Supercharging?

[paul.deitch]

Day dreaming again, but where can I find info on superchargers for the s3, and the likely costs/benefits? Does the engine have to be rebuilt as well beforehand or is it basically a bolt on and enjoy?

[Last S4]

As far as I know you don't need to rebuild the engine if its ok to start with.
I think the biggest problem is getting the supercharger speed correct by using the right size pulleys.
I looked into it briefly for my Mi16, but there is no room under the bonnet for the supercharger. I was looking on Ebay at the unit used for the new Mini - modify the intake, get the pulley size right and I think you are away.
I am no expert on this though despite driving a supercharged Range Rover sport as my normal car. If pics of the setup would help let me know.

[GreenV8S]

There's no one answer, it depends entirely how you approach it. I'd suggest exhausting all the options for capacity increases and/or conventional tuning before you tried forced induction though, and if you do go for FI I suspect you'll find there are more turbo packages available (for the 2.8) than supercharged ones.

[CTE]

There are quite a number of twin turbo set ups in Sierra 4x4`s etc. The main issue will be space and the exhaust manifold. Mike at LS1Boosted is a good place to start aswell as the fast Ford forums.

[Jed-S]

http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/tvr/s/Default.asp?sto...


Bugger - just noticed that you were the last poster on that thread.

Edited by Jed-S on Friday 4th September 18:17

[paul.deitch]

Thanks for the replies guys. Greenv8s can you help me understand why you suggest all the other mods first. Is it the cost/benefit ratio or something else. It just seemed to my simplistic mind that I could bolt on ooudles (sp?) of hp with hardly any effort and no other changes. I guess this isn't possible? Are there any companies offering this upgrade today?

[sighck]

Check this
http://www.skogenracing.com/

or this picture

Edited by sighck on Saturday 5th September 13:19

[Boosted LS1]

Or better still with turbo's you can have something like this.





Smaller turbos would bring the power in lower down the graph and still have the same peak bhp but we want to crack the 500/550 hp barrier so went for slightly larger items. The car's perfectly driveable and is a daily driver.

Edited by Boosted LS1 on Saturday 5th September 14:53

[Gerald-TVR]

sighck said:

Check this
http://www.skogenracing.com/

Edited by sighck on Saturday 5th September 13:19

I would if I could understand it!!!!!!

[GreenV8S]

paul.deitch said:

Thanks for the replies guys. Greenv8s can you help me understand why you suggest all the other mods first. Is it the cost/benefit ratio or something else. It just seemed to my simplistic mind that I could bolt on ooudles (sp?) of hp with hardly any effort and no other changes. I guess this isn't possible? Are there any companies offering this upgrade today?

Just to get a forced induction system working at all needs quite a big investment in hardware and the associated management systems. So it's only worth while if you're looking for a substantial power increase.

More power isn't necessarily the best way to make the car faster, but it's got an obvious attraction. In terms of cost effectiveness, the options (best first) are:

• Trade up to a more powerful car, if there is one. In this case you have V8S, Griffith, Chimaera etc available. By sticking with a standard car it's cheaper to insure, likely to be more reliable, the rest of the car will be engineered to suit the extra power, and the money you invest buying it will potentially be recovered when you come to sell.

• Put a bigger engine in the existing car. If there's a bigger capacity version of the original engine available, it'll give you more power and torque without compromising the other characteristics.

• Tune the existing engine. Modest power gains can be had by tweaking the existing engine, although these generally result in a compromise between ultimate power and tractability/reliability.

• Forced induction. If you have got the biggest engine that's available, and need to go further than can be achieved with conventional tuning techniques, then you might resort to forced induction. You can get substantial power increases, but the bigger the increase the more fragile the engine will be. You need to know the strengths and weaknesses of the base engine to understand how much boost the engine can withstand and what mechanical mods are required to support that.

Bear in mind that as soon as you start modifying, insurance and general running costs start to rise. The time and money spent is largely wasted in the sense that you're unlikely to see much of it back when you sell the car. Most likely it'll sell for similar money to a standard car but be harder to sell. You can also expect the transmission, suspension and brakes to need attention and it's up to you whether you plan to upgrade these in advance or wait and see what breaks. The 'wait and see' approach obviously means that it is going to blow up on you from time to time. I've spent rather a lot of time and money on various power upgrades for the V8S over the years, but I think I've spent even more on the transmission, suspension, brakes, cooling etc so that the rest of the car copes with the resulting performance. It would have been more sensible to save the money and simply buy a faster car. I didn't do it because it was sensible, I did it because I wanted to.

Edited by GreenV8S on Saturday 5th September 16:14

[sighck]

Sorry, follow the link, click 'BILAR' and scroll down to 'Kryckans Ford Sierra 2.9 turbo' and click on the picture. This is a low cost build, they use one turbo and it gives them ~320 bhp on the wheels.

I aggree with GreenV8S but if you like the car, have the money and time and can do a lot of the work by your self, why not go for a turbo or charger?

[Boosted LS1]

I looked at the sierra link. It's running e85 but I can't see any mention of boost level or compression ratio. 7psi on a 24v cosworth with stock compression will get appx 300 hp at the wheels. My guess is the e85 is helping quite a lot with higher boost.

[sighck]

Here is a link to the build (some pictures).
http://skogenracing.editboard.com/projekt-forum-f1...

The engine should be a 2.9 with cat (in Sweden all cars after 1987 has cat), compression ratio 9.5:1 and the only boost level figure I could find is approx. 1.5bar

[orange_dodo]

sighck said:

the only boost level figure I could find is approx. 1.5bar

21psi!!??




ETA, unless thats not gauge pressure then it's a less engine exploding 7psi

Edited by orange_dodo on Saturday 5th September 22:29

[Boosted LS1]

At 21 psi heads lift. We are fitting nitrogen filled Wills rings, special studs and a head brace. That ought to sort it. Also our compression's been lowered. The swedish car seems to be on stock compression. I'm amazed they can use that amount of boost without detonation issues.

Old fords do work well with boost though. They need a bit of help

[sighck]

I haven't read the whole thread (37 pages) for boost level, it's not easy to find any more technical info besides the first page. I can send him a mail and ask for it. I think the built is just for fun not serious, I assume if they blow the engine they just get a new one from the scrap.

Edited by sighck on Saturday 5th September 23:42

[Boosted LS1]

^ Yes, using second hand engines is pretty cheap especially over here in the UK but my swedish friend say engines in SE are very expensive. People here do the same thing, crank up the boost till it breaks and then stick in another standard engine. I think the E38 raises octane a lot, it's popular in sweden but not over here.

[sighck]

I have check 22 pages now and what I can see is that they have testet 1.5bar with success however 'normal' boost is 1-1.1bar. E85 is around 104 RON.

This link is when they dyno tested the car
http://skogenracing.myftp.org/film/www.skogenracin...

Edited by sighck on Sunday 6th September 00:16

Edited by sighck on Sunday 6th September 00:18

[paul.deitch]

OK thanks for the info, I will probably go for a more powerful car in future, but not until next year, and will probably keep the S until son is responsible enough.... could take a while though.

[Boosted LS1]

sighck said:

I have check 22 pages now and what I can see is that they have testet 1.5bar with success however 'normal' boost is 1-1.1bar. E85 is around 104 RON.

This link is when they dyno tested the car
http://skogenracing.myftp.org/film/www.skogenracin...

Edited by sighck on Sunday 6th September 00:16

Edited by sighck on Sunday 6th September 00:18

Thanks for getting the info, I like that sort of stuff. Just heard a swedish car has just made 464 hp & 486 Lbs/ft. One of theirs maybe and on E85?