Really bad experience with Kraftwerks C30 supercharger
 

My friend suggested me to go with Kraftwerks C30 supercharger when I first had a thought to get some more power from either turbo or supercharger. And I heared his advise.

It was all good at begining, before I go to track. It seems no problem at all for me to daily drive it.

However, on my first open track day with this supercharger, the belt was broken.
All the jags was gone, it just became a flat belt. So I have to cut it.

Then they sent me another belt later, and I went to track again. Well, it's broken again. This time, it just "explode" everywhere in my engine bay. I don't even need to cut it. The material of the belt was spilled everywhere inside my engine bay.

After the second broken, I ask them for 3 belts. I ordered two extra belts besides the one under the warranty, just in case it will broken again.

Today, I went to track again. Guess what? The belt broken again. Material spilled everywhere in my engine bay again! But I have 2 extra, so I don't need to ask them and wait for shipping ha!

I asked them why that would happen, they told me it maybe something about belt tension. Then I ask how to measure the tension? They told me to use a phone app to test the vibration frequency near the belt, if the frequency of the belt is around 75 Hz, it would be no problem. However, no matter how I adjust the tension, loosen it or tighten it, the Hz rating on my app is not changing too much.

After all these things happened, I would not recommend anyone to put on the Kraftwerks C30 supercharger. Yes, it is belt on supercharger, when there are some problem with the supercharger, u can just take off the belt. Well, from my experience, the main problem with this supercharger is the belt.

Right now, I'm asking my friend to see if anyone can make a new belt in the same size with better quality. If no one can do this, i will just wait til my 3 extra belts finished and then go with another force induction products.

I attached all the belt broken pictures in the attachment, so you can see it clearly.

Swapping out FI kits isn't easy. Likely, fixing your belt issue is. Clearly you don't have much experience working on cars, which is completely fine since everyone starts from somewhere, but I'd suggest doing some research on your issue before you just toss the system.

shield ur headers

This is why I am going with the other rotrex kit.

This has been a known issue and apparently isn't resolved.

This doesn't happen on the JR kit as far as I have read, no?

I am sure belts snap regardless of the kit, but KW's kit seems to be notorious for it happening often vs. the other S/C options.

Thank you for posting and sharing. I hope you resolve your issue and don't have to continue dealing with these shenanigans.

Something is wrong. Youve gone through far too many.

I went through one belt on my early kit after about 10k miles a couple track days and well over a hundred autox runs. Kw sent me new cogs and a new belt. That second belt has seen 5 or so track days, several hundred autocross runs and 10k+ miles. Its still going fine.

You need new friends

There is a reason why Rotrex doesnt recommend cogged belt for this application.


Call Jackson Racing and see if they will sell you just the bracket and piping?

The issue is the belt drive system.

Its poop. Nothing more, nothing less.

His experience is commonplace.

If the belt snaps, I usually see it snap with only a few fibers here and there and a bit of fiberglass dust, but when its shredded flat like yours is, there will be fibers and fiberglass dust everywhere, as you've noted.

That said, @wqc3241 I suggest taking a can of compressed air to the small nooks and crannies of your engine bay to blow out the fiberglass and threads. Try and do it with the bottom shield off, so the threads and dust can fall down for easy sweeping. Otherwise, they'll just be sitting atop the tray, and will fall on you when you remove it.

Just some general questions if you have the time...

Did you install the KW supercharger kit, coilovers or headers yourself?
I see the bolts on the mounting plate are a tad rusty, how long did you have the kit on before heading to the track?
How long between track days?
How many sessions before it broke?
Were you running an oil cooler?

You're still running the smooth idlers?
Some have had zero belt failures while others have had multiple failures. Seems either a tension issue or a bad batch of belts

I emailed with workers in Kraftwerks back and forth, and I did everything they told me to do. Things like this still happen. By the way, I didnt put it on by myself. It's all done by a mechanic

@SPCorBUST
Did you install the KW supercharger kit, coilovers or headers yourself?
It's all done by a local mechanic
I see the bolts on the mounting plate are a tad rusty, how long did you have the kit on before heading to the track?
3 months before I went to track with it. Was winter, and lots of snow
How long between track days?
half months
How many sessions before it broke?
2 sessions, then it break
Were you running an oil cooler?
yes, i have skunk2 oil cooler

i dont know if this is your issue but i see you have "smooth pulleys" they should be sending you out the cogged pulleys. id would inquire with them.
btw i have yet to break a belt in 5k of driving.

@DAN_BRZ
They actually sent me a set of new pulleys in different size. But there is no help. Still broke

Shouldn't all the pulleys be cogged? That seems to me like it would be the obvious answer.

I drove from WA to FL no oil cooler and the only problem I had my whole trip was due to bad fuel. I have not snapped a belt yet, and you should run clogged idler pulleys just saying.

lolololol......No. This does not happen with the JR kit. The JR kit actually has good quality and support behind it.

That is what I understood as well :thumbup:

The KW belts may not regularly break with light street usage, but the cogged design means that they will experience shock when transferring power to the pulleys and when that energy repeats in intense fashion (track abuse) they can only take that shock so many times before giving out.

This is why Rotrex doesn't recommend cogged belts/pulleys to drive their superchargers.

Please show us where Rotrex doesn't recommend the cogged system?

Where does a belt failure show poor quality of the kit or poor quality it service?

Again, please show us where Rotrex has stated the recommendation against a cogged system.

There are plenty of users, some even here, without issues. Rotrex representatives themselves have given many compliments and praise to both the cogged design and divorced belt drive-system that we offer.

From http://www.rotrex.com/media/5fd67e23...20Handbook_pdf


http://i.imgur.com/ozka42D.png

Ribbed are the standard as the handbook states. Cogged is non-standard so it's insinuated that they do not recommend them.

I have an email trail....

Looks like Atlanta beat me to it....

Anyway, thats the PG13 version.

My conversation was considerably more direct.

Nowhere in that paragraph or in the design specifications in 6.1 or 6.2 does it say to not used cogged pulleys.

That insinuation in the user manual that I highlighted along with all the evidence of broken belts from the end users who are tracking KW kits is enough for me to understand that it's not a good idea to use a cogged system regardless of it being explicitly stated.

@slipdog

You can also argue that the fact they specifically put,

"Not following these specifications voids warranty and may result in permanent damage of the supercharger system and/or other systems in the vehicle/application"

...explicitly states it is highly not recommended as well as discouraged because of the above said repercussions.

I want to see it :word:

One belt failure doesn't do that. Multiple and repeated failures does.

I cannot comment about your service since I have never, nor will ever, buy a Kraftwerks product. Hell, I won't even abbreviate your name because I feel like I am somehow sullying the people who I humbly consider the real KW (the suspension company) by doing so.

I can speak with high regard for Jackson's quality of service since I have experience with them though.

Anyway good luck luck OP. I hope you get all these issues sorted out for the better.

This is all Im able to show since the rest of our conversation was not something Im willing to share.

David

If possible please use a serpentine, since all our testing is done with this
type of belt.

As long as timing is not required we recommend s-belts for many reasons.

Not really. If you look at the specifications, the only ones mandatory are things like bolt pattern/spacing, shaft diameter, depth, etc. So there is no explicit statement about cogged or not. If your pully is too fat or the diameter is too big, then yes. But you could make a cogged belt that fits their specifications and it will not void the warranty. Causing damage is unknown.

that's a long ass drive

You are clearly missing it and ignoring the words right in front of you provided above....

It is plenty clear and there is no room for confusion or doubt.

Wow - OP - so sorry you are dealing with an issue like this. What a total buzzkill. GL in your effort to get a stable ride.

What is your hypothesis on why your kit tends to breaks belts? All user error or a design problem?

I'm assuming this is rhetorical?

Seems like KW could resolve this easily enough by offering or changing the kut to a ribbe belt. However the shock explanation makes a hell of a lot of sense to this engineering student. Damn shame that kraftwerks doesn't seem to want to recognize the issue either as I believe they honestly have the superior tubing route.

Please elaborate; from what I've observed the charge piping on both the JR and KW kits follow the same route.

From the SC outlet they both route the piping under the driver's headlight down around the washer fluid reservoir with a bend feeding the intercooler and then back up under the opposite headlight and onward into the intake manifold.

He's probably talking about the curve right before the TB, although it isn't as drastic a curve as many people think.

That's exactly it, I'd also like to see the j/r utlize a more sealed filter. I can fix the filter quibbles myself. Not much I can do about the curve ahead of the TB.

The air in that curved inlet tube has already been metered by the MAF and most tuners use a speed density hybrid tune using the MAP sensor in the manifold past the TB so not sure what his point is.

After looking at the dyno comparisons between the kits and understanding how they both measure airflow and manifold pressure again I don't see anything superior about the routing of the KW kit's charge piping.

Did you know that CSG has measured and logged intake air temperatures to be lower than stock with the JRSC kit? It's not hindering performance in any way having the air filter exposed in the engine bay. Intercooling takes care of all those concerns. The filter gets fresh air through the same opening that the stock airbox snorkel does at speed.

If you're really that worried about it and have money to burn then you can buy what Pure made for the Vortech kit. Should be relatively easy to adapt or put your own together.

http://i1273.photobucket.com/albums/...pse332ef57.jpg