Hi,

I love projects like this.

Ok, in deference to In-Tech and his far greater experience than mine, I believe pressurizing the throttle body will expose the FPR to boost. The factory regulator has a port on the air cleaner side which exposes it to atmospheric pressure. If you pressurize this side of the regulator and TB, the atmospheric pressure port will see boost just like the injectors. The TBI pump usually does not create high fuel pressure so a TPI pump is probably in order. Regardless of injector choice, you may find the injectors need a RRFPR to help make tuning easier. I'd do some research though as low pressure TBI injectors are not always happy to operate at high pressure.

One issue folks have found by pressurizing the TB is that fuel and air will be forced out the TB around the throttle shaft. One answer is to supply boost to the throttle shaft on both sides of the TB. This can be done by drilling holes that are connected to air from above the injectors in the TB opening. Another is to drill ports from outside the TB then use fittings and vacuum hose to route boost to the shafts. This solution uses both methods for the one barrel TBs used on crossfire injection.


You said you have a '59 engine which should have pressurized oiling. This is good. I would not be comfortable adding boost to a splash oiling engine. I would strongly recommend considering thermal barrier coatings on the pistons and cylinder heads. Techline Coatings sells this as a DIY product and I have had great results using it. 235 rods are strong. And they're heavy. For a boosted engine at 5 psi I would only be concerned with bottom end failure if the engine were seeing detonation.

Speaking of detonation, have you selected a knock sensor yet? Knock sensors are tuned to the engine bore size. The 60 degree V6 family also uses 3.5" bore engines so I'd start there. The trick is matching the knock sensor resistance to the ecm family. 89 S10 Blazer was available with TBI and uses a knock sensor. 90 Lumina APV (All Plastic Van) was available with 3.1 TBI. If you're using an early TBI ECM that uses an external knock module, it wouldn't hurt to get ESC from one of those vehicles.

Is it too late to consider alternate TB choices? A Clifford dual carb intake and a pair of model 700 TB's might give more injector choices as it uses the same injector as Saturn TBI and GM 366/427 engines from Kodiak trucks. And it could allow you to use an aluminum TB "hat" from a late '80s 2.0 TBI engine.



There are plenty of threads to read through although few people stay with the thread until a project is finished. I hope you find success with your project.