Mustang Power!

Ola Lysenstoen grew up in Lunner, about 40 miles north of Oslo, always dreaming of piloting helicopters. During his senior year at school, he made inquiries at all the schools in Norway that offered helicopter flight instruction. He soon found out that helicopter flight training in Norway was very expensive... and Ola didn't come from a wealthy family. So Ola made contact with helicopter pilot training schools in the US, and in 1988 decided to go to a school in Ellenton, Connecticut that offered the lowest price tuition for helicopter flight training.

After successfully graduating Flight School with a certified Commercial Helicopter Pilot license, Ola became a pilot for a Helicopter Service in Connecticut. For the next 3 years, Ola ferried wealthy people to and from work, took aerial photographers up for shoots, and flew surveyors to commercial projects.

In his spare time Ola learned about turbocharging engines and started offering his service to owners of Audis who wanted more power and speed from their cars. Ola met and made friends with many of his turbo clients. After 3 years in Connecticut, a friend asked if he'd like to relocate to Southern California and fly helicopters out of Oxnard and Camarillo Airports; this was an offer that Ola could not refuse.

After 3 years of basically doing the same type of work, Ola was offered a job by his friend Rick who was working for Turbonetics Turbochargers of Camarillo, California. Ola took the job and his position at Turbonetics was Tech Sales Manager. Soon afterward, Ola made contact with Norwegian rally driver Martin Schanche and started selling him turbos and trading turbo knowledge back and forth. But six months later, Turbonetics was sold and at the time there was no clear direction on the performance side of the business.

So in 1999 Ola and Rick started Innovative Turbo Systems, a company that designs and manufactures custom turbocharging systems for any application - go karts to race cars to drag boats to big tractor rigs to log jammers making up to 1600hp and 3000 ft-lb. of torque.

It was in late 1999 that Ola decided that he needed to work on and have fun with a project car. He purchased a damaged 1996 Ford Mustang GT and decided to see what he could do to make it fast - real fast - using the experience and knowledge that he had gained in the past 3 years at Turbonetics and Innovative Turbo Systems.

Ola chose the Mustang GT because it came with a V8 engine, was easy to tune-up and turbocharge - plus the Ford Mustang was the favourite car of his wife Maura.

At night and on the weekends Ola worked on the Mustang. First he put a Saleen front bumper on and purchased a Saleen SR 2-stage rear wing. For the lower rocker panels, Ola used an aftermarket brand. The power-dome hood is from Harwood and has a 3-inch raised cowl like the Cobra R. The front Short/Long Arm independent suspension was upgraded and strengthened with tubular suspension members from Central Coast Mustang and a new coil- over kit was also purchased from Central Coast Mustang in Tehachapi, California.

Central Coast Mustang also supplied stronger rear lower control arms, new bushings, thicker front/rear anti-sway bars, and then Ola changed the factory 'Quadra-Shocks' to stronger Tokico gas-shocks. He lowered the front/rear 4 inches with Eibach coil springs - 550/280. The factory Brembo brakes work fine but Ola is getting ready to install 13-inch Wilwood rotors with 6-piston calipers for even stronger braking power.

The factory 4R70W 4-speed electronically controlled automatic transmission can handle up to 700hp so no major changes were necessary, but Ola did alter the line pressure, shift points, and lock-up point for the extra power that he was getting ready to add to the 4.6 litre SOHC V8 engine. The GT comes with a Positraction Rear End with a 3.73 final drive ratio.

Next the engine bay was cleared out so that Ola could work on adding power to the stock 260hp V8. First a Fluidyne High-Performance radiator was installed. Then an Innovative Turbo GT 66 Dual-Ball Bearing Turbo was installed - it can make up to 600hp with 25-psi of boost dialled in. Ola then took apart the engine management system and installed custom software allowing for modifications to all engine parameters such as fuel, timing, spark advance and top speed. The big GT 66 turbo spins up to 120K rpm.

A specially fabricated Innovative Turbo Systems wastegate was installed to help the hot gases quickly exit. The 4.6 V8 was upgraded next with stronger Carillo rods, lightweight Ross aluminium racing pistons and a steel crankshaft from Ford Motorsports - but the stock flywheel was kept in place. Ola next ported the heads but kept the manifold and springs stock because the SOHC engine doesn't make too much more rpm in this modified trim. Innovative specially fabricated a 4-into1 header system to further help the hot gases quickly exit the engine into the turbo.

He added a remote oil filter/cooler in front, kept the stock rack and pinion steering system but installed an auxiliary PS oil cooler. The stock oil pan was taken off and a Canton unit with extra capacity and internal baffles was installed.

The factory dual exhaust system was discarded and a specially fabricated Innovative Turbo System 2½ dual exhaust system was installed for better breathing. A giant intercooler was fabricated by Innovative Turbo - it measures 24½ x 3 inch. It was placed down below and behind the front bumper.

More power, faster speeds and upgraded handling capability demands better tyres and stronger wheels so Ola choose Toyo P255/40ZR Proxes wrapped around beautiful TSW 6-spoke, 18 X 9 REVO cast aluminium wheels.

On the interior, Ola ripped out the factory high-backed bucket seats and replaced them with Konig race-style foam front bucket seats offering better lateral support. The factory gauge cluster was replaced with an AutoMeter cluster and customized by Innovative Turbo to allow all factory warning lamps to work properly. An AutoMeter oil/water gauge cluster was installed on the top-centre of the dashboard where the LED clock was, and the driver-side A-pillar was fixed with AutoMeter gauges for boost, air/fuel mixture and electronic fuel pressure.

Ola drives his project Mustang GT everyday, to and from work and to do his everyday errands like taking and picking up his daughters from school.

He usually dials the turbo to just 6-psi of boost - that makes about 425hp at 5800 rpm. This setup gives Ola plenty of power to zip to 60mph (97 km/h) from a standstill in just 4.6 seconds, covering the quarter in just 11.4 sec at 124mph. That's plenty of power and speed to challenge any Corvette, Porsche or Ferrari that Ola can find at a traffic light or on the back roads around Simi Valley...

Contact:

www.innovativeturbo.com

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