Supercharge your 3.0 Vulcan for cheap

[McCormack]

The last thing I'd want to do on a boosted engine is hurt the performnce by pulling timing when it can be avoided.

My comment was in regard to a stock 3.0 engine, which comes from the factory with too much timing, hence the pinging problem.

On a boosted engine, if you don't lower compression, then one of the first things you'd want to do is retard your timing or your going to soon have holes in the tops of your pistons.

 

[stmitch]

On a boosted engine, if you don't lower compression, then one of the first things you'd want to do is retard your timing or your going to soon have holes in the tops of your pistons.

There are many approaches to reducing detonaton. Keeping the air charge cool, Smoothing the roughness of the combustion chamber castings, and appropriate fueling will keep things plenty safe, even on a boosted engine.

 

[McCormack]

There are many approaches to reducing detonaton. Keeping the air charge cool, Smoothing the roughness of the combustion chamber castings, and appropriate fueling will keep things plenty safe, even on a boosted engine.

OK, suit yourself. Once you get a blower on your 3.0 keep the stock timing and let us know how it turns out. I'm betting that you're not going to like the results.

 

[JP02XLT]

Just a couple comments on a Whipple setup, The reason you see a loss with headers is due to the loss of scavenging and less velocity through the intake / head / exhaust system. Port the heads, change the floor level to increase the flow & velocity and the little 3.0 heads wake right up & now your headers help the situation as they are able to smooth & handle the increased air flow from the additional flow through the heads.

As for timing, even at 6 psi, with premium fuel, its going to knock/ping in the upper gears on stock tuning, you might get away with it in 1st gear maybe 2nd. A very general rule for tuning SC vehicle is to pull 1 deg of timing per lb of boost on a WOT top end pull, this is only a base starting point, of course your MAF signal is going to play into this as well on WOT and mid range. The Whipple kit added a 4.0 MAF as the 3.0 was easily maxed out with adding the SC & caused frightful lean spikes.

I have mine tuned to run 87 octane, & big shots of H20/Meth under boost, and its good most of the time, occasionally it will slightly knock depending on weather conditions & only on WOT in high gear, like a big top gear roll on.

Most of the time I run a 75% mix of 87 or 91 octane gas with 25% E-85 and it seems to like it really well, no knock and my mileage stays in the 16-17 mpg range as I do mostly city with just a short bit of highway driving.

The Whipple kit came with a 160 thermostat, I never had any luck as it caused the engine to run too rich all the time, Mine runs better on a 185 stat.

As for the Air cooler or Meth setup, an air cooler would be nice but it seems that the intake runners get way too long trying to hook everything up on the Ranger body. I have a dual shot meth setup on mine, I shoot before the SC and after, triggered by boost pressure, MAF signal & throttle position.

One thing you need to change is your air filter location, your not going to make HP on hot air and from the pics posted of the OP's setup that open filter is doing nothing but sucking in hot air, anything taken from under the hood is ridiculously hot after even a short drive.

I did a ton of work on my intake to get a good sized tube into the grill area from the stock air box and lid with a panel filter to get ambient air into the system, and it works, I generally see pre-SC intake temps 2-3 degrees below ambient temps, even a greater delta in the winter months, sometimes as much as 10 degrees below ambient. I am setup to see both pre & post SC temps in the cab on the Scangauge II.

Believe it or not the 3.0 is a great engine for boost if tuned correctly, 6 psi - better than stock but still pretty boring, 10 psi - runs decent, 15 psi - now you have a good v-8 killer, 17-18 psi is a torque monster that will just scream. 20 psi hauls the mail, but life can be short as it will eventually vent the head gaskets, and the rod bolts on these 3.0's are tiny and can be easily wadded up at this level.

My Experience: I have a Whipple, heavily modded 3.0, ported / polished heads, intake, upper & lower, roller rockers, bee hive valve springs, headers, running on ~18 psi with a 2 shot H20 / Meth setup, its my daily driver year round, yep even in the Indiana winters.

The whine is great, the HP and gas mileage are good too.

I applaud you on your efforts for the Eaton kits, keep working the bugs out, but whatever you do plan on tuning it accordingly, the H20/meth setup, polishing on the heads and air to air cooling are all just ice cream on the pie, while it may add flavor, its not going to cover up the bad taste of a poorly made pie.

JP02XLT

 

[oodannyboyoo]

Just a couple comments on a Whipple setup, The reason you see a loss with headers is due to the loss of scavenging and less velocity through the intake / head / exhaust system. Port the heads, change the floor level to increase the flow & velocity and the little 3.0 heads wake right up & now your headers help the situation as they are able to smooth & handle the increased air flow from the additional flow through the heads.

As for timing, even at 6 psi, with premium fuel, its going to knock/ping in the upper gears on stock tuning, you might get away with it in 1st gear maybe 2nd. A very general rule for tuning SC vehicle is to pull 1 deg of timing per lb of boost on a WOT top end pull, this is only a base starting point, of course your MAF signal is going to play into this as well on WOT and mid range. The Whipple kit added a 4.0 MAF as the 3.0 was easily maxed out with adding the SC & caused frightful lean spikes.

I have mine tuned to run 87 octane, & big shots of H20/Meth under boost, and its good most of the time, occasionally it will slightly knock depending on weather conditions & only on WOT in high gear, like a big top gear roll on.

Most of the time I run a 75% mix of 87 or 91 octane gas with 25% E-85 and it seems to like it really well, no knock and my mileage stays in the 16-17 mpg range as I do mostly city with just a short bit of highway driving.

The Whipple kit came with a 160 thermostat, I never had any luck as it caused the engine to run too rich all the time, Mine runs better on a 185 stat.

As for the Air cooler or Meth setup, an air cooler would be nice but it seems that the intake runners get way too long trying to hook everything up on the Ranger body. I have a dual shot meth setup on mine, I shoot before the SC and after, triggered by boost pressure, MAF signal & throttle position.

One thing you need to change is your air filter location, your not going to make HP on hot air and from the pics posted of the OP's setup that open filter is doing nothing but sucking in hot air, anything taken from under the hood is ridiculously hot after even a short drive.

I did a ton of work on my intake to get a good sized tube into the grill area from the stock air box and lid with a panel filter to get ambient air into the system, and it works, I generally see pre-SC intake temps 2-3 degrees below ambient temps, even a greater delta in the winter months, sometimes as much as 10 degrees below ambient. I am setup to see both pre & post SC temps in the cab on the Scangauge II.

Believe it or not the 3.0 is a great engine for boost if tuned correctly, 6 psi - better than stock but still pretty boring, 10 psi - runs decent, 15 psi - now you have a good v-8 killer, 17-18 psi is a torque monster that will just scream. 20 psi hauls the mail, but life can be short as it will eventually vent the head gaskets, and the rod bolts on these 3.0's are tiny and can be easily wadded up at this level.

My Experience: I have a Whipple, heavily modded 3.0, ported / polished heads, intake, upper & lower, roller rockers, bee hive valve springs, headers, running on ~18 psi with a 2 shot H20 / Meth setup, its my daily driver year round, yep even in the Indiana winters.

The whine is great, the HP and gas mileage are good too.

I applaud you on your efforts for the Eaton kits, keep working the bugs out, but whatever you do plan on tuning it accordingly, the H20/meth setup, polishing on the heads and air to air cooling are all just ice cream on the pie, while it may add flavor, its not going to cover up the bad taste of a poorly made pie.

JP02XLT

Thanks for all the information! One thing that worries me is the PSI of boost examples you are using....youre not implying I can boost a stock vulcan with 20 let alone 10 psi are you? On a stock lower end? This is getting me worried lol

 

[stmitch]

Thanks for all the information! One thing that worries me is the PSI of boost examples you are using....youre not implying I can boost a stock vulcan with 20 let alone 10 psi are you? On a stock lower end? This is getting me worried lol

As long as you have a healthy starting point, 10psi is doable on a stock 3.0. The Whipple kits ran around 10psi and came with a Ford Racing warranty, so I wouldn't worry about the engine being able to withstand that amount of boost.

The critical thing is making sure you have the appropriate size MAF, fuel injectors, and a good tune to make it all happy together. A bad tune can do plenty of damage at low boost too, so It's a very critical part of the equation.

The boost levels you attampt all depend on your hardware. If you have a way to cool the air charge, it can allow you to safely run more boost. There's nothing at all wrong with being cautious and starting low and working your way up. Just realize that it's going to cost money every time you want to increase the boost. Hardware changes like smaller pulleys, larger injectors, fuel pumps, MAFs etc all cost money, and so does retuning, so if you think you'll eventually want 10psi, then starting @ 6psi might not be the best idea financially speaking. It boils down to your comfort level, and what you want from the engine.

 

[JP02XLT]

All the levels of boost I have mentioned, I have done, all on stock internals, its the tuning along with the charge temp that throws curves at you. All I added to the stock 3.0 bottom end was the main girdle that the Astrovan uses, otherwise its a stock bottom end.

Like I said, my daily driver runs ~18 psi boost, so its very do able.

JP02XLT

 

[oodannyboyoo]

All the levels of boost I have mentioned, I have done, all on stock internals, its the tuning along with the charge temp that throws curves at you. All I added to the stock 3.0 bottom end was the main girdle that the Astrovan uses, otherwise its a stock bottom end.

Like I said, my daily driver runs ~18 psi boost, so its very do able.

JP02XLT

This is scary and exciting for me to hear at the sametime lol. I definitely have an idea on how to create ports and tunnels for some type of coolant to flow through the manifold im creating and the supercharger itself. My only other concern I would have to say is the age of my truck which is now at 110,000 miles.

WOuld this be a concern? And what kind of tune did you guys use or get? A local shop im assuming on a dyno? If this is the case and can hold true for me I will gladly push into the 8 or so psi.

How did you get the whipple supercharger to push 18 psi by the way? Thanks for all the info!

 

[JP02XLT]

The original motor in my truck had 100k+ miles on it when I threw the Whipple on it, took it up to 18+ psi & ran it that way for almost 2 years until it stretched a rod bolt and threw 4 rods out the pan, I figured it owed me nothing as I ran it hard all the time.

It is no problem to get the Whipple to 20 psi, just change the pulley, & some light polish work on the inlet & outlet and the H20 pre-SC shot helps seal everything a tad bit tighter and build boost fast. This blower has at least 40k miles on it, I send the oil off for lab analysis once a year when I change the oil. It also gets a new gates belt once a year regardless of wear. I have heard of people putting 100K miles on the Whipples with no issues.

Your going to need to find yourself a good tuner, 1 the original software in the Ranger is not the most sophisticated software and not what you would pick for a SC application. But it can be tuned for SC/Turbo applications, but it takes time, you want someone who has experience, a wideband setup, and willing to take the time to tune out driveability issues as well as tune for WOT pulls.

Another big thing is routine maintenance, you are going to have to stay on top of every little thing and definately follow a preventive maintenance schedule once its boosted, Things like plugs, wires, oil changes are all very important.

JP02XLT

 

[don4331]

Dannyboy:

You're disappointing me as future fellow engineer

Eaton Superchargers are good for PR of ~2,5 - 21 psi; Whipples are good for PR of ~2.7 - 24psi. Pick a large enough model; spin it fast enough and it will make the boost. (Feed it enough fuel and ADI for it to survive).

JP02XLT:

I am curious of you statement - below ambient temperature... How are you achieving that?

p.s. Rod bolts fail as a result of too many rpm; not boost levels. Bearings fail under boost and failed bearing will break rod bolts. Higher boost level might tempt/allow higher rpms. But cause and effect are separate.

Don

 

[JP02XLT]

Don I have the truck setup to see pre & post SC temps, I also have an overhead console that has the standard compass & temp / message center, Its usually right on with what the local weatherman reports temp wise, & I see a couple degrees lower than they report, I know its not a windchill deal it just what the Ford MAF reports, and I have had 2 MAF's on it with the same result on temp. The real issue I was trying to point out to the OP was that his filter sucking in underhood air temps would really kill his setup.

True on the rod bolts, boost cuts / breaks piston ring lands, then the fun starts.

JP

 

[oodannyboyoo]

As long as you have a healthy starting point, 10psi is doable on a stock 3.0. The Whipple kits ran around 10psi and came with a Ford Racing warranty, so I wouldn't worry about the engine being able to withstand that amount of boost.

The critical thing is making sure you have the appropriate size MAF, fuel injectors, and a good tune to make it all happy together. A bad tune can do plenty of damage at low boost too, so It's a very critical part of the equation.

The boost levels you attampt all depend on your hardware. If you have a way to cool the air charge, it can allow you to safely run more boost. There's nothing at all wrong with being cautious and starting low and working your way up. Just realize that it's going to cost money every time you want to increase the boost. Hardware changes like smaller pulleys, larger injectors, fuel pumps, MAFs etc all cost money, and so does retuning, so if you think you'll eventually want 10psi, then starting @ 6psi might not be the best idea financially speaking. It boils down to your comfort level, and what you want from the engine.

I completely agree, as I have heard people take stock mustangs run on custom tunes that were not....I guess the most well thought out... and throw rods on brand new GTs...I cant imagine being the owner spending a few hundred on your first mod, to a guy who you'd trust...only to have your engine explode :L sounds like one very very bad day LOL tunes can make or break an engine

 

[oodannyboyoo]

The original motor in my truck had 100k+ miles on it when I threw the Whipple on it, took it up to 18+ psi & ran it that way for almost 2 years until it stretched a rod bolt and threw 4 rods out the pan, I figured it owed me nothing as I ran it hard all the time.

It is no problem to get the Whipple to 20 psi, just change the pulley, & some light polish work on the inlet & outlet and the H20 pre-SC shot helps seal everything a tad bit tighter and build boost fast. This blower has at least 40k miles on it, I send the oil off for lab analysis once a year when I change the oil. It also gets a new gates belt once a year regardless of wear. I have heard of people putting 100K miles on the Whipples with no issues.

Your going to need to find yourself a good tuner, 1 the original software in the Ranger is not the most sophisticated software and not what you would pick for a SC application. But it can be tuned for SC/Turbo applications, but it takes time, you want someone who has experience, a wideband setup, and willing to take the time to tune out driveability issues as well as tune for WOT pulls.

Another big thing is routine maintenance, you are going to have to stay on top of every little thing and definately follow a preventive maintenance schedule once its boosted, Things like plugs, wires, oil changes are all very important.

JP02XLT

Very informative! thanks so much for the info, would you happen to have pics of your old setup?? What kind of meth injection did yu get and nozzle did you use? Im look at AEMs meth and water injection kits look pretty decent whats your take on it?

 

[oodannyboyoo]

Progress

Hey guys its been a while since my last post. Haven’t had a whole lot of time since then with school but some personal issues arose and in order to solve them I had to drop physics for the first half of the summer which gives me now some free time until summer term 2 starts up. Regardless, I was able to talk to a local machinist I went to once before, he owns a custom shop and specializes in cars, he didn’t have much to say for the design except that I could combine three of my pieces into one without increases the cost of milling it out. He told me it will be about 600$, but will allow me to mill out as many stencils of certain aspects of the part to physically double check clearances and measurements! Which is great news! This allows me to really fine tune a lot of clearances which will remove a lot of variables. Essentially the intake spacer, base plate, and cavity plate will all be one piece (as seen highlighted in the picture). I’m going to close up the tolerances on the bolt holes for the “intake spacer” ensuring the whole assembly is solid, and I will see how much I can lower the height of the intake spacer to allow more clearance for the total height of the supercharger and intake.

In terms of a kind of cooling system, personally I don’t see that happening as there is just not enough room to fit some form of intercooling system inside the intake. However, a meth/water injection seems like the way to go as JP02XLT suggested and is what I will be installing for this project. A bit pricey for a pump and controller at around 400-500$ but I think the added safety to prevent detonation is worth it.

Bad news is the mastercam free edition doesn’t allow any post processing nor allow me to save my files as anything but mastercam home edition files So my machinist introduced me to this really neat CAD software called ViaCAD, he says he uses it more than solidworks, and to be honest I was impressed! In some ways its more powerful than mastercam's design tools. The program costs only about 70$ and allows me to save in almost ANY file possible! I wish I had known about this earlier. So it looks like I will be copying down the blueprints onto this new software and sending some stencils to mill out and check my measurements physically. Im not sure how long this will take but I’ll keep you guys posted as best I can, and sorry if this thread is slow, im trying my best to get this done when I have time!

 

[oodannyboyoo]

Fuel Pump

I was also able to get in a walbro 255 lph fuel pump the other day, it was branded as a "High Flow Performance" product but im pretty sure its all from the same source, looks just like a chinese walbro. Either way works well so far