Well im thinking of adding a kit to our 02 Z06, the car is pretty much stock. It has a intake, exhaust and a tune ( w/an SCT X Cal) I was looking at the Zex kit, but have always been told the NX kit is better. Any thoughts on this? Also Ive been told I could go with a 150 shot, and comments or suggestions? Since we already have the X Cal, I figured I would get it tuned for nitrous and just have that tune on there for when we need it. Anyways, just looking for some input from guys that run nitrous. I want a good reliable kit, that will be safe. Thanks

 

Shoot Robert56 a PM. He's the CF N20 guru..

Then just do EXACTLY what he says..

 

Lol, Thanks Yeah I guess I didnt do a good search or look enough, but Ive been looking around and found quite a bit of info.

 

Check out the NitroDave stuff. He has some good kits. The downside to all the Zex stuff is that the noids are in the box they use. Noids can often fail due to heat and the box makes them retain heat. I would suggest a good kit from NX or Nitrodave. Depending on if you want a wet or dry shot changes the cost and how you set up everything.

 

For starters, i'm just gonna run a sinple plate system from HSW, with NX express noids, and an FJO progessive controller. 150 shot max.

 

Ive got Daves 2 stage plate, went on easily and looks great.

 

Really with the innovations in the dry camp there is absolutely no reason to go wet hits on the EFI/LSx platform, just down falls. Now with that said, the only place that supports the dry technology, currently, is HSW and I would look at the Dry plate kit and their Interface. Very simple and easy to set-up with the inherent safety that only the dry technology can offer. NX does have a Dry MAF kit coming out that uses a mechanical **** at the MAF for dialing in the a/f ratio, though they will be for the smaller 75mm MAF for know. The Interface offers stable and repeatable a/f ratios that stay the same everyday, where as the wet hits will vary every single day (remember the wet hit is 40 year old carburetor tech). hell the Interface even works wonders on dialing in the wet direct port kits and can be used to keep them at the optimum daily a/f, much better than trying to dial in 16 jets. Also, the Interface allows for timing pull, so once your n2o is armed and you go WOT, the a/f kicks in as well as the timing pull and does not in way shape or form effect your optimum n/a tune. No longer any reason to need to tunes. just set up the a/f with a wide band and/or dyno and make sure the timing is pulled and your done; and no worry of fuel noids failing or fuel in the intake tract. I don't have all my info yet on tuning the dry hits but there is some on my web site and you may get some insight. also, over at tech there is a wet vs dry thread that will give you more info than you prob want and it's a long read but worth it. Hope this helps in some way. Oh yea, if you really want a trick set up we can know go Dry Direct Port running the stock PCM and as large as anyone would dare, try that a year ago, lol. So as you can tell I am die hard current EFI technology all the way. Why not use the injectors to fuel our nitrous, we use them everyday for normal driving and...
Robert

 

My personal expierence was that on a Stock C-5 setup (mine is a 99), the wet kit was easier to set up out the box than Dry (despite it having more components). I did a Dry kit and a Wet Kit and tested them the same day. I researched and planned and did the testing on a dyno with AFR logged.

The dry out of the box I ended up needing larger injectors (injector duty cycle was 106% with the factory 26#). The AFR was fine w/ a 50 and on a 75 it was above 13. Months later Larger injectors solved the problem, I feel comfortable now I could easily do 150-200 with my 42#'s.

The Wet Plate kit (Nitrous Outlet) worked out of the box to a 150 shot. Wet is easy to tune by upping or downsizing the jets to get the right AFR without any electronics (such as the HSW interface).

Lotsa of new stuff out there, lots of proven stuff as well. I know two forum members successfully running Zex kits on the C-5.

My personal preference is NX. Although I don't think you can go wrong with smaller guys like Nitrous Outlet, Harris Speed Works, or Dynotune (I used components from all three of em).

 

*opinion alert*

If you don't think you'll use it much, or if you're just putting it on for the occasional rush. You might just bolt in a dry kit like I did and leave everything else stock.

I've just removed my dry kit to put an STS twin turbo on my stock 98 C5 A4. For two years though I used my dry kit with a 125 shot filling up a 15# bottle once every two or three months, pretty rarely. It would last me a week or so, and was great fun. I don't race, so it was mostly there just to give friends and neighbors a kick when taking them out for a ride or for the occasional high speed run west in the desert. I wasn't looking to maximize the performance of the car by having it tuned for it, or anything, I only used it for 5-10 seconds at a time every days or so, and hopefully (crosses fingers) the engine wasn't hurt by it.

With my turbo kit I've gone through the fuel system upgrades and will be having it tuned at STS, so I'm not taking any chances now. But it did always feel like I was on borrowed time running the dry kit on my stock setup. It really might not have mattered as little as I was using it, I've heard lots of folks on CF say it wouldn't hurt to run a 125 shot on a stock C5. But in my opinion I'd say it really depends on what you plan on doing with your nitrous setup, as far as how much you need to do to your car to work best with it.

If you are looking for consistency and durability with extended/repeated use then as was said previously... listen to the experts and do exactly as they say.

If you don't think you'll do much more than fart around with it every few months, you might just pop a dry kit on like I did and call it good. In my experience, you might still cringe just a little every time you use it not knowing if you're hurting it or not... Anyway, I'm definitely no expert, so this is pure opinion, just wanted to chime in from the cheap seats.

 

be careful with the interface. there are a few people including myself that have had problems with it. i have been running nitrous on the ls platform for seven years and prefer wet kits. they are easier to tune and taken the right safety measures/matinance they are just as safe as a dry kit. now on which kit i would go with, it would be a nitrous outlet plate kit. it has high quality parts, great atomization, and looks extremely trick. it is also backed by the BEST customer service in the nitrous business. i personally run a TNT kit and it is awsome. i have had it for some time and got a great deal it (reason for not doing a plate). they have also given me great customer service. either kit will meet your needs. ask any of the bigger shops and they will gear you towards a wet kit. do it right by getting all the neccesary accesories and you will have a kick *** safe system. if you have any questions just ask.

 

Great input as normal Beer. However, let me clarify a couple things for those reading along. Your dry kit was/is the old method/style and the new dry plate kits work out of the box also, given fuel supply is there (a consideration, wet or dry, but injectors for dry hits). I believe your opinion would be different had the new generation of dry kit been available at the time you added dry. Now, would we rather have the convenience of changing modding the a/f ratio by mechanical jets, or would we rather flip a dip SW from the drivers compartment. Why is this important? Well the reason is simple when we all realize that a wet hit changes a/f ratio day to day of up to 10/20%. Now for normal cars and n/a the fuel trims take car of fluctuations as it was designed to do. However, a fixed mechanical jet has no way of compensating, where as GM electronics do. So the point is, esp if going bigger, the dry hits will and do stay stable day to day with no need for fine tuning. Then when you want to change hit size, again just change your combo of dip sws with the dry, or go trial and error with mechanical jets on the wet. This is why I feel today that the argument that wet hits are easier to set-up is no longer valid. The past dry hits would have an a/f ratio all over the board, or at least some could/would (nozzles and air dynamics causing inconsistent readings from the MAF), but this is no longer a problem running the Interface for dry hits in particular and wet hits in general. Now I have nothing against the wet plate kits if someone decides they do want to go wet, but for me the safety factor heads me towards the dry plate kits and of course the simplicity and GM electronics package. The wet kit has not evolved since the 70's when I put my first wet kit on a 57 Chevy, it was a 10,000 RPM brand kit, and myself love the new technology and advancements that only the dry method can allow. It's the wave of the future concerning spraying the EFI cars, mark my words. Beer, I hope you don't think I am trying to knock your input or insight as that is not my intention nor style, and what you say is certainly valid and important.

One other point that needs attention. The wet kits need tuning as well as the dry hits. What the companies have done is given a base set of jets for a given hp at there bottle pressure. Hopefully it falls within a safe a/f range, however this is not always the case, even with wet hits. Every car is different and shows volumetric efficiency levels that are broad, and thus the reason for variations per car, per same kit. so we all need to check parameters like a/f ratio, timing, knock retard. A/F ratio can tell us to look at jetting, fuel pump, injectors, filter or a few other things; so it's very important to know we are safe through out the entire rpm band.

Another point that needs to be made. try dialing in an exact a/f ratio with a wet hit. That's not an easy job. Most end up with an acceptable a/f ratio that is safe and will work fine. However, you generally will need a fist full of jets to get it there. Lets say you want 11.7:1 a/f ratio with your 150 shot, chances of getting exactly that ratio with the supplied jets, I can almost guarantee, will not happen and even a fist full of jets getting exact is difficult. Then lets try getting that same exact a/f ratio, 11.7:1 and 150 shot, with the dry hit and Interface, I can guarantee, you will get it exactly. Now with the Interface, you can dial in an exact a/f ratio every situation and every HP change without all the mech jet trial and error-you just put in the supplied HP n2o jet then dial in the a/f with dip switches. You can change fueling by the single HP, you can't with a wet hit. Try dialing in a wet direct port hit sometime, a nightmare can ensue, though the Interface can make it a breeze.

To clarify, I have absolutely no monetary gain by steering guys towards the dry hits/kits, but just getting the info out so anyone can make an educated choice on which way they would like to go. The misunderstanding about the dry hits is really unbelievable sometimes, but not so much in this thread. The reason most n2o companies steer people towards the wet hits is the fact they understand them and do not get the dry at all. Some are starting to come around though it's a slow process. even many tuners will advise clients to go with wet hits because they do not understand the workings of the dry hit and believe there to be some sort of voodoo needed to tune them. Not anymore, it is easy for anyone now to set up a dry hit and tuners will likely stop shunning the new tech and embrace it.
Robert

 

Please be fair. All of the companies and/or products you mentioned have had issues at one time or another. So trying to highlight some sort of problem with the interface, an innovative cutting edge product, is really not fair to HSW. Out of the many thousands that have gone with the Interface so far, your only the 3rd person that I know of that had an issue. One of the other 3 was installer error. I don't work for HSW and don't know the real facts of the matter, just trying to look out for all in the n2o world. I could use implications like you have and direct it towards any of your choosen products and supply back up info implicating an issue and steer clear, would that be cool? Of course nothing personal.
Robert

 

I like wet kits as you jet and go, as well as I have no MAF sensor on my car ( Speed Density Open Loop tune) However the H S W kit and interface work well in the on vehicle I installed it in, after the setup issues were resolved. Now the other dry kits I've never used, gong back to the MAF issue of mine.

 

robert, i was wondering if you have personally used the interface on YOUR car yet? also, if know of any problems with the products i have posted please feel free to post them. after all this is for every ones benifit.

 

Wow lots of good info!! So for my application what would be needed if I went with a dry kit? Injectors, pump, race gas etc? Just throwing that out there, not saying I definitely need that stuff.

BTW..Im thinking of running a 150 shot.

 

It is my understanding (correct me if I am mistaken) that the fuel trims go to 0 when Power Enrichment Mode is Commanded. The jet tuning method has nothing to do with daily driving effects, the jets function only with ALL three items listed below on a standard setup.

1. System is Armed
2. The car is at WOT
3. The RPM is the window selected by the window switch

These three items tell the car to go fast. If its jetted correctly, it will.

The trail and error of the jets is nothing more than exchanged for the trial and error of the dip switches.

Its just a personal preference as to what one would prefer to do.

 

i also don't understand how the a/f is going to change if you are always getting the same amount of nitrous and fuel due to the size of the jetting never changing.

 

Pressure drops in the bottle and fuel tank. I know since I have put in a fuel pressure gauge I can watch my fuel pressure move from 58 psi to 66 psi depending on weather, brand of fuel, and amount left in the tank. That combined with an ever dropping nitrous pressure in the bottle would cause fluctuations.

 

pressure inside the fuel tank may change, but it does not change at the fuel rail (pressure regulator). if your car is going from 58 to 66 psi something is up. also, if using the inteface to add fuel on a post maf dry kit, it will go just as rich as a traditional wet kit when the bottle losses pressure (unless using a nano).

 

Fuel pressure can vary via voltage, line restrictions, and the stock systems pulse dampening effects. With the dry kit as pressure drops the Interfaces design (or computer calibration) will factor in the fuel as needed depending on that variable supply provided. With a wet kit, you get what you get. By this I mean even if bottle pressure is high or low the amount of fuel and nitrous provided is based on a set supply level, consequently giving you a broader range of inaccuracy. But then again if the tune for dry is off you'll have the same issues.