My Vortech Supercharger Install Diary, For the loonies out there...

Right, its Friday and none of my mates are going out so I thought I would begin a long term post into the trials and tribulations of a Vortech install.

Ive had the car 6 months now and really love it. My only gripe is that I love performance modding, and I hit a brick wall with this straight away. N/A mods are stupidly pricey, and while I envy people for going down this route (takes a lot of thought) its not for me.

Here is where I looked into S/C's, got scared off, and came back again

Spent a lot of time on the US forum as it would appear you are nobody unless you have 6 turbo's and a shot of nitrous Those boys dont do thing by halves. So, as I normally do, I spent a few months working out how the cars's ECU and engine worked, and what S/C I wanted. I really wanted the Comptech S/C as it didnt require any drilling into the oilpan for return. But... a Vortech came along at a great price (Thanks Simon ) and I had to have it. Bit earlier than I wanted but I couldnt miss out.

Picked the kit up a few weeks back and have been busy listing a cunning plan before installing it. Its not as simple as bolting it on....

You need to consider:
New plugs and what type (gap is different for S/C)
New oil (its working harder and a bit hotter!)
More tolerant gearbox oil (as above)
Getting all the ECu wiring diagrams together
Insurance (incidetally its only £200 a year more!)

Then importantly there's the monitoring gear you will need to check the health of the car.

Hopefully this will be of interest to some people, and I plan to do the install in stages rather than in one weekend. This is possible but takes a bit of thought! Will take quite a few pics etc. It might take a while but I will get there!

Enjoy



MB

This post has been edited by Dark Blue Mark on Apr 30 2006, 01:41 AM

So what's the idea behind it?

Well, A S/C is driven off an extra pulley, via a belt. Its basically an air compressor or turbine, which compresses air sucked up by the intake, and feed this into the engine. Simple theory is that the more air you can get in, the more fuel you can mix with it to increase combustion. And this means more power!!!!

The reason I like S/C is that its simpler than a turbo (not as efficient) and keeps the VTEC character of the car due to its power being linear with the RPM's

So what's in the kit?


Hopefully when finished it will look like this:


And hopefully it will do this :
http://videos.streetfire.net/Player.aspx?f...CC48F6&kw=3&p=2

MB

Nice bit of kit .... and a very good price (I went with Simon to look at it before he bought it)

The big thing that would worry me about SC'ing the car (...and I had considered it) is getting the fueling right. Both the Vortech and Comptech are designed for use with US fuel i.e lower RON than in the UK.

How do you plan to get this right? I would have thought the AEM route that Simon was planning would be the best solution.

Looking forward to your updates

I don't think that took you too long Mark I have been reading the FI forum alot for several months (I like to read up on things before buying... ) and every time I get more interested in getting a SC I read a thread about another mishap or factor that I had not previously considered. I'm going to be interested to see how you get on I'm watching the development of the Axial superhcharger here

First things first...

Ok, Im putting a device on the car which can potentially see pistons exiting the bonnet at varous angles and at £8k for a new engine fitted, I need to be a bit careful

I would have like to use an aftermarket ECU with the car, as that allows custom mapping, but quite frankly the experience in this area is very limited when it comes to the S2000. For that reason, I decided to fit the Vortech kit as the manufacturer intended, that is with a standard car and using its own Fuel Management Unit (FMU)

A lot of people in the US are using these with no problems. It basically wires into the Honda ECU and adjusts the fuelling and timing (to an extent) to allow for the extra air going into the engine. It also allows the standard MAP to cope with seeing posotive boost, which it can anyway, but the ECU is not exepecting this.

If there is loads of air going in, but not enough fuel (Air Fuel Ration - AFR) then it is said to be running lean and can easily cause pre-detonation of the fuel due to heat build up. this can really nacker the pistons etc, so is bad news. Ive seen many a scoob piston pop from running excess boost...

Not being the trusting sort, I need to monitor what the engine is doing before I fit this huge beast, so first things first are monitoring gear.

Most important is being able to monitor the AFR, as thats critical to engine health. Straight away I wanted to go for a wideband sensor. The standard Lambda Sensor is 0-1v 0 being lean and 1 being rich.

That doesnt allow for very accurate analysis of the fuel mixture, so a wideband is often used. These run from 0-5v. Many companies sell them with various displays and logging facilities. What I wanted to do was replace the stock primary lambda sensor, and replace it with a 0-5v wideband one, rather than have to drill and tap a new hole in the exhaust for it.

Only problem there is that the ECU wants to see a 0-1v signal and a wideband is 0-5v. I found a few widebands that will allow you to replace the original, but will also send a simulated 0-1v signal to the ECU! Result! A few companies do this but I went for the PLX R500.



www.plxdevices.com

Delivered this morning for £400 and will be fitting this weekend!

The other key points to monitor are boost and knock, which this will also do, and more. It has a headphone jack for det cans too, so it really does satisfy my safety concerns. Also means I dont have to have loads of gauges everywhere...

MB

looks like a centrifugal blower.. why then is the power delivery different to a turbo?

Steven, I will be keeping a close eye on this with the kit above, and have been in touch with Vortech who assure me it will be ok. But if not, they can take my AFR logs and possible modify the FMU for me. its easy enough to remove just the FMU and the S/C unit for a short time if this is an issue.

Paper, with no offence to the US guys, there are very very few of them who want a standard setup. Most want big power and are using bigger pulleys, injectors, aftermarket ECU's etc - which is away from what Vortech designed it for I guess...

MB

Kobe,

Simple - belts are different to the way exhaust gas builds up and spins the blower...

MB

cheers for the info.. hope it goes well.

the installation on the US car looks really neat - as if Honda reserved the airbox space for something

No probs, tried to get a S/C vs Turbo dyno chart for comparrison, but cant find one at the moment

A turbo takes a specific amount of exhaust gas before it starts to wind up, then goes off like a rocket, and tails off as it reaches is max speed / pressure. A S/C keeps going and in a linear fashion.... So its a bit of a loop versus an increasing line! Turbo's give more power though.

MB

This post has been edited by Dark Blue Mark on Sep 30 2005, 12:52 PM

On the S/C you only get full boost at 9000 revs.

Standard boost gets boring after like a week.

Uh, oh - sound like a bigger pulley and injectors on the way Mark?!

Will update this weekend with the PLX install / pics (hopefully!)

MB

Just strap on a big tubby, say a T67 or a T78 and add a high-stall or anti-lag system. Won't take time to spool up then.

Oh, don't forget to sell your house to pay for it either.

Anti lag is a bit tasty, and you would then need a GEMS or Motec (AEM) to support it Nearly went for it on one of my scoobs. Turbo doesnt like it too much either

Right, today ive just been trawling through all the ECU diagrams and making my own connection diagram. I did think that while I was fitting the PLX into the ECU, I could do a lot of the Vortech FMU wiring, but I cant The Vortech cuts into each wire and sends it in a loop through the unit so even with no power on it, it would screw the ECU signals up.

Sun's shining, off to the parents to borrow my dad's garage and tools

MB

Hope it doesn't look like that...battery and brakes have switched sides haven't they...........

Someone's paying attention!

MB

Mark

I must admit, I have been toying with the idea of FI for a while now.

I have been through the TC vs SC debates and had decided that if I was going to go with FI that the Lovefab TC would be the way to go: all on the FI forum that have got this kit keep raving on about it.

However it appears that no matter what FI you go for, there is no such thing as simply "bolt on". The kit may bolt on but the time you look at tuning requirements and sorting out the initial set up problems that's a whole different game.

Anyhow, best of luck with the install, I will be watching eagerly. If yours runs smoothly then I may well be tempted to go the SC route.

Dark Blue when you say the Insurance is only £200 more !! Who the hell with, every company i've spoken to about simply changeing the ECU in ANYWAY (they can only cope with calling it chipping most of the time) have ran a mile or quoted me over £1500 !

Hi Chris, I still think that bolt on is very possible with the Comptech and Vortech - if done sensibly and as the kit was intended. The problems ive seen, are with aftermarket ECU's and fitting errors. You are right though, that if you encounter a problem it can be frustrating. My kit has been on another car and I have no idea if the FMU is actually functioning correctly til it goes on - and its the last piece of the puzzle! I think as long as you know the issues and who to speak to, to sort them, you're a bit of a step ahead - I hope!

Feel free to laugh at me when my pistons meet the outside world though

Fitting a turbo is a mammoth task IMO, look up Andrew Docherty, who did a grand job - but cost him £000's They can be very complicated and you have the added issue that onlt 1 person has done it in the Uk and mapping experience is next to nil.

Ruckus - Adran Flux I was scared when I rang up as I intended to fit the kit regardless of cost! What a pleasant surprise

MB

PS - Got some of the wiring done as I was distracted by various sporting events on TV. Pics to come soon for those scared of hacking an ECU apart!

MB

Honda could have been nice and used a little more wire down there, not much slack on the harness.


No need to worry if the engine falls apart, winters coming so there will be a stock pile of them soon.

Very interested in how this goes MB, I would like to do something more to the S, I would really like to go the turbo route and have been reading about the lovefab kit. It'll be a while before I do anything and even then I'm not sure. The tuning is the bit that worries me. I hope your pistons stay in the block

I am paying ~ £550 with Adrian Flux ..... including all the mods in my sig.

what sig? but thats cheap

just so I dont get any ideas how much is this costing?