Looking at doing a supercharger kit down the road, have a 2011 GS A6 w/ 12k miles, looking at A&A or ECS. What supporting mods do I need to keep the car reliable?

 

Have plenty of fuel (upgraded fuel pump and injectors). Use consistent quality fuel (octane). If that's not available, add a meth kit. Keep the boost under 10psi. Long tube headers and a free-flowing exhaust are a must in the performance department. Enjoy.

Oh, if you're going to drive it with a mad-on in a hot climate, I'd upgrade the radiator.

 

Change the piston ring gaps from .006" to .028 top ring, and .030 bottom ring. at .006" and super charger added heat to motor, too easy for rings to go to Zero gap at heat, and rip the top of the piston off as the rings bind to the sides of the pistons walls.

And easy to do, since the LS oem pistons have the top ring very close to top of piston to start with, while on the after market forged pistons, they drop the ring groove for the top piston done, to give it some more meat before top of piston.




Run meth kit, for added cooling so you are not losing HP after a couple of boost hits back to back with the motor just turning into a heat pump, and added octane rating, so you can push timing and not run into detonation problems as well.

And to add, there are some that will take a stock LS motor and get over 700HP out of it with boost, but motor can only take a few quick hits of boost every few mins, and never going to last where you are hit after hit on say a road course track for 40 mins straight instead.

So before going boost, better figure out how much your going to be using the boost to start with/if it time to pull the motor down to build it for that kind of power long time use, without giving the motor breaks to cool back down, so is not coming through the hood in parts instead.

 

I ran my OEM LS2 with twin turbos up to 100k mi @ 620whp/620tq (max 9psi) with bone stock internals. The only thing I switched out internally was a custom tt cam and dual valve springs. I did have a lifter let go, but that's a common weak point FI or not. Keep oil level topped off at all times.
I did see some oil cavitation after multiple hard pulls due to the oil pump spinning so fast mounted directly on the crankshaft. Just keep an eye on oil pressure after pulls.

I never had heat soak issues with the oem cooling setup. However my turbos are mounted low and running dual intercoolers kept iat's reasonable. Never ran meth, but as mentioned above, with a blower mounted in the engine bay your experience will most likely differ. I also didn't live in an climate where 100°+ temps are common.

Lastly, one concern with FI for me is; make certain you have a nearby competent performance shop with qualified LS tuner for issues that can/will crop up. Attempting to callibrate an FI vehicle via emailing tune files is risky as things can go south fairly easily. I'd rather transport my vehicle via trailer to the location if options are limited.

 

When you say keep an eye on oil pressure, what are you watching for? Too high or too low?

Would a catch can help in any way?

 

Yep, stock LS3 motor wants to go flat about 5.8K the way GM tunes them, making you want to short shift the engine,
while will blower, its going to pull hard to redline instead, meaning that with the motor now being reved to redline before shifting more, lifter springs are going to see more use, more likely to snap sooner.

As for replacement spring or if different cam'g, need to now not only the spring pressure at lift, but the spring pressure at valve seat, and make sure that your spring compression lenght at seat, is the same length as what they are stating for seat pressure. In some case, can end up with the spring longer at seat compression, meaning that seat pressure will be lower at valve seat, and may not be enough to start with.

And again, there at tuners that will get more than 700hp out of the motor on a dyno, but this does not mean that the motor is going to hold up to an hour of road racing on the track, where you are boost after boost hit for this longer time period. So before you just go for lawn chair high HP numbers, determine what your going to use the car for, and tune the car for that in regards to power. Drag strip, go for the Plus 700hp, since motor is only going to see that for 10 second most. Road coarse work or Mexico long duration high speed runs, better be on the conservitive side in regard to added HP on the stock motor isntead.

 

1) Fuel and plenty of it, talk to Doug at ECS (East Coast Superchargers), theyll set you up with a fuel system that will support your needs... Skip the boost a pumps because when they fail it can be catostrophic
2) Injectors, Doug can help you here too
3) a good tuner that knows what their doing, if you let us know where you are we can maybe recommend someone in your area.
4) a sticky tire.

If your planing on going bigger and doing a blower cam or anything like that the rabbit hole gets deep quick but if your just supercharging and otherwise stock car it can stay pretty simple. Talk to the guys at ECS and theyll hook you up with everything you need for your goals.