Turbocharged vs. Supercharged - Part 1

Turbocharged vs. Supercharged-Part 1 The time has come. The time has come. It's

supercharged

versus

turbocharged

. It's

supercharged

versus

turbocharged

. It's supercharged versus turbocharged. It's supercharged versus turbocharged. It's supercharged versus turbocharged. And we have MX5. introduction Welcome to another episode of Mighty Car Mods. Now, it's a very, very exciting time in the history of Mighty Car Mods because ever since pterodactyls have been having sex, by the way, they have a micropenis Marty: really? Moog: There's been a lot of discussion Marty: Just one or two? Moog: Just one so they transfer their genetic makeup to another pterodactyl. The sex life of dinosaurs is interesting.

Anyway, since the dawn of time and the dawn of pterodactyl sex, people have been asking the same question, right? Martin: Marty: Yeah, which one is better? Moog: how do dinosaurs have sex? and also what is best. Turbocharged or supercharged? Now, they are both forced induction but they use slightly different methods. Moog: As you are, this is getting heavy. Marty: Is that really heavy? Yeah, this is really heavy too Marty: But I thought I should try holding it Moog: No, keep going man, keep going, you're okay. Both are a type of forced induction, a way of compressing air. a way to get more air into the engine, add a little more fuel, add a little spark, you get a big bang and you go faster.

But we want to explore the differences and even find out which one is better. And not just better: we want to discover the philosophical underpinnings from the driver's perspective about what is better, but how would we do it, Martin? How would you do it? Because I mean, we could get my supercharged Mini and we could fight your turbocharged 2SEXY, but that wouldn't be very good, would it? It wouldn't be very fair. We will try to keep this comparison as fair as possible. We're not scientists, as you can clearly see, but we have some MX5s. then we might as well be scientists.

Not just MX5: we managed to get our hands on 2 MX5s which are MB MX5s that are 4 months a

part

from the factory, so they are the closest thing we will be able to get. In terms of bracket mods and other modifications to the car, we'll replicate them as closely as possible so they both have MCA shocks set up the same, the wheels offset, the same specs on the wheels. the same size, the same offset, everything. Both Bridgestone RE003s, which we use in many of our cars, are exactly the same. Um, ecus Martin? Same ECU, Haltechs, same injectors, same size injectors.

So really, what we want to try to do is create the environment where we're really focusing on the supercharger and the turbocharger and seeing what the experience is like on the street and on the track. In the red corner, we have an NB8B MX5 with a 1.8 liter naturally aspirated engine with about 100,000 km on the clock. These cars are known to be extremely capable on the street and track. In stock form, they generate around 75kW at the wheels, and with their lightweight bodywork, that's reasonably good. But as we learned with our white MX5 turbo setup, with some forced induction, these cars are next-level awesome.

For the supercharger team, we have this black MX5. This one has a Rotrex supercharger which is kind of unique - on this side, the intake side, it actually looks like a turbocharger, but all the supercharger

part

s are on the front. Now, what makes this unique, with this Rotrex system, is that in here, what's the word Martin? Planetary gears, also known as scrotums and a half, so there are 3 balls there, and those 3 balls are positioned like the way 3 balls would sit together and spin, but what they're doing is really clever, invented in Denmark in The 1980s, is that the gear system allows the impellers to rotate at a speed similar to that of turbochargers, which is usually one of the disadvantages of a supercharger.

Now obviously boost is controlled by the size of the wheels at the front, as you know we did a whole 10 part series on supercharging in the classic Mini, but this actually gives you turbocharger-like performance that For our test it is perfect. Exactly, it's basically a belt driven supercharger, they call them centrifugal superchargers and the design is unique. If you turn it around, it looks like a turbocharger cap, except we don't run it with exhaust, we run it with a belt, and the tricky part is getting it to spin fast enough, because it will only work if you can spin it at a certain RPM.

And some fast and nerdy stuff that of course is controversial, but on a normal supercharger system, you might be able to get half the speeds, RPM-wise, of a turbocharger. Yes, and they all have different efficiencies, but it's actually also a measure of size: if you have a turbo that size, you have to spin it at a certain speed to generate boost. As you know, big truck turbos don't have boost until because you can't spin them, this is interesting because you get that speed on the belt directly from the crankshaft of the engine, but it's also how they reduce it to make it efficient, and they're pretty interesting and impressive, and This will make the kind of power that could potentially be comparable to that of a turbo, so it will be a close race for that.

The interesting thing about a kit like this is that they come in kit form, now Rotrex is the company that makes the actual supercharger that you see on many different cars, but they don't make kits. The kit is made by a mob called Craftworks who did everything, and the interesting thing is that it installs in less than a day. And I was going to say, that's probably one of the advantages of a supercharger kit, and if we take a quick look at the pros and cons, which is probably one of the most important things in this video, is that unless you you're supercharging On a Mini you bought in Japan, superchargers should be easier to install.

They can be expensive and in fact probably by the time you've got the whole turbo and supercharger set up the price is probably negligible between the two except the difference with this one although this one has its own It's kind of a dedicated oil system here, no you don't need to access the sump or the water feeds or anything, so it saves you a lot of trouble with that, and this thing here, which was done here with a couple of guys, was done in less than a day, so It's a big plus for superchargers because the same probably couldn't be said for a similar turbo conversion.

Exactly, and a lot of it looks the same, I mean you have a front bracket that cools the charger, the intake that goes to the supercharger, the supercharger spits it out the other side. It looks a lot like a turbo, and even on the MX5s the turbo is in a similar position, which is quite interesting: the front mounted pipe, requires no cutting, it is simply bolted on. I mean, if it was a Saturday morning and you wanted a boost for Saturday night, you would always be overfed. Marty: yeah Moog: oh here we go, unless you have the most precisely built turbo kit in the world, which I have yet to see, that you didn't have to weld something, but literally the tools needed for this, no.

Soldering iron required, exactly, without manufacturing. It just screws right on. So that's the configuration of this car. I'm really interested to see what it does, it'll need management of course, it'll need injectors, all that sort of stuff, but that's the nuts and bolts of how this particular supercharger system works. We managed to install the entire Craftworks kit in under 8 hours, with only a few bolts required to mount and connect the supercharger. There are complete bolt-on turbo kits available for these cars, but we've decided to source parts from local suppliers because it's easier, cheaper and that's how we like to work.

We'll also be throwing out the interceptor boxes and opting for fully programmable engine management to keep things as similar as possible between the two cars. The first interesting point of comparison will be the time it takes to convert this red MX5 from its naturally aspirated form to a turbocharged machine. It's time to start, so the first thing we have to do is lift the car. The hood comes off so we can access the entire engine compartment. We are also removing the wheels and protective liners. It's a good idea to mark the hood hinges so everything lines up when you put it back together.

Don't forget some soft cloths to rest it on, so as not to scratch the edges. Next we can remove the intake pipe, exhaust heat shields, air flow meter, air box and wiring, which we will mark with tape so they don't get mixed up. Marty: bye! Marty: Thanks for coming! Marty: Have a good trip! Removing the stock exhaust can be difficult. You have to remove the lower reinforcements and spray the exhaust bolts with a little penetrating spray so they don't round off. The entire front section of the exhaust will be replaced with a 3-inch low-mount stainless steel downpipe.

Everything made man. Good material, amazing. So things are heating up and getting a little exciting! Why am I talking like it's a game show? I don't know, Martin, but I think it's because we're about to win the prize. We've...we've spun...we've spun the big ball sack and it's about to hang on the million dollars. reinforcement reward I want to buy a vowel A discharge valve? Yeah