I have been looking at ways to improve the performance of my Crossfire for about a month now and have been researching different ways to do this. After a lot of thought I have decided to go with a V8. I have been asked to document this conversion, so this will be the first official post. This first post is just to get you all up to speed on what I have been up to and then I will post from time to time as it progresses.
Background:
I looked at forced induction including dropping in an SRT-6 engine which are selling fairly cheap, but decided on the V8 for these reasons,
1. investment, dropping in a SRT-6 engine or other turbo/supercharger set up will result in car that will probably never be worth more than an SRT-6 which currently isn't worth all that much more than a Limited.
2. The only V8 Crossfire's on the market are priced very very very high.
3. Love the sound, smoothness and torque of a V8.
4. Exclusiveness.
5. Only a 130 pound weight penalty over a non supercharged V6.
6. All Mercedes
Auto Body Parts or an OEM (non Frankenstein) result.
I have located an engine complete with ECU and engine harness. The engine I found is from a 2002 CL500 with less than 15,000 miles on it.
the engines that will fit are any 24 valve V8 from 1998 - 2005 430 C43, 500, and 55 AMG. The C43 would be a little easier since it already has the correct exhaust manifolds. It also looks like you need the thinner electric fan from CL500 (may be on other Mercedes as well) . The biggest fear is electronics. I have called and talked to many experts that have said it can't be done to it can be done. The problem is with the ECU and the VIN encoding. When you try to run the V8 ECU it will not find things it is looking for and activate the anti theft system. It appears that if I bolt it all up and use the ECU and harness from the donor car, it will not start. I will have to tow the vehicle to someone with either a Mercedes Star Mark or an Auto Logic with Mercedes module diagnostic computer. I just had a good talk to an independent mechanic that hot rods Porsches and Mustangs while doing service on Mercedes and other German cars to pay the bills. It turns out he remembers me from when I was showing the Cobra in the Dallas area a few years ago. He said he even remembered talking to me a few years ago! We hit if off and he said he could get this car to run if I can bolt the engine in, and he does have the Star Mark computer which he said would be needed to reassociate the ECU with the Crossfire. There is no way to know for sure if this will work but I have gone as far as I can and now just need to start wrenching.
If all goes well I should have the 5 litre engine in my garage by the end of the month or first week of November.