I am thinking of getting the Greddy turbo kit for my AP1. I have read all of the threads on how turbocharging the S is costly, high maintenance and most of the time has poor idle and reliability results. Since Greddy came out with their turbo kit it has everything included, including a pre-tuned E-manage. How reliable and safe is this kit for my car? Are there alot of issues with reliability? I want to know if this is a good route to go for my car. I drive it a little each day. By a little i mean when i bough the car it had 43,000 miles on it and now after owning it for 2.5 years it has 54,000 miles on it. Thanks for your help!

 

wow you barely drive your car.

I'd say for you, turbocharging your car will cause you no problems in reliability in any near future. You hardly drive your car, so any problems like worn parts will not arise for a very long time.

Like any kit, idle and reliability is mostly based on tuning. The emanage is pretuned, but for optimal reliability and performance, you should get it tuned specifically for your car. Each car is different.

 

Your going to have to get a tune with the Greddy plain and simple, thats the only sucky part. The E manage "pre tune" is misleading as it runs like crap (horribly rich in vtec with lots of timing pulled) and will destroy your stock catalytic convertor because of the richness if you run it too long. In all honesty on my base tune I could barely pull from a stock S and that was with a 70mm single and high flow cat.

As far as reliability, its pretty reliable. Only problems I have had were with the oil lines leaking.. Smog legal system is a definite

 

I have found the kit to be very simple if you get rid of the oil filter relocation kit and tap the pan for the oil return. Other than that I would suggest the following parts be ordered with it, many of which will be helpful/necessary with any turbo kit. I am sure I forgot a few things but other can chime in.

Almost Necessary:
Greddy's Pressure Sensor and Harness
Wide Band and Greddy Harness
Fuel Pump Sock
8 x 1.25 Allen Head Bolts for the Turbo Discharge (Makes it easier to install)
Heat Resistant/Reflective tape
Metal Straps for the Heat Wrap (DEI makes then in SST)
Heavy Duty PCV (My dipstick blows out without it)
Extra Silicon Tubing (I ordered 20' in Black)
A couple of Vacuum T's
Oil Filter and Oil
USB Printer Cable and Emanage Software for Data Logging (Mohdparts.com)

Highly Recommended:
C Nuts for studs in the manifold that hold on the turbo and downpipe
Exhaust Manifold Studs
Boost controller (not essential but very nice)
3.5mm Jack to make a switch for the switch port.
Blowoff Valve (For Performance not Reliability)
High Flow Cat
Heavy Duty the clamps and couplings
Boost Gauge
Instead of Gauges I use led's hidden in the A pillar and buzzers to indicate problems using outputs in the Emanage.
AEM Dry Flow Air Filter

Other common upgrades are exhaust, meth injection and of course a new clutch.

You may also want to look at Inline Pro's smaller turbo kit with the 5965 turbo which is comperably priced but has more room for expansion.

 

What is the difference between the greddy pressure sensor and a three bar map sensor?