Hi guys and gals

Whats the pros and cons of turbos and superchargers? I'm just wondering why turbo'ing is far more common than supercharging, when supercharging seems to be the more simpler route?

Thanks

Rich

 

simpler? its more complicated.

why is it simpler?

 

turbos are more economical broadly speaking

 

well i was hoping you could tell me that

 

superchargers dont lag like a turbo coz there connected directly to the crank.and dont rely on exhuarst gases to spool it up.

 

a supercharger saps power to run it. a turbo is using the waste gas so doesnt use up any power

 

It depends on which noise you like bestest

 

Depends what type of supercharger you use.

Generally roots and screw superchargers aren't "laggy" but centrifugal(sp?) blowers are.

 

can be more expensive to supercharge,and theres more scope for power with turbos usually

 

What?

Yeah, really laggy

Those types of chargers give different power delivery, but none are laggy in any way, they give a sharper throttle response than most n/a engines would.

Its not even possible for em to be laggy.

And the way centrifugal ones deliver the power can help drivability on some cars massivley, but lag never would.

 

I KNEW you reply with that, I was trying to put it in terms he might understand hence the quotes around the word laggy

 

Simply a supercharger is correctly a term used to describe any forced induction ie turbo or as we all refer to a supercharger being mechanically driven.
A supercharger will use more fuel as it is being driven even when not needed, and don't have that much scope for further power hikes compared to your average turbo car which by using a waste by product to create forced induction is more effecient.
Lag is nowhere near as bad now as the early days of turbo cars, but any mechanically driven compressor/supercharger is going to have the edge lower down.
Superchargers are expensive to manufacture and are bulky.
Turbo's are comapct and cheap to make but have a much narrower window of power.
A lot of work was done in the HYPERBAR experiments to further aid the suitability of turbo's.
tabetha

 

Its "boost threshold" not lag you mean of course.

 

Not true actually the turbo causes a restriction in the exhaust flow of the engine, this means that cylinder pressures on the exhaust stroke are increased, so the engine is still having to work against it to turn it.


There is a quite shocking amount of misrepresentation in this thread generally TBH!

 

agreed.

not necessarily - if a very small turbo is used then it could be responsive from idle but would be restrictive at higher rpm

again, not necessarily. especially in the case of variable vane turbo's

 

i've got a supercharged (jackson racing) zetec and a turboed (T28) zetec, the turbo is much much much better.

not that the supercharger is bad, i love it to bits but i am now a turbo convert.

yes sure the supercharger has more response but the turbo only has very very slight lag and then its party time compared to the supercharger.

i see you have a focus so i'm assuming its that you are on about forced induction on. well having got both on the same type of engines as yours, my advice would be turbo it

 

IMHO crappy bolt on turbo or supercharger kits cant and dont give a true representation of what they are like, makes superchargers seem nowt special, and makes turbos seem lag free lovlies.

This might be the case on low boost/power setups, but not in general.

And no matter how responsive and small a turbo is, it never gives the same feeling, theres always "lag", without ALS throttle position and acceleration is never directly proportional.

Saying all that though, id go turbo 99% of times as its much easier and more adaptable when you want to change stuff.