c5vette211

I have been reading over the years a ton of negativity toward ebay turbo kits. I have a theory that 90% of that is from people that just have an opinion. I want to put this post out to see what kind of actual stories exist of people running/ran these kits. so post up if you are running one or had one in the past. This is a judgment free post just want to know if its as horrible as everyone says they are.

GaragedLS2

Ive never personally ran any turbo kits from ebay, but when I was into DSM's quite a few years back, I know lots of people had good luck with them and then some, not so much. It seems to be really hit and miss with those turbos. What a lot of people do is buy the cheap turbo and have it rebuilt with quality parts. You still save quite a bit of money in the end.
If you were running a older import and you could have the motor rebuilt for the price of the cheap turbo, I'd say go for it. Now on an aluminum LS motor, not so much. I think quality parts are cheap insurance for peace of mind and an expensive repair bill in the end. Thats just "opinion" though.

So to answer your question, yes, they can work. I havent seen any kits for the corvette though. I'm kind of interested in what youve found. I suppose when it comes to piping and metal, metal is metal and as long as the welds are ok, I wouldnt be hesitant to piece something together and save a few bucks.

Chicago1

^ What he said... I had one on my dsm for awhile no issues. The turbo lasted a lot longer than the car. I had 3 dsm.. 2 with precision turbos and 1 with a ebay cheapie.. I didnt have any issues with it at all had it for 8k miles. My Galant vr-4 will be getting a big ebay turbo shortly since I didnt have any issues with my last one. This was on a 4g63 which are bitchy little motors but can take a beating..Ill be pushing the ebay turbo hard on the G..Thats my experience

Milan

If you are talking turbos they typically work pretty well if you have them balanced and add an oil restrictor

c5vette211

I was thinking over all not specifically the turbos. My train of thought was like most of yours. If you have a "kit" metal is metal, and the turbos can be taken care of to last a bit longer. My main thoughts were the WB and BOV failing and causing a ton of issues. I feel that if you have a "kit" and bring it to a little better standard then they are a ok route to go. I just think it is funny how people jump on bandwagons with little to no knowledge of whats actually happening and its a giant game of telephone. "this guy i know said they suck so must be true"

I equate it to the header debate commonly seen on forums. Everyone warns people not to by OBX or EBAY headers because they are china bla bla bla. its metal and i have run OBX in many different cars for many years with no problems and have run kooks and have had problems.

GaragedLS2

I think the OBX name has lost a lot of the bad attention is had during its early stages. OBX actually makes some decent stuff and I know a lot of guys on here are running OBX headers. Metal is metal of course, but you do have to make sure the metal theyre using is the correct metal. I see some companies run stainless cold side piping, use low grade stainless on exhaust pipes etc. Just make sure its the right stuff for the job and youre good to go. As far as blow off valves go, most corvettes run such a low amount of boost I wouldnt worry too much about them leaking. I know they can hold up as I have personal experience with them and will actually be running a Tial knockoff on my current build that consists of over $4k in turbos alone, I think that says a lot for how much I trust them. Wastegates are a different story though. again, low boost in most corvette applications and I've seen some knockoff WG's under stress perform rather well. They do eventually fail prematurely though in comparison to a Tial or Precision. For this reason I spent the extra money on 46mm Precision gates.

Heres some food for thought. I priced a whole 76mm turbo system for my corvette with all ebay parts. I think the build would have ended up costing me about 3k total in parts. Right now with all name brand parts (minus the bov of course) I am sitting at about 13k and still have a couple things to pick up. Quite a bit of difference there.

c5vette211

I have feed this thought quite a bit and I created my own monster on my C5. (https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...it-begins.html) I pieced together a rearmount kit 78mm for around 3k. I tried to make a stand alone oil system so that was a little extra on the cost. with 3k though I had a turbonetics turbo, tial WG and BOV, and a tredstone intercooler. I fabricated everything on my own.

It kinda puts into perspective how much of a mark up a turbo kit has on it from a traditional dealer. the ebay kits are knock offs yes, but you can buy the kit and keep all the flanges, clamps and hoses and still be cheaper than the mark up some people have on these kits.

Any one know if you can just buy the piping from say hinson, or STS etc?

turbocvette

I am an ebay turbo expert by now lol. I have done 2 blow threw carb set ups 5.3l then a fox body 5.0 1 hayabusa 1 cbr all ebay turbos.
One was a 5.3 converted to carb and the first turbo was a turboknetics
that took a crap within 2 months of daily abuse! Kissed my $800 turbo goodbye. After that i purchased an ebay turbo for it and spool was the same and the best part of this is my neighbor purchased the car about 4 yrs ago and it still runs fine with the ebay turbo on it.
Cx racing just to give my take on it use thin wall tubing and likely don't backpurge gas when welding them up so cracks are very possible with the ebay headers etc. Now lets get to wastegates i purchase ebay wastegates on every build i have done and have yet to see one fail! I take precautions though. I dissasimble and polish all the moving parts then lube and hook up a line to my compressor so i can see what psi they start to crack and i also turn the valve on and off a few hundred times to make sure it never binds up. To this day i have never had an issue. I will say that on the cbr i used the dirty cheap $120 free ship t3 t4 and it started to chirp after 1 season at the drag strip. I contacted the seller and they replaced it for free! Then we get to the BOV again i have never had an issue so cant really say.

GaragedLS2

Youre almost always paying for R&D and a brand name. That can get very expensive, especially when companies drop crazy amounts on R&D. It has to be recouped somehow and that is passed on to the buyer. Not that thats a bad thing, its just reality. With a little ingenuity and some skillsets, you could definitely make one of these builds budget friendly. I'm too lazy or I'd of saved some money and done some more on my own.

c5vette211

Thanks for the testimonial! This is the kinda info i was hoping to hear.