UK Superchargers?

UK Superchargers?

Author
Discussion

Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
Hey, Folks,

I've spoken to Monkfish Performance about their Superchargers, and, although it's not available yet, they say that they will be doing one for the C5 for £7K which is maintenance free and fits under the stock hood. This is fitted and tuned.

Does anyone know anywhere else which does Superchargers for C5's (2001 A4), that are similar (spec wise) to the above, but perhaps a bit cheaper, and are available now?

It was great to meet some of you at the Fairmile last night - looking forward to next month already! smile

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Col.

eldudereno

997 posts

233 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
Surely you're better off getting a tried and tested supercharger from the States at a fraction of the cost?

http://www.zip-products.com/CorvetteForum/dept.asp...

Don't get a top mounted version unless you want to change the hood.

Edited by eldudereno on Wednesday 27th June 13:23

Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
Not disputing that, really fancy a pro-charger, but with import duty and paying someone to fit and tune the thing, surely it's going to cost about the same as the Monkfish one anyway?

Unless I'm missing something?

eldudereno

997 posts

233 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
Many US suppliers will readily give you a bill of sale for a much lower amount giving you a very nice saving on the duty + vat. Any decent mechanic will fit the kit in no time at all so no real need to go to a specialist. With regards to setting the car up it's possible to remove your computer and merely send it off to be reprogrammed for your exact set-up.

Edited by eldudereno on Wednesday 27th June 17:03

michaelZ16

119 posts

241 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
Just put a pro-charger on my Z. It wasn't easy to install, but I'm not a trained mechanic.The car is a trifle quick though......evil

It cost me one heck of a lot less than £7k, that's for sureyes

Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
OK - come on, then - how much did it cost you? In the spirit of community! smile

Col.

LuS1fer

41,569 posts

251 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
www.nsracing.com in London are the agents for Vortech who do a kit for the Vette. I paid £4500 to have mine fitted to the Mustang which was the top spec polished 462hp kit. The Vette one is more expensive but my price was based on when it was 1.6 dollars to the £. It is expensive but if it goes wrong, you can take it back and tell them to fix it. Luckily, mine has been flawless.

monkfish1

11,691 posts

230 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
All superchargers are expensive. That said, vortech style superchargers are invariably cheaper than those such as the Harrop and Magnacharger.

We have tried both and driven both. For our monaro work we went with the Harrop (no bonnet clearance issues) and for me in performance terms (and i don't just mean outright power) the Harrop came out top and as such is the product that we now offer.

Both work and have their place however. Best advice i can give is try to drive one of each before you decide.

ws6

420 posts

246 months

Wednesday 27th June 2007
quotequote all
Try Mark at http://www.rapid-gb.co.uk/ formerly of Linden Special Vehicles. He supercharges LS1 and LS2's all day for the Holden, cant see why he wouldn't do a vette.


Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
Hmmm... they're all expensive. The cheapest quote I've had so far is £4800 fitted (as recommended by LU51FER), which for me is still stretching the bounds of what I'm happy spending on this kinda thing.

I'm actually thinking I may just buy the A&A Corvette kit from the US for £3000 (Custom Pro-Charger install), and either try to fit it myself (which I'm told is pretty easy), or pay my local performance car garage to do it for £500 or so...

Hmmm...

Does anyone have experience of actually fitting a supercharger? If so, how easy is it?


Corsette

135 posts

241 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
Procharger has self contained oil supply, if I remember correctly. With the Vortech you have to tap into the oil pan for the oil return line.

Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
Oh - it must be the vortech one, from A&A, then, as it's self lubricating from the car's oil supply...


Boosted LS1

21,198 posts

266 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
Thing is, unless you're competant you're taking a big risk imo. If using a business to do the work there may be a warranty included to cover the pcm tune. Otherwise it could end in tears. As you get cheaper and cheaper the risk is rising unless you can do it all yourself.

Boosted.

LuS1fer

41,569 posts

251 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
www.vortechsuperchargers.com has an installation manual you can download for their kits. It doesn't look too difficult but I decided against it when I got to the punching of the oil pan.

£4800 isn't really a lot of money given the power these things make as it takes the car to a whole different level of performance. That's probably a few over-zealous ticks on a Porsche options list.

The main advantage of a UK supplier is avoiding the "arseing about" if it goes wrong. A couple of Mustang owners have had excessively noisy Vortechs supplied and have had to return the units at their expense to the USA. I can sympathise as the same sort of thing happened to me when I bought wheels from the US and the chrome peeled and they had to go back at my expense. My supercharger kit came with a wrong pipe which would have thrown me but the supplier adapted it and sent me the correct pipe.

Bear in mind the different characteristics of the two types of supercharger. The centrifugal type are more a universal blower adapted to various models by different ducting to feed into the stock intake. The computer tune is replaced to take advantage of it. The nett effect is a car that drives like a normal car at lower speeds and builds quickly to a whizz bang frenetic rush at the top end that will have you grabbing gears like they've become disposable. To my mind, it's not ideal because the redline is a rush in every gear but it means the car drives like a normal car for most of the time and is, in theory, far gentler on the clutch and drivetrain as the rush comes when the car is already into it's stride. It can mean rowing the gearbox to get maximum velocity though despite the headline torque figure.

The screw type tend to be more expensive having dedicated intake compressors that bolt on. These give you a massive hit of torque low down but may be less powerful than a centrifugal so the car will be easier to wheelspin, induce oversteer if you boot it in a corner and I assume more likely to fry tyres and clutch. The advantage is torque everywhere but probably poorer fuel economy and more strain on the drivetrain. I have no experience of this type so am only passing on what others have said.

Whatever you do, good luck with it. I suppose I should warn you that it means p*ssing round with your insurance company but I've found A-Plan very accommodating.

te51cle

2,342 posts

254 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
Those installed prices seem pretty reasonable to me. You have to ask what is included in each package such as bigger fuel injectors, fuel pumps etc. You can make a kit cheaper by leaving some "optional" parts out but you still end up having to buy them anyway...

stevieturbo

17,474 posts

253 months

Thursday 28th June 2007
quotequote all
Anyone who thinks they can just buy a kit from the US, fit it, and drive off into the sunset happily, smoking the tyres ....

well, I think they are either extremely capable at tuning cars with lots of experience in doing such work, or more likely, have never done any such work, and are a little naive.

These things are not easy, they rarely go smoothly, and can so so easily turn into a nightmare if not in capable hands.

Im all for DIY'ers, but dont try and take on such work lightly.

Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Friday 29th June 2007
quotequote all
Fair enough, if that's the case, but many of these kits simply come as bolt on situations and seem no more difficult than fitting a Nitrous system (well, OK, a *little* more difficult!) - the tune to map the car correctly generally comes on a Diablosport programmer or similar, meaning that there is little or no need for a custom tune in standard form (this is, of course, all information given to me by the vendors, so may be complete crap!)


Boosted LS1

21,198 posts

266 months

Friday 29th June 2007
quotequote all
Guess we'll know when you've done a £3k installation. Seriously, spend a bit extra and get a UK map by somebody from on here even if you do the installation yourself. There are a number of people who can offer custom remaps.

Ringram may do a remap if he hasn't done the installation and he travels.

Boosted.

TEKWIZ

283 posts

241 months

Friday 29th June 2007
quotequote all
This is my favourite SC.




Read full post here

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&t=362332 

One of the better SC

Colvette

Original Poster:

844 posts

253 months

Friday 29th June 2007
quotequote all
That is really cool - just one problem: I don't want a raised hood, so I'm going to have to go down the Procharger\V-Engineering\Vortech route...

But - on reading that thread, I saw these little beauties (the rear lights)



Where can I get a set of those??