What Turbo?

[larry]

Hi Guys so long story short..

I am in the process of getting more power out of my car which is currently on a IHI VF28. I am on a budget so bare with me. I know the billets and garrets etc are quiet pricey

so I am looking at alternatives. I know of some guys who have used the eBay TD05 20g Turbos and managed to get 400+Plus after some alterations to fit a 99 subaru

and there going strong after 2 years. I think the cost is around £200 for them. You then have the Kinugawa option which are in the £780 Region which produce similar power.

 

I know the general stigma attached to the Chinese turbo are negative simply because its unbranded and from China so people think cheap.

Having said that some people have bought them and their cars are running fine. Does anyone have any first hand knowledge and or turbo Options?

 

 

[savage bulldogs]

Only sort of first hand experience I've had with cheap eBay turbos is a mate of mine fitted one to his forged 3.2 ltr 4wd mk2 golf .

It made 440 hp and went like stink ,for 1.5k miles.... then spat its seals out .

He fitted a £1.8k  hta turbo and it made 480 hp at the wheels and is going strong 3yrs and 20k miles later .

Although I know the expensive turbos are tried n tested ,Personally I'm too tight to buy a £1k+ turbo . I've given the arashi tdo5 20g billet wheeled turbo a punt . It did seem to look reasonable quality and spool well ,even with a wrongly fitted actuator at the time .

I upgraded the core to a ball bearing core but haven't got any numbers , due to currently running in. 

I think it's the hit and miss nature of really cheap turbos that put people off , you could be fine and make good reliable power 😎

But it could fail sending shrapnel into the inlet causing engine damage 🙁

Hence why most people wont advise you to "give a cheap eBay turbo a go ". 

As you won't get much change outta £2k just in parts and machine costs to rebuild a boxer lump properly,  let alone labour costs .

As for running 400 hp on a standard classic 5 speed and  engine , I've been into scoobies for over a decade and never seen any mechanicallly standard classic with over 360hp last long .

So if you do know people running 400hp I would like to see some dyno graphs ,supporting mod list and know how long they've been running that sort of power for .

I don't mean to sound like i don't believe you ,its more if I'm wrong I'd like to learn something new .

 

[larry]

I agree Turbos are not cheap for these cars at all I guess you could call it capitalism lol With the arashi turbo that you tried what was wrong with the actuator?

Some of the Kinugawa Turbos have an option to choose from for instance depending upon the bar. 0.3bar, 0.5bar, 0.8bar, 1.0bar, 1.2bar, 1.5 bar etc they will fit the waste gate actuator to your spec, What do you think is best?

I knew of people running 400BHP but they have disappeared or else I'd be asking them lol

 

 

[savage bulldogs]

Over in the states they have a lot more companies that offer sub £1k turbo options and it annoys me that they seem to have a heavy "scooby turbo tax " over here .

Hence why I gave the arashi a try 😉

The arashi comes with numerous strength springs and I'd fitted a 1.2 bar one that was too strong (possibly with too much pre tension) . So had to rush fit a 0.6 bar spring on the dyno , unfortunately I fitted this (in a hurry) and without enough pre tension . Meaning that we couldn't set the boost any higher than just under 1.3 bar .

So in short ,nothing wrong with the turbo or actuator,  just me not fitting the spring correctly 🤐🙄😂

I'm going to fit a 0.8 bar spring , slightly over standard but not too strong,  to allow the boost solenoid to control it eaiser 😉

[larry]

Oh right good to know.

So how do you know what strength spring to have with the turbo they send you?

How much BHP Were you running with 1.3 Bar?