled and the deck he

check

this bottom and will be held in with some

carp main ST,

the main caps can be dropped in the place

a little lube on the threads

and then torches back.

The key to any successful engine build is obviously paying attention to the details like a crankshaft oil clearance. That's why there's no crankshaft in it. Right now, we're going to check the size of the crankshaft bore using this Boar gauge, simply going to slide it in place of the crankshaft main journal

and compare the measurement to a measurement from the crank shaft. If it's within specification, we can go ahead lube up the bearings, put the crankshaft in for good. If it wasn't within specification, the crank shaft would have to be machined and you'd have to get new bearings.

Normally, when you build a serious gas engine, you replace the crane shaft. But in a diesel engine, these pieces are already pretty stout. So here they clean up the counter weights, polished them up a little bit, gave him some arrow wings to help shed the oil off that rotating mass.

And everybody say hi to David Bash.

We

help me put this in

this. This is Banks powers, master engine builder,

know it.

Now, before we can go ahead and bolt this engine to the engine stand, we have to install this flywheel housing on the back of the block. Not only will this adapt the block

to our automatic GM transmission. It also includes the coolant crossover for the coolant passages inside the block.

Later on the bank's extreme

Duramax will spin its crank on the engine,

dyno. But up next extreme mud racing where horsepower and torque run second to a good set of wiper blades. Stay tuned.

Welcome back to Xtreme 4x4. We're here in AUA

California at Banks power, finishing our ultimate

Duramax engine with it on the stand and the crank in and the cam almost in I gotta do is put on the thrust plate and cam gear

with the CM gear installed. We can go ahead and put the oil pump drive on the front of the crank shaft. And behind that is a reluctant ring that works as a crank trigger, sends a signal to the engine's computer and once this is installed, they can go ahead and put the oil pump on. Now, the computer for this engine is a Bosch E DC 16 controller. It's the factory

computer from the

Duramax diesel truck, but just like the engine builders here at banks, get inside the engine and change everything. The engineers get inside these computers, strip all the programming out and reprogramming it depending on what kind of numbers they want to get out of their

Duramax. And while these guys button this up, I'm going to take you to a place that nobody ever gets to see here at the bank's headquarters.

It could handle walking through here every day.

Sure, thanks.

This is the boss' office.

This is where Gail and his team of design engineers dream up of nothing but big horsepower and torque.

I know only a half hour away from L A but there's another L A just west of the Mississippi were off road. Dream of nothing but Mud

Louisiana was once known for its endless cotton fields. Today. The region is considered the mud racing capital of the world.

Come from

a Louisiana you got to love.

I've been playing in the mud ever since I could walk. Probably it gets in your blood. I don't know what it is.

It's a southern tradition. We just like playing in the mud. They didn't come to Motorsport City's quarter mile horseshoe just to play.

We work on them all week long so we can come one day and try to tear them up.

You just can't ask for no more extreme mud race

running two at a time side by side. Motorsport City's first turn is insanity.

The first turn is crazy.

A

4

ft straight drag and

shut your eye and hit the water and have to turn left. You can't beat that. That's just

part of life right there. You know,

when you bring those speed side by side with another person into a horseshoe curve,

it's, it's nothing but good

in turn one, it doesn't always go good

if you go on that first curve and if you're behind, you don't have any idea where that other man in front of you is sometimes. So you just, you can't see anything.

It's just like the lights go out. The windshield is totally blacked out and you don't have a clue where you are.

You're just waiting for at least maybe a quarter of inch of a clear spot in your windshield to where you need to have an idea of where you are. Your windshield wipers are twice as fast as the stock ones. If a man doesn't know how to make his windshield wipers go fast, he's not going to be able to see a hole

at Motorsport City de

Wayne was ready to tear through the mud class life to us on a Sunday afternoon is mud racing and winning at the mud races. And that's what is King Crowborough

was built to do.

This is an 84 Ford Bronco 900 horsepower.

It's like a drag car on the,

this is a 514

two inch motor. It has the 5, 14 ex heads which produces the most torque of any head you can put on the Ford motor,

but you have to design the suspension to handle the curve. We added an extra leaf on the back right side to where it would be more stiffer on the back right corner as you come into the corner, which would actually give you more handling

and that's what we've done to. Our suspension.

D Wayne was undefeated in his first two races. Then it all went back.

D Wayne. Are you? Ok,

Dune

and his co driver were ok.

The King Cobra wasn't as fortunate when I went straighten up my steering arm, my steering wheel went all the way around the opposite way and it just went hard, left out into the media there was no control over the vehicle and I just prayed to the good Lord. Everything is gonna be ok and held

on and I'm, and I'm sitting here talking to you right now. It may have been a rough day for dune,

but something tells us it won't keep him from the Louisiana mud. Words

can't describe

how great it is on a southern Sunday to be in a mud truck with 900 horsepower.

And I don't know what else to tell you

back inside the engine room at banks power, finishing up the short block on our soon to be twin turbo

derma

getting to see the inner workings of the diesel engine is rare. Indeed.

And before we leave some solid poles off the

dyno,

let us know exactly what we built

the heart of any performance engine, whether it be gas or diesel is obviously the pistons and the rods. Now this is where the difference between a gasoline part and a diesel part become very apparent. This is a typical performance gasoline piston and this is the stock

Duramax piece. Aside from the fact that the

Duramax piece weighs almost twice as much as the gasoline one. The real difference is in the design. The diesel one has a combustion bowl cast right in the top of the cylinder.

This is where all the burning of the air and fuel happened in the diesel in a gasoline engine. It's up in the combustion chamber inside the cylinder head. Now, aside from that,

the parts are just a lot beefier. You can tell this by looking at a gasoline piston pin versus a diesel piston pin. Now the assembly of the system goes together just like a gasoline engine with a floating wrist pin held in with

clips. Now, we're building our engine

specifically designed for reliability and durability. And so in the long run, power to us is sort of a secondary option.

But in the future, if you were gonna put together one of these

Duramax

and power was your main goal, you can get a set of rods like this from gale banks. These are H beam performance rods specifically designed for the

Duramax.

The bottom end torque means the front cover can be installed followed by the water pump

and the front seal

and finally a newly designed fluid dampener balancer assemble.

Next, the oil pump pickup,

the pan

and the rears,

these particular heads have been ported and polished.

The intake valve have been replaced with severe duty stainless steel pieces.

There's been new Crome Molly retainer plates and these custom valve springs developed by banks offer slightly higher clamping forces and allow for more lift without coil bind.

The dima

pistons will protrude from the block slightly. You have to match this distance with the proper head gasket slide, the head over the A RP ST

and talk and a just everything.

Hm Dave's not done with his side yet,

I'm working as fast as I can.

Big difference between the diesel and the gas engine right here. Obviously, the diesel motor has no spark plugs and the engine timing is controlled by the fuel delivery and it starts with an injection pump mounted directly to the motor.

Now, the

Duramax common rail injection system and pressures inside this fuel rail can reach well above 26,000 P si

and that fuel is then injected into the combustion chamber through the,

that's controlled by the computer. And to give you an idea, that's the

Duramax fuel injector.

And that's a typical car fuel injector that runs at about 40 to 60 P si.

Now, diesel fuel doesn't really like to start in the cold. So to solve that problem, you have what's called a glow plug in the combustion chamber. This plug will glow red hot and heat up the combustion chamber when voltage is applied to it

and it simply screws right into the head

with a completed long block. We can now install the finished pieces that started as prototypes and mock ups only a few months ago

with our

Duramax assembled and everything checked. It's down the hallway to the

dyno

here. Banks engineers connect every sensor and meter imaginable

break in time 46 hours over a two day period before going for peak power numbers.

So here's the deal we're going to build these twin Turbo

Duramax two ways, 600 horse

basic crate motor

and then a 750 to 800 horse that's been printed and we're going to use the power PDA command center on both of those as standard. So you have a basic calibration and then you can tune the power level from the PDA.

All right, Gail, you promised us 1000 pound feet of torque. Let's see what it can do. All right, let's pull on it.

345

and the,

it's gonna crack it.

There it is. There it is.

We hit it.

Hey, get a load of that horsepower

well into the 77 well into the 7, 725 horsepower and over 1100 pound feet of torque.

I don't know a

lot of

we're back on the show and as you can see back home with the good,

that's right inside this container is our banks power twin Turbo

Dr

Max

Banks engineering kept their

Duramax for one extra week to test and tune it and get some good strong numbers off the

dyno and put it into perspective for you. A stock GM

Duramax only has 650 pound feet of torque and about 360 horsepower. And we smoke those numbers with 1113 ft pounds of torque and 770 horsepower. Now, this engine is ready to go back in for one last mock up stage.

Wow.

Remember the last time we worked on this frame. We spent a lot of time building the super trick upper spring bucket. We spent tons of time bending to

and welding upper coil buckets.

Then we slipped in some rough country coil springs.

Well, obviously those coil buckets are gone. We had to cut them out of the way with a cutting torch to make room for our turbos. And I'm not gonna lie to you here. We screwed up. We honestly should have built the whole front suspension when we had the mock up pieces here at extreme. But they had to be sent back to Gail banks to have the finished pieces done in time for the motor. So we had to change. Our plan, went back to the junkyard and got some stock

upper buckets and some stock height springs

and the Chevy frame is only four inches narrower. So we just had to add some two inch spacers with all the measurements taken. We can weld it in place with the engine and the buckets. It also leads to another problem. Now, we have to reconfigure our steering or just completely move this box and we also have to deal with the exhaust. Where the heck is it going to go?

But that's just another day.

How?