[gmookher]

So In now way is the turbo kit bad, but it IS driven by hot exhuast gas. It does employ a mechanical pump. and soft tubing.

I went with SC myself for a variety of reasons..and not only live where its hot, but have a need for it to do minimum of 20 minute sessions at redline under full load, repeatedly; I know how hot my turbo cars tend to get out on the tarmac and how heat soak affects performance, and how the turbo raising my motor oil temps is not something I want on this tiny motor.

Well, I finally put my money where my mouth is.... I dropped off my car with Vortech for installation and testing in Oxnard CA. As some of you know, I have a unique opportunity to do some testing for them. Its strapped to their dyno now. Yeah, I'm pretty excited about it. First they dyno, then I datalog track time. then they test more and then they determine when to market what final design. I get to have a riot at the track and get to employ a 'just try and break it' kinda approach.

The facility tour was mind blowing. The entire solution gets made in house in usa, their manufacturing is not just limited to automotive, seems they supply everything from naval to aircraft applications, busses and trucks to industrial applications and heavy machinery. This is a no joke firm. Forced induction gurus. I met their impeller design guru. Thats all the man does. Mind boggling. The milling and machining they have is pretty serious robotics. sick, really.

I wasnt allowed to take pictures but saw our impellers being machined, not stamped. Same with the backplates and housing, saw it all from raw to finished stages. Billet this and that everywhere-for our kit.

1. I live in AZ, and Robert at Evolution Motorsports who takes care of my porsche is a Vortech shop in PHX, they have dealer/installers who have been with them for years in every state. check yours.this system keep the stock cat which is actually a pretty high quality cat to start with. If carb or smog testing is a concern, I think a setup that keeps the OE cat is a no brainer. Being able to present a unmodified catalytic and a system that retains both cats is nice. The Vortech solution is simpler than a turbo in this regard, fewer parts, fewer failure points and downstream dependancies.

2. Vortech SC's iso 9001 is unparalleled industrywide in the FI market. The fact that they makle the tubing and cnc everything in house rather than slapping a off the shelf turbo in and making it work. My understanding is they made a whole new product just for this application. The tubing is aluminum, not soft rubber or silicone. Stuff like a few feet silicone piping isnt what everyone wants under their hoods; they can offer a custom made aluminum setup cause at the end of the day they are a machine shop. They make it, not made in mexico Garret, not some kid assembling this in some 3rd world country. the control along the entire way of the production process, the TQM approach, well, if you know manufacturing, you know how important stuff like stress analysis is. These guy have a lab area dedicated to trying to real world test stuff their FEA computers cough out. The difference is, with a turbo, you have a vane architecture and flow dynamics as made by the turbo maker, in our case, because of tight tolerances and small batch control, and since they go the extra milke to give us a CNC billet impeller, they can fine tune, test, in small batches, and finally be able to custom design the best impeller flow characteristics, since they MAKE the impeller specifically for our car's application. I was told this allows them to further tune the driving experience, from something as wild, basic, critical, and something only a shop like them can control -inhouse- as critical to any air delivery system something the turbo guys dont have any control over is impeller design. Its not a make it work approach, its control along the entire way of system development, right along side testing is re-engineering and performance optimization and re-development. Me, with Vortech, have little to no concerns to reliability, what so ever.

3. No potential for oil leaks what so ever,No oil lines, or aftermarket pump to fail in this system, has its own oiling system. Oil changes take 5 mins and can be done independent of motor oil to ensure high speed bearing life.

4. Vortech claims the SC will be all about instant power, and linear controllable predictable power on demand anywhere in the curve. Simple swaps of a pulley can be made to affect the boost curve, and desired target psi, and for the customer seeking more than the stock setup, its easy to implement a more robust setup from the stg1 departure point, simple as a bigger or smaller pulley by a few mm's. Its not like you can do that with a turbo.

5. Gas milage between the two I expect to be comparable

hope that helps...