Rv8 'thor' turbo / supercharging

[Deicist]

Hi all, I have a completely stock 2001 Range Rover P38 with the 4.6 'thor' engine in it. While I love the car, and I never expected it to be a sports car, sometimes I wish it had a bit more grunt behind it.

While I'm happy to get my hands dirty, and have done minor things like water pump replacement, shocks etc I'm a complete novice when it comes to forced induction. However, I love tinkering and learning new stuff so....

First off, could I just mount a blower of some description (turbo or super) in place of the current air inlet retaining the current MAF, throttle, manifold etc and have it 'just work' or is that doomed to failure before I start?

I'm not interested in wringing every last drop of hp out of my engine, if I could stick say 6psi of boost into it I think I should see reasonable returns.

If it is as simple as 'bung a blower in front of it' then which type should I be going for? I'm looking for low / mid range gains, not a 2 ton drag racer

[scudderfish]

No idea myself, but congratulations on an excellent first post, you'll fit in well here

[SuperV8]

Hi and welcome;

Hi all, I have a completely stock 2001 Range Rover P38 with the 4.6 'thor' engine in it. While I love the car, and I never expected it to be a sports car, sometimes I wish it had a bit more grunt behind it.

While I'm happy to get my hands dirty, and have done minor things like water pump replacement, shocks etc I'm a complete novice when it comes to forced induction. However, I love tinkering and learning new stuff so....

First off, could I just mount a blower of some description (turbo or super) in place of the current air inlet retaining the current MAF, throttle, manifold etc and have it 'just work' or is that doomed to failure before I start?

I think you can bolt on some sort of forced induction - and let the standard fuel injection control the fuel/spark - the question is what PSI boost will the standard ECU safely control the engine AFR- and I don't know? Would guess 2-3psi might be ok? and would think 6 might be too much for the standard ECU tune. You could have the standard ECU mapped to correct the fueling, but this would be quite costly and you'll maybe limited by the fuel flow for the standard injectors/fuel pump?

I'm not interested in wringing every last drop of hp out of my engine, if I could stick say 6psi of boost into it I think I should see reasonable returns.

6psi would be very noticeable and the standard engine would be easily capable - your 'challenge' will be controlling fuel and spark. Most versatile way would be standalone ECU (like megasquirt) but there would be lots of learning if your not failure? I wasn't but found learning about it enjoyable.

If it is as simple as 'bung a blower in front of it' then which type should I be going for? I'm looking for low / mid range gains, not a 2 ton drag racer

If 'I' was doing cheap as chips boosted RV8 I would get some cheap log manifolds/weld flanges on current manifolds, and find two small second hand turbos of an engine which has around half of your power goal - then megasquirt to control fuel and spark.
Warning - boost is addictive and you always want more

[Deicist]

Thanks for the reply

I think you're right, my best bet is to grab some T25s off eBay (around £130 each), some stock exhaust manifolds (£70 for a set) and find someone to machine some flanges on there for me.

Then, as a proof of concept I'll route the output from the turbos via the existing MAF into the air intake and aim for 3psi.

As a stage 2 I can get a megasquirt ECU at a later date.

[SuperV8]

I went supercharger route in my applications due to space/or lack of (Dax Rush) and already having very expensive exhaust which I didn't want to cut up.
In the early days I was trying to use a V belt to drive the supercharger but just couldn't transmit enough power to the pulley so was only seeing 2-3psi boost due to belt slip but even that was a big difference.

[Pxr5]

If I was doing this I would buy a single Chinese Ebay turbo, eg, Universal Turbo Turbocharger T3 T4 T04E A/R .50 A/R .63 V-band Oil 2.0-3.5L SCB @£90,
Fit it just after the pipes merge, dont worry about it being too far away from the exhaust ports, it will work fine.
Use a scavenge pump for oil return, for fueling use a FMU unit, & fit a cheap A/F gauge, cheap & cheerfull, it would work a treat for your application.