ok so this is brand new for me so....I was thinking or stroking but now I'm leaning toward supercharging. After looking in this forumn it seems turbos are not ready "off the shelf." So I have two questions:

What do you guys recommend? Turbo or supercharger (note that budget is 4500 approx and is a daily driver).

Second, what other parts are required to replace/upgrade, ie pistons, cam/etc.

I'm trying to see the whole picture here. Thanks..

 

Honstly for that money, you'll be able to do neither. Your best bet is a scoggin-dickey 383lt1 crate motor for $4800. Much better for a adaily driver. Boost is fun ,addictive, makes sick power, but can be a hassle.

 

Pro-charger has a kit for 4500

 

unfortunately, that initial 4500.00 for the ATI kit is just that an initial expense.. I doubt you would be happy with the performance out of it off the shelf, and it is not ideal as far as fuel system and compression is concerned.. putting a supercharger on your stock LT1 will in essence put that shortblock on borrowed time. yes ATI and some other companies claim they are safe.. well... I won't say they can't be but thats where the extra money expenditure comes in to play a good rule of thumb with Forced Induction is to take your initial cost assumption and double it.. and that is conservative to what you will eventually need to do to get your moneys worth out of it.

If you are serious about supercharging/turbocharging, my recommendation is to begin purchasing the parts starting with a forged shortblock.. ~3200.00, bag it and put it in your garage.. with the remaining 1300.00, begin purchasing your new fuel system components..ie..injectors, racetronix pump and hotwire kit, good FI fuel pressure regulator, and a boost-a-pump... now you have gone through your 4500.00 initial expense and have a pretty good foundation to add to and your car is still running in the mean time.

next, by now, STS or another company will have come up with a rear mount turbokit for the C4and this will likely be the easiest kit to install and you have a motor you can dial up the boost on to make some decent power. all in all, figure about $9-10k if you are going to keep the stock ECM to run everything, and about $11-12k if you go to an aftermarket engine management system that will be much easier to tune yourself, and will actually read boost with a 2 or 3 bar map sensor. FI requires very careful consideration if you are looking for some easy and quick power because it never turns out to be as affordable as you think. I know you may be thinking no way, it can't be that much.. ask anyone here who has taken on this endeavor if their initial estimates were remotely close to what they calculated.. I think all of us here will just pound our heads on the desk thinking about the countless dollars we have poured into these systems, and there are still more that are unfinished then running at this point and I know I have been here for about 2 years now in this section alone designing and buying parts to complete the build. I would also recommend reading the camaroz28 forced induction forum.. there cars have kits ready to install by several companies, and that help taking custom fabrication out of the picture, but they will still tell you that the kits are the cheapest part of the project.. its the little yet very expensive parts you don't think about, and then the maintanance and upkeep of the level of power you will be making that will continue to drain your pockets.

Not trying to discourage, but just want you to know what it takes to go from start to finish properly without bandaiding something together or settling for what you get from a stock SC kit.

If you are still interested, I suggest you read the last years posts in this forum and the same on camaroz28 to better educate yourself and make more informed decisions.

best of luck, and if you do decide to take the plunge, all of us here will more then likely be glad to help in anyway we can!

Chris

 

$4500???? as Icvette and everyone else saying. That $4500 is just a start. Trust me I 've been there and done that. If you do a search on my name you will find I did all sorts custom work for my supercharged 383LT1 with initial dyno untuned made 544rwhp and 598rwt at 4600rpm and 14.2psi of boost and I later abandoned the SC and gone turbo. That 544hp ATI kit alone would never can achieve, I have to do serious custom cog drive to get that much boost.

Bruce

 

Take it from someone who just went the ATI Supercharger path last summer....4500 will not get you this kit in your car running correctly even if you do the work yourself.....Nor will it ever deliver the power it claims....Turbo chargning is all custom work so you can scratch that out....and getting a 383 built is going to cost more then 4500....So..what can you do....

Find a good shop.....and get some Head work done and find a nice cam like the LPE 219 or the LT4 hotcam kit....if not doing the work yourself those two mods should soak up all teh 4500 and you will prolly gain about 50-70hp

 

Thanks guys....it's back to the drawing board...again...

 

i would say it can be done...there is a guy jason selling a D1SC for a LT-1 for 3500

Then fuel injectors and tuning for what you are looking for would do?

NOW if you want to go crazy on boost and more Cubic inches then you are looking at more money like fuel pump and gauges and a bunch of little things but i can say it can be done!

 

Also remember that this car has and will never see the track. It's for very occasional road racing. I want more power when I hit the pedal at 70+ and I'm not interested in NOS.

 

road racing? thats about 100 times more abusive to the motor then a few 12 second blasts at the track.. keeping the revs up high for extended periods of time will build excessive heat from the supercharger and the intercooler will begin to get heat soaked, the power will drop off, and your engine oil and coolant temps will go sky high. then all it takes is a few pings of detonation, and you will be pulling the motor from broken ring lands or disentigrated pistons. road racing.. agree with above.. get yourself the LT4 Hotcam top end package with heads, spend the rest of the money on exhaust and tuning and some better injectors, meziere electric waterpump, and you will be around 350-360 RWHP with plenty of low end grunt.. 80-90 rwhp and about 60 ftlbs you will feel very good at 70 plus pulls on the track or highway. and will last much much longer and be alot more reliable. the iddle may be somewhat choppy, but hey power has some setbacks unless you are adding boost and cams and lobe seperation make for better top end power at the expense of idle smoothness. but the hot cam is not too bad, and the lift on it will let the springs last for a good long while although I personally would go with a set of comp 987's and be done with it!

Chris

 

I hate to sing more sad tunes, but if your luck goes like mine, that tranny won't last long after all that added power comes. If you plan to road race at all, you better make sure that the tranny stays cool or start saving now. I put over $600 in my tranny (not counting converter) and did the complete overhaul myself. As a side note, I am one of the "started a turbo and haven't finished yet bunch". It will happen, but as stated above, I will have 10k in mine as well and I do most all work myself. Don't get discouraged, just know that these guys and myself are givin it to ya straight, no sugar!!!! Good luck with your choice.

 

I agree with everyone else, I don't think $4500 will get you a reliable forced induction system. A friend of mine just finished up a custom twin turbo on a 1991 Mustang. The initial budget for the twin kit was 10k, he has close to 20k in it now. Granted it made close to 800 RWHP, but my point is that doubling your initial budget is a close guess.

I dunno, you might be able to pull of a used, non-intercooled procharger with your budget. You won't see tremendous power gains, but it will at least get your foot in the door. You'll need larger fuel injecotrs and a custom tune at the very least.

If you road race the car a supercharger is a better choice, IMO. The power will be more predicatble, and come on in a bit more linear fashion.