Probably a question that's already been asked but why not! I have a 2008 TL Type S with all standard bolt ons and running about 290hp on dyno, but I am still missing that scare factor. Would a turbo or supercharger be the best bang for the buck or can someone point me in another direction? I don't know a whole lot about boost or whats compatible with my TL, so any advice would be much appreciated!

 

I'm not sure if there's a supercharger kit for the Type S. There is, however a turbo kit.

As a kit, the turbo is just worlds apart in reliability. The kit is complete with everything needed to make the engine last such as fuel pump and injectors.

The Comptech supercharger kit is crude and will blow the engine eventually and it makes less power than the turbo kit. You can fix this by adding what it needs, more fuel, a real engine managment, not crushing the fuel pressure regulator, and/or adding a methanol injection kit.

There are some advantages a turbo will always have on a supercharger. Assuming it takes 50hp to drive the supercharger, the engine has to make 50 additional hp in order to break even on the dyno. This means the turbo will have less stress on the engine at any given hp level, the fuel requirements will be slightly less. MPG can be slightly better not that you care if you're FI. Torque is generally much higher and at a lower rpm with the turbo. You will get a nice broad powerband with power starting much early on than stock vs the supercharger which raises peak numbers but doesn't help as much at the lower rpms.

Superchargers are usually easier to install and can potentially be emissions compliant. You could get a turbo TL to pass tailpipe emissions but just the fact that you have to move the converters further downstream into the downpipe makes it illegal.

Each one has it's advantages and disadvantages but it's up to the owner to decide.

 

Wow, very informative thank you! Reputable brand? Horsepower gains based on each individual car?

 

Gotta search my friend. A lot of threads about this.

 

Haha believe me I have spent hours and hours and pushed through many headaches looking through threads! I'll look harder

 

According to some of the threads and this is just by my reading, the supercharger and piping will bolt up fine. It's the tune that is missing. But if you have the means to get the J&R ECU, that will allow you to properly tune it.

I can say from personal experience that the turbo will transform your ride. But it does degrade the "luxury" feel.

In the OP's defense, most threads are worthless for finding information. I've tried to find info and spent literally hours trying to verify one thing I thought I read. Sticky's are badly needed.

 

^lets tag team and knock em out, KN.

 

I honestly can't blame anyone for not being willing to search for too long..... there's so much stuff that's been repeated over and over and over and over from every possible angle that search results are going to clog up your head and confuse you way more than before you searched.

On that note...FIC-6 was a pretty good solution...which I never got to do. Not knocking JnR down, and If I may say, they've come a long way with stuff most thought weren't possible...but the pricing is a bit way over what I'd wanna invest. But then again, that's just me

 

Your 20 yrs old.. willing to fork up $10K for the turbo kit? Another $5k for transmission (not necessary, but I'd recommend). I'm just holding til the economy gets alittle better. Too much jobs being sent to Mexico and China these days, I don't know how long I'll be getting a job.

 

Turbo= $ & power!...

I Hate cars " your a bad ass! "

 

Extreme hijack but.....

We should. I'm going to start heading to "steady state" and just enjoy the ride for the foreseeable future. So I won't be out there as much working on it and could start doing some documenting. Time to take a break from changes.

Any good examples of how they should look?

 

I think it really comes down to how much you want to spend as its not an insignificant difference. Of course being in California, turbo was never an option, but since I'm A/T it probably would have blown up my trans in a week anyhow. Honestly if its a DD, leave it alone, I wish I would have left my car alone. Save the money and buy a better car to mess around with, STi, Evo, etc (I'm thinking cheap cars). That'll give you that scare factor you seek.

 

turbo=best

 

Skip on the turbo and the super charger and move onto a much more reliable sentiment. Do a full race build and you will be naturally aspirated putting down ~400whp.

 

That ^^ TL is not meant to raced and running crazy horsepower. It'd be worth more to run a RWD/AWD in something you can actually hot rod around in.

 

 

There are several reasons why FI is the way to go for a high hp small street engine. Up to 300whp, NA is a decent alternative but above that for a street car, FI is better in nearly every way.

A turbo engine at the 400hp level will have MUCH more torque and a much fatter powerband than NA. They can be more reliable as well because you don't have to rev it to the moon to make power which reduces stress everywhere.

A little 3.2 making 400hp NA is not going to be streetable and chances are torque will be well under 300lbs. You're talking a 9,000rpm+ redline with most of the power gains being past 7k. A turbo motor is going to have nearly as much torque as hp and it's going to start making serious torque very low in the rpm range. The turbo offers a huge power increase with no penalty in drivability.

NA at that level will require better internals, valve springs, cams, ported heads, ported intake, throttlebody, basically a fully built race engine while the turbo with a good tune will work fine on a stock engine. The cam lift and ramp speeds required to make that hp can hurt reliability. The only reason turbos and superchargers have had failures up to the 400whp mark is from a bad tune. If it's kept out of detonation it will live a very long life.

After racing all of these years you really get an appreciation for forced induction's ability to make serious power while keeping things reliable and streetable. I've run up against plenty of huge cammed big blocks that sound great but are hardly daily drivers, all rowdy, loud, with serious drivability issues with my quiet daily driver V6 with a lot of boost.

 

supercharger all day....

 

^neg.

 

With the prices of SC being what they are I have to agree with juvi.

SC, ecu, preventative systems, addons, gauges, etc, and you'll probably still be less then base price for the turbo.

It's also a better type of power for a DD imo.

I plan to do a full exhaust, sc, ecu, and call it a day.

 

No reason a turbo couldn't be a DD any more than an SC. Either case the gas mileage will suck if it's tuned correctly and the boost can be tailored and managed easily.

They are certainly going to deliver power differently and cost will obviously differ.

 

Do you have anything to back that up?

 

just his post count.

i think he's just trying to get 5 posts to gain privaleges on the forum.

 

Im not choosing one side or the other but the sound from a supercharger is sexy

 

^The sound from a turbo is sexy too. It really just comes down to cost and horsepower goals.

Why get the turbo when all I want is 350-375?
Why spend $7k when SC sell for sub $3k these days?
Doesn't the turbo require a lot of exhaust work? SC can practically be slapped into a stock car?

And I like the go-cart effect. What RPM are you turbo guys hitting boost at? When does the SC hit boost?

Edit: This topic could get ugly real fast. Not saying I wouldn't want the turbo...It's just not in my plans.

 

The sound of the SC is much meaner, the car does need to be more modified to run the turbo, where the SC can be used on a stock car with stock cats.
As far as hitting boost the SC is instant once you get enough vacuum, you are at 3-5 psi almost instantly. The turbo can get into boost at pretty low rpm, maybe 2500 and above.

When it comes to power and consistency that is where the turbo far out shines the SC. The intercooler alone makes a huge difference in power, not to mention being able to run 2-3 times the amount of boost the SC allowed. The real downside is the gas mileage at the moment. From 25 mpg to 15 now makes the DD part more expensive, but a lot of fun.

 

The turbo sound from a TL and a STI are two different sounds especially with the blowoff valve. Most of the TL running turbo have 3in exhaust are loud and raspy

Is the 15mpg for just turbo or both?

 

So like I said, instant on, turbo far exceeds my HP goals, I'll save the cash and get a SC.

Either way is baller. If I had $10k and unlimited down time available I would totally buy the turbo.

 

It's amazing how people who don't own either are such authorities on the subject.

 

I hope that's not directed at me...I made no such claims.

But...

How many boosted cars have you owned? TL the first one? Were you SCed before the turbo?

Once again I find it comical that the people who jumped on the JnR train early get so offensive. Like it's some type of special club.

 

with the path ive taken with my car (VIP) i think turbo would be overkill. im more about stance and i dont need 400+ HP. if someone could make the SC work on a type S id be all over it (not sure its been done reliably but i may be wrong). it would give me enough power to keep me satisfied without having to worry about mixing excessive camber with 400+ HP

 

Is the tune the only problem with the S/C not working for the Type S ?

 

No. It's fitment issues.

 

^BBBZZZZZZTTTTTTT- WRONG. The kit bolts up fine. Prior issues were just the ACM not being good enough to get by.

Can be solved with an FIC or MS3.

https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...harger+install

 

Edit: I was actually quoting someone else. I hadn't looked at that info in years. I knew the management didn't work intially but I thought there were a couple things plus the battery that had to be moved around for the 3.5. Oh well.

 

The more power you make, the more fuel is required no matter how you do it. However, if you add a turbo and stay out of boost (impossible, I know) mpg shouldn't change. If it does, there's a tuning issue. There's no reason you can't run the stock target AF ratio under vacuum.

 

This is why I don't understand the turbo tune being set to run 11.5-12.5 under vacuum. I think my tune is using load to determin AFR and running the car on the freeway in 6th gear is putting the engine under enough load to make the ECU think I am transitioning into boost and give me low 11's. 5th gear pushing the car seems to use less fuel than calm 6th gear driving.

 

What does your AFR table look like? Mine looks like this....I have a new map that doesn't have the 16's that I am going to try next. These are generated by tunerstudio's table generator based on adjusted inputs.



I see my AFR going high when just cruising.

 

I have not extracted my tune yet, I hate to admit but I'm scared I will lose the tune or mess something up. I am driving the car 3-4 times a week and need the car running. I have watched your video 3 or 4 times and am working up the courage to check out the fuel tables. This beta versions thing confuses me and you losing and reloading your tune recently, makes me think the same could happen to me and I am back to dealing with a tuner. I am very happy with just about every aspect of my tune, I just need to pull fuel from the lower load ratings to get more consistent mileage. I see 16's at very light throttle, but go into the 12's at enough throttle to accelerate.
Thanks for your help

 

The same could be said for the S/C. At least as far as MPG is concerned. I'm not really mapping my AFRs and stuff. Around town, I'm hitting rather dismal MPG numbers (darn lead foot), but a recent run to Vegas netted around 32 mpg with a full car at around a 90ish mph average.