Supercharger vs Nitrous
 

I would love to have a supercharger on my Vette but they are a good chunk of money to buy, install and tune about $7-10K. In reality, I would not use the power that often, maybe 10% of total drive time, but it would be nice to know I have it on tap. As an alternative, I am considering a nitrous system to give me "boost" when I need it and my guess is they are much cheaper. I have a couple of questions, I am curious what a complete system installed would range in cost? Is nitrous bad for the engine, does if "fry" the pistons and rings, etc.? Is it hard to tune a nitrous engine? How small do they make nitrous bottles? I have seen some bottles that are the size of a scuba tank which gobble up a lot of rear cargo space. I have an 08 LS3 A6 75,000mi, Z06 exhaust. Input and pictures are much appreciated.

Nitrous may be cheaper up front but over time that cost adds up quick. A good quality kit cost money, add in safety equipment, and bottle refills next thing you know you could have had a blower. Everyone always says I won’t spray it all the time etc but it’s gets addicting to have that power over and over. I did this 11 years ago with a baller direct port setup. Ultimately I would have been better off saving and just getting what I really wanted from the beginning that’s why I this car I knew it would be FI from the start.

I concur with Detoxx.

I think it depends on your real goals. Are you going to want to just do a quick simple 100 shot for random pulls or the track? Then nitrous...if your going to spend the time to do h/c with other various bolt ons and nitrous then your better off just going with a blower off the bat. Especially considering you can purchase a used A&A or ECS kit for 3-4k.


Keep in mind with the nitrous your really going to need longtubes or at the very least ls7 manifolds and knock the cats out. That may be a no go given your location unless your willing to spend the time to get around it.

Everyone says nitrous is cheaper, over the long run when you are really spraying the house down, those 70+ dollar bottle fills add up.

I probably have about 3000 or so into my setup including hard parts and electrical items.

You can set it up for a lot less than that and it'll work. Just realize with nitrous that the maintenance, tune, fuel, etc needs to be on point all the time. You cannot skimp out on changing plugs, especially when you are hosing the thing down a lot. Depending on the fuel, you may be changing O2 sensors here and there. Learn how to read plugs if you don't already know how to. Know when to spray it rpm wise. Know what bottle pressure range is proper for the solenoids, you don't want too little or too much.

Nitrous takes some dedication whereas a blower is going to be kind of a one and done aside from typical maintenance and maybe the occasional tossed belt lol...

I just switched from nitrous to a blower a couple years ago. If you just ran a blower kit how it comes I would say a blower is cheaper but once you start wanting more boost then the blower cost more.

Just save for a blower kit or be patient and find a nice used one for sale.

I used nitrous for years and years.. Finally swapped to blower last fall and want to kick my own ass for not doing it years ago. All the money & time spent filling bottles, checking bottle pressure, making sure stand-alone had good fuel, cost of C16 in stand-alone, trying to find places to fill bottles, got an account to get cylinders on my own and started filling my own bottles, then there are times when it gets hard to find a cylinder and nitrous cost is steadily rising... Piss on all that crap.

And you can make more power, safer and be more reliable on a nice blower setup. And it's always there. Unless you've been there, you just don't understand how nice it is to simply get in car and go do whatever without having to screw with bottles.

Gentlemen, I really appreciate you sharing your experiences. It sheds a whole new light on my decision. Didn't realize the "work" involved in maintaining a nitrous system. I'm a keep it simple kind of guy and I'm just gonna save some more pennies and probably get a used A&A kit down the road. I'm not a lead foot and I don't track or drag the car so I am not chasing horsepower. I've never even driven a 600+ HP car and none of the guys from our Vette cruises has a blower installed so I can't get a feel for that kind of power. I just had the car dyno tuned and got it up to 422 RWHP which really woke it up from stock, so yeah, maybe I am in the early stages of chasing horsepower! haha

If you decide to go S/C, drive over to Oxnard and visit Andy & Josh at A&A Corvette. They will recommend a set up that works for you. I made that trip from the Bay Area five years ago and the smile is still on my face. :cheers:

Yeh, I spoke to Andy and he does sell refurbished S/C when available. I know they also have a list of authorized installers and there is one close by my home, American Heritage Performance, but the last couple of times I spoke to them regarding installing headers, NPP in a Box and HP tune, they said they are revamping their shop and couldn't get to it for months. That sent up a red flag.

I am also thinking of replacing the harmonic balancer since the area would already be opened up and I figure I could save some money there. Also, just doing some research on doing a FlexFuel conversion as I understand that works really well with a S/C

I have less than 7K in my A&A kit, buy it when its on sale or Andy may even give you the hook up. Install and tune should be right around 2K. I make 550RWHP that is all CARB legal.