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Turbo or Supercharger? Reliable?


emile
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Hi Guys,

I'm thinking about putting in a turbo or supercharger in my MK5 R32 to get between 300-350 hp, but as I can't find that much info about this searching the web, I was just wondering if anyone out there know anything about how reliable these turbo or supercharger upgrades are? I mean it's not exactly worth it if the car breakes down evry two weeks you know, so please anyone out there who had some experience with this please help me. Any company in perticular that have a good reputation for theese kind of upgrades?

Thanks

Emile

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I don't think thats an entirely fair comment Gti...the reason there are no turbo's for sale is that there are maybe 2 or 3 in total in the uk.

I suspect if people didn't like the supercharger then they'd have it removed, which is probably a lot easier than selling the car...

b0b

b0b

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[ QUOTE ]

'm thinking about putting in a turbo or supercharger in my MK5 R32 to get between 300-350 hp,

[/ QUOTE ]

Hold your horses there, tuners haven't released a remap for the mk5 yet as the ecu is being a pain in the $sre to encrypt, so the turbo or supercharger is a while yet to come, tho i may be wrong, best bet is to talk to helfinger as he should be getting his back soon after some mapping tweeking...

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Yeah, its way too early to be thinking about a supercharger or a turbo on a MKV R, becuase if i remember rightly it was the end on last year and the beginning of this year that the first Turbo was put on a UK MKIV which is a long time after the first was up for sale. And i think the supercharger was around summer last year.

Added to the fact that the ECU is holding things up i think it will be over a year if not two before both version are avaialble for the MKV R

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HGP are the company that supplies www.hpa-motorsport.com with their kits - and then VAGTech in the UK buy them from HPA (or they did when I spoke to Jon at VAGTech about it last year).

AFAIK, there are only 3 or 4 turbo'd Mk4 R32s in the UK. There are probably closer to 20 or 30 supercharged Mk4 R32s by comparison. All the conversions on standard engines push out around 330 bhp, but, with the exception of one person on here (think it's DaddyDub?) none of the supercharger installs have gone without problems. AmD have been called in to help out every installation that Regal Motorsport and Nik Saran Racing have done on the R32.

Aside from waiting for a while until there is a conversion for the Mk5 R32, I would suggest you wait another six months or so to see how reliable the Mk4 conversions have been.

Helfinger has now got his (VF ST3 S/C conversion) car back, but I'm waiting until he's run it for at least 10K miles before I go down this route, simply because there are so many other mods with the ST3 conversion to get the bhp and torque figures it's now running.

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I spoke to Helfinger the other day and by the sounds of things he has had some very beneficial changes made to his car and VF kit (it doesn't come standard like this). I'm also going to give it some more time but will more than likely go the SC route. And by the sounds of things his car is a bit of a beast and capable if silly speed without hesitation... FIREdevil.gif

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The thing is that I would only like something like 320 bhp not more, but HGP has a minimum conversion of 405 = 0-62 in 4.2 that's fast dude! But anyway the reason for me only wanting 320 bhp is that I want it to be more reliable. But is this always true? I mean it feels like the more horsepower the more changes the bigger the risk for engine fault, but maybe this is not true in this case, I mean stage 1 in the HGP conversion program is 405 bhp, I mean wouldn't this be there most reliable upgrade, I mean a stage 1 upgrade would be more reliable than a stage 3 upgrade or am I totaly wrong? Do you think I should do the HGP upgrade? I really want it but they want like 15.000 euros for it. Is that much?

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[ QUOTE ]

HGP are the company that supplies www.hpa-motorsport.com with their kits - and then VAGTech in the UK buy them from HPA (or they did when I spoke to Jon at VAGTech about it last year).

AFAIK, there are only 3 or 4 turbo'd Mk4 R32s in the UK. There are probably closer to 20 or 30 supercharged Mk4 R32s by comparison. All the conversions on standard engines push out around 330 bhp, but, with the exception of one person on here (think it's DaddyDub?) none of the supercharger installs have gone without problems. AmD have been called in to help out every installation that Regal Motorsport and Nik Saran Racing have done on the R32.

Aside from waiting for a while until there is a conversion for the Mk5 R32, I would suggest you wait another six months or so to see how reliable the Mk4 conversions have been.

Helfinger has now got his (VF ST3 S/C conversion) car back, but I'm waiting until he's run it for at least 10K miles before I go down this route, simply because there are so many other mods with the ST3 conversion to get the bhp and torque figures it's now running.

[/ QUOTE ]

No problems here watsoever (well so far anyway). Haven't had to go anywhere near AMD at all...

b0b

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[ QUOTE ]

The thing is that I would only like something like 320 bhp not more, but HGP has a minimum conversion of 405 = 0-62 in 4.2 that's fast dude! But anyway the reason for me only wanting 320 bhp is that I want it to be more reliable. But is this always true? I mean it feels like the more horsepower the more changes the bigger the risk for engine fault, but maybe this is not true in this case, I mean stage 1 in the HGP conversion program is 405 bhp, I mean wouldn't this be there most reliable upgrade, I mean a stage 1 upgrade would be more reliable than a stage 3 upgrade or am I totaly wrong? Do you think I should do the HGP upgrade? I really want it but they want like 15.000 euros for it. Is that much?

[/ QUOTE ]

None of this is about the reliability of the kit itself - the HGP/HPA and the EIP Tuning conversion consist of a turbo, a load of pipes and some electronics (OK, so this is a crude description, but you get the idea) - equally, the VF kit consists of a supercharger, some pulleys and a lot of pipes and electronics (see above!).

The likelihood of any of the kit components failing is not very high. Of all the turbo'd cars I've had, I've only ever had to replace one turbo, and that was on a very high mileage diesel Golf.

The real issue is about the additional strain you'll be putting on the bottom end of the engine, as well as the additional heat that's generated.

A lot of people choose to install intercoolers to cool the air before it gets to the cylinders - even the supercharger generates a bucket load more heat, but not as much as a turbo would, based on the mechanics of it (turbo driven by exhaust fumes which are hot and the air being sucked in and forced into the engine is very close to this. Plus compressing air causes it to heat up.

You can take it to as many bhp as you want, but as soon as you start tipping 400 bhp, you'll need to seriously consider adding additional strength to the bottom end of the engine (crank, conrods, pistons etc), as well as doing some work on the cylinder head.

For a bolt on conversion, the VF ST1 kit is a fantastic way to go. As Bob says above, no problems.

At the end of the day it's your money, but spending 15,000 euros on the kit is only the start of it. Have you thought about the brakes, suspension etc. You will probably get a shed load more value for about half your 15,000 euros by tuning the engine without a supercharger or turbo and uprating your suspension.

Quicker driving and more fun isn't all about having an engine that chucks out a load more bhp and torque - if the drivetrain and suspension aren't geared up for it, you're potentially throwing a lot of money away in lost performance getting round corners.

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Thought I was gonna have to eat my words about never having a problem today...

Went out in the car last night and really felt that things weren't quite right. When I hit the slip road to the motorway, the car felt like it was having real difficulty accelerating properly...felt way slower than stock.

Again, this morning on the way to work, didn't feel quite right.

Nipped into town at lunch and couldn't actually make the car accelerate. My old corsa 1.5d would have ripped me in two.

When the car tried to idle, it would just fade right out and stall...however would restart OK.

So took it out to Star this afternoon....hardest 60 miles ever. Had to heel-toe brake everytime I came to a halt in order to keep the revs from dropping below 500....

Took them about 2 secs to find the problem...the intake hose from the charger to the engine block had disconnected....strangely difficult to notice when you look into the engine bay as it was still in the correct place...took Brian about 2 mins to put things back together...

Managed to come away with a Haldex PP at the same time somehow smile.gif

b0b

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Don't know alot about it but personaly i'd opt for turbo with low boost. If your worried about reliability you dont always need to run the turbo, where as a charger is constant power. A friend has just picked up a turbo kit from EIP? in the states, but this is for a VR6 so i'm not sure if they can accomadate a kit for a mk5 but they do a kit for a mk4 R32.

My personal bleif is the mk4 would be far more rewarding with a turbo

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