would it be easy or even possible to replace the stock MB supercharger with a turbo . ? seems like it wouldn't be to difficult. I'm interested in building a custon kit. I'd be happy forever with a 10-12 psi turbo c230. Any one ever see one online or anywhere in Europe?
There was a company in Germany doing turbo kits for your car but like anything made in Germany, it was not cheap, may $15-20K. Started with an H like Hagmann, Hartmann, something like that. There was one forum member many years ago, back in 2002 that blew his engine up at the drag strip with a 75 shot of NOS and his mechanic bought the car from him, rebuilt the engine and put in a small Mitsubishi turbo and got 300HP out of it but then blew the clutch because the manual trans can't handle that sort of power and put it back to stock and made it his wife's car.
That was the first question I had when I bought my 04 C230 Komp. There is so much space for a turbo. I race DSM's for fun and I wouldn't think that it would be that hard to install a turbo in this car. Fabricating the exhaust would be easy and cheap. Not sure, do to my own ignorance about the 1.8, where you would tap in for oiling the turbo. Piping in a larger intercooler would be easy if you don't mind minor modifications to the body (if it would even be necessary). I wonder what the engine internals could handle? I bet the hardest part would be tricking the computer to handle higher boost than the supercharger does. If MB builds thier motors as good as Mitsu then I would assume that at least these motors could handle 20psi intercooled. The trans would probably be the weak spot. Not sure how MB builds em.
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Turbo T
-if it's not forced then why drive it-
2004 C230 Kompressor
1996 Eagle Talon TSi AWD (tested at 12.8@108)
1991 Eagle Talon TSi AWD
Just do it the way it's done on the new turbo kits for Corvettes and Mustang, put the turbo just before the muffler. Suppose to work really well and you don't need a fancy exhaust manifold.
I find that way extremely interesting. I've heard about it being done on GM's supercharged V6 motor before (which have the capability to produce more low end torque). The only problem I have with it is that one of the main elements that gets a turbo going faster is the heat of the exhaust gases. The heat at the end of the exhaust system would be less intense vs. right at the begining. These cars being 1.8l and low compression would benefit from quicker spool. Just food for thought. Either way a turbo Kompressor would be awesome to see.
Actually the opposite is true, the intense heat in the turbo on top of the exhaust manifold requires the use of a intercooler to make the air charge cooler and therefore denser, you want the compressed air to be as cool as possible. In addition, the IAT sensor will read that the incoming air is very hot and ECU will pull back timing severely. And on top of that, if the cylinder head temps get too got they will ping like crazy. So you see, there 3 huge negatives for having it be too hot.
Also, quicker spool is more of a design of the turbo, that's why they use this system on cars with dual exhaust, then you have dual smaller turbo's giving you lower turbo lag. They use these on Coverttes and Mustangs that I know of. Obviously, you don't want to use the same size turbos designed for those V8s. The reviews, even on TV shows have shown these system have better performance and lower lag over traditional engine compartment turbos.
The heat from the compressor is not because it's by the exhaust manifold. It because you are compressing air. That's why our superchargers (which are not by the exhaust manifold) get intercooled. Compressing air gets hot by nature. The added heat from the exhaust "location" is small compared to how much heat is generated from compressing. I guess I was thinking more along the lines that the c230 is already intercooled. I was looking at it from the angle of dumping more boost than the factory intended (not just a replacement for the supercharger). I think it would be pointless to turbocharge a 230 komp if you weren't gonna push the motor to the limit. This would require more fuel , larger exhaust, bigger intercooler. In my mind the only heat enemy is the compressed air regardless of surrounding temps. I had non ball bearing turbos (they are cheaper) in mind which require that added heat for better spool up. That heat would be localized with the use of heat shields or ceramic coatings. I personally would not be interested in setting a turbo in the rear and then plumbing the compressor all the way back to the front if I wanted to run more boost. You would still have to intercool it for maximum air density at high boost. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on the "heat on the turbine side" issue. Those that race make it a point to ceramic coat the turbine housing, exhaust manifold, and o2 housings. If not ceramic they make special heat bags just for turbine housings. The heat is a plus for spool up on a non ball bearing turbo. Wouldn't hurt a ball bearing turbo either.
Actually, just replacing the s/c with a turbo with the same exact boost would increase power by a good amount as there's no HP consumed to drive an s/c. Adding a small amount of boost, say to a total of 15 psi would probably not require much of an change to fuel pump and injectors such as the M111 had about the same boost increase without any fuel changes. I figure such a change would probably yield 50rwhp. Is that worth the money to do this, don't think so, why not just get a C32 or do a C32 engine swap.
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