Turbo upgrade budget?

[003]

Surely you've made your decision by now and have already started down your path, but I'll add my experience as one additional data point, and because I'm bored at work.

I bought my '08 135 this summer, July 2018. 103K miles, bone-stock, original owner, an older gentleman in SoCal. The car drove perfectly fine the first month, and I went FBO by the second month. It was pretty fun! Until my turbos started smoking.... At this point in time, I'd guess that a lot of these cars are around the 100K mile mark, and probably not ready to handle 50% more power output, especially the turbos. So i wasn't too surprised about them smoking, but didn't expect it THAT soon. At least it was early enough that, if i did upgrade them, I'd get to enjoy them for as long as I own the car. (as opposed to having to replace them right before selling the car). My indy shop said they might last a while if I just baby the car, but they're definitely on their way out. I wanted to enjoy the car, and not worry about failure every single mile, so....

I opted for Pure S2. (they went on sale, 15% off, a month later, around Black Friday. ) $1,200 for labor, $500 tune, and a few hundred for the LPFP and misc stuff.

I took it to its first dyno event a couple weeks later, and only made 357hp. The dyno graph was strong and smooth until 80mph, and then it fell flat, and became very jagged between 80-150ish. Back to the shop it went. Apparently it just needed a new fuel pressure sensor, as suggested during the turbo install. $250 and Done. (Again, expected, but not sooo soon!)

Took it to another dyno event the following weekend. 350hp.... . Back to the shop.
Everything was logged and 'test-driven' and no issues were found.
At this point, I'd given up and just accepted my fate. I rarely go over 80 anyway. Big city livin' for ya...

Less than a month later, my car starts stuttering during very gentle weekend driving with the misses. After a couple of red-light restarts, it just dies completely. It's towed to the shop. Turns out the HPFP decided to retire. (Side bar. It was replaced at 17K miles, and again at 29K miles, last in June 2008. I called the dealer to see if they'd replace it since its a known-faulty part and the warranty was extended to 120K miles, but apparently its also a 10 year warranty, so I missed it, almost barely. womp womp.)


Moral of the story is this. Yes, you can surely do everything on a budget, and piece it all together slowly, as needed. And Yes, $5K is enough to buy the turbos and install them, plus tune and fix your gasket/seals. But it's also definitely inconvenient. You already saved up $5k. Just save up another $500-$1K and do it right the first time. All the issues I had were expected. They're known issues, even with just FBO, let alone S2 turbos. I didn't save any money by waiting an extra month to replace the fuel sensor or upgrade the fuel pump. If anything, it's an extra few days of uber/rental cars, and tow trucks (insurance FTW, even though they wanted me to wait 3 hours for a tow. I called my own random company, and am being reimbursed).
Just save up and do it right the first time. You're already so close! The peace of mind that comes with it is priceless. Not to mention the convenience. If nothing else, you might save a couple hundred doing everything at once.


Would you look at the time!!??? Time to go home!

[ShocknAwe]

Maintenance before mods.

[WeekendWarriorz]

Originally Posted by 003

Surely you've made your decision by now and have already started down your path, but I'll add my experience as one additional data point, and because I'm bored at work.

I bought my '08 135 this summer, July 2018. 103K miles, bone-stock, original owner, an older gentleman in SoCal. The car drove perfectly fine the first month, and I went FBO by the second month. It was pretty fun! Until my turbos started smoking.... At this point in time, I'd guess that a lot of these cars are around the 100K mile mark, and probably not ready to handle 50% more power output, especially the turbos. So i wasn't too surprised about them smoking, but didn't expect it THAT soon. At least it was early enough that, if i did upgrade them, I'd get to enjoy them for as long as I own the car. (as opposed to having to replace them right before selling the car). My indy shop said they might last a while if I just baby the car, but they're definitely on their way out. I wanted to enjoy the car, and not worry about failure every single mile, so....

I opted for Pure S2. (they went on sale, 15% off, a month later, around Black Friday. ) $1,200 for labor, $500 tune, and a few hundred for the LPFP and misc stuff.

I took it to its first dyno event a couple weeks later, and only made 357hp. The dyno graph was strong and smooth until 80mph, and then it fell flat, and became very jagged between 80-150ish. Back to the shop it went. Apparently it just needed a new fuel pressure sensor, as suggested during the turbo install. $250 and Done. (Again, expected, but not sooo soon!)

Took it to another dyno event the following weekend. 350hp.... . Back to the shop.
Everything was logged and 'test-driven' and no issues were found.
At this point, I'd given up and just accepted my fate. I rarely go over 80 anyway. Big city livin' for ya...

Less than a month later, my car starts stuttering during very gentle weekend driving with the misses. After a couple of red-light restarts, it just dies completely. It's towed to the shop. Turns out the HPFP decided to retire. (Side bar. It was replaced at 17K miles, and again at 29K miles, last in June 2008. I called the dealer to see if they'd replace it since its a known-faulty part and the warranty was extended to 120K miles, but apparently its also a 10 year warranty, so I missed it, almost barely. womp womp.)


Moral of the story is this. Yes, you can surely do everything on a budget, and piece it all together slowly, as needed. And Yes, $5K is enough to buy the turbos and install them, plus tune and fix your gasket/seals. But it's also definitely inconvenient. You already saved up $5k. Just save up another $500-$1K and do it right the first time. All the issues I had were expected. They're known issues, even with just FBO, let alone S2 turbos. I didn't save any money by waiting an extra month to replace the fuel sensor or upgrade the fuel pump. If anything, it's an extra few days of uber/rental cars, and tow trucks (insurance FTW, even though they wanted me to wait 3 hours for a tow. I called my own random company, and am being reimbursed).
Just save up and do it right the first time. You're already so close! The peace of mind that comes with it is priceless. Not to mention the convenience. If nothing else, you might save a couple hundred doing everything at once.


Would you look at the time!!??? Time to go home!

With your low dyno figures did you even bother to take a log? It should've been very apparent in my opinion when you have a ps2 and making less whp than stock turbos..

[mfindigital]

Originally Posted by 003

Surely you've made your decision by now and have already started down your path, but I'll add my experience as one additional data point, and because I'm bored at work.

I bought my '08 135 this summer, July 2018. 103K miles, bone-stock, original owner, an older gentleman in SoCal. The car drove perfectly fine the first month, and I went FBO by the second month. It was pretty fun! Until my turbos started smoking.... At this point in time, I'd guess that a lot of these cars are around the 100K mile mark, and probably not ready to handle 50% more power output, especially the turbos. So i wasn't too surprised about them smoking, but didn't expect it THAT soon. At least it was early enough that, if i did upgrade them, I'd get to enjoy them for as long as I own the car. (as opposed to having to replace them right before selling the car). My indy shop said they might last a while if I just baby the car, but they're definitely on their way out. I wanted to enjoy the car, and not worry about failure every single mile, so....

I opted for Pure S2. (they went on sale, 15% off, a month later, around Black Friday. ) $1,200 for labor, $500 tune, and a few hundred for the LPFP and misc stuff.

I took it to its first dyno event a couple weeks later, and only made 357hp. The dyno graph was strong and smooth until 80mph, and then it fell flat, and became very jagged between 80-150ish. Back to the shop it went. Apparently it just needed a new fuel pressure sensor, as suggested during the turbo install. $250 and Done. (Again, expected, but not sooo soon!)

Took it to another dyno event the following weekend. 350hp.... . Back to the shop.
Everything was logged and 'test-driven' and no issues were found.
At this point, I'd given up and just accepted my fate. I rarely go over 80 anyway. Big city livin' for ya...

Less than a month later, my car starts stuttering during very gentle weekend driving with the misses. After a couple of red-light restarts, it just dies completely. It's towed to the shop. Turns out the HPFP decided to retire. (Side bar. It was replaced at 17K miles, and again at 29K miles, last in June 2008. I called the dealer to see if they'd replace it since its a known-faulty part and the warranty was extended to 120K miles, but apparently its also a 10 year warranty, so I missed it, almost barely. womp womp.)


Moral of the story is this. Yes, you can surely do everything on a budget, and piece it all together slowly, as needed. And Yes, $5K is enough to buy the turbos and install them, plus tune and fix your gasket/seals. But it's also definitely inconvenient. You already saved up $5k. Just save up another $500-$1K and do it right the first time. All the issues I had were expected. They're known issues, even with just FBO, let alone S2 turbos. I didn't save any money by waiting an extra month to replace the fuel sensor or upgrade the fuel pump. If anything, it's an extra few days of uber/rental cars, and tow trucks (insurance FTW, even though they wanted me to wait 3 hours for a tow. I called my own random company, and am being reimbursed).
Just save up and do it right the first time. You're already so close! The peace of mind that comes with it is priceless. Not to mention the convenience. If nothing else, you might save a couple hundred doing everything at once.


Would you look at the time!!??? Time to go home!

So what power did you end up after all the kinks were worked out?

[The Wind Breezes]

My opinion on this is you should probably be able to buy a second copy of your car outright to be thinking about a bigger turbo. There's tuning kinks and hangups, dyno time (or god forbid, countless highway pulls) and the possibility of breaking big and expensive stuff when you get the turbo making power. You'll need supporting mods for the power, probably a diff bracket and some stiffer bushings at minimum to prevent wheelhop. Then obviously you want to replace the stock garbage open diff with something better, what kind of tires are you gonna use to hook up, are you ok with breaking or upgrading driveline components thanks to those drag tires etc. If you just want a dyno sheet and maybe a couple fast trips down the highway all that mostly doesn't apply but that's really about the only situation where you can just throw in a turbo and tune and go without spending gobs of extra cash.

[b3turbo]

Originally Posted by Furqwan

Looking todo the fraken turbo upgrade and wondering do you think 5k is enough to budget out the turbos and install? With some other work? Like oil pan gasket, tune it etc. Let me know what you guys think would be a good budget

Check out speedtech single turbo kit options

[Jeff@TopGearSolutions]

Originally Posted by Furqwan

Im getting a really good deal on some Rb's are they worth considering? Or should i just stay with the ps2?

Originally Posted by WeekendWarriorz

Rb's are fine, but pure's customer service is top par. Do some research of other people's experience and decide what's best for your needs/budget

[Furqwan]

got rb super Evo 19t's going to put them in the new year! they look great, and got a great deal super excited. just getting the supporting mods and maintenance

[003]

Originally Posted by WeekendWarriorz

With your low dyno figures did you even bother to take a log? It should've been very apparent in my opinion when you have a ps2 and making less whp than stock turbos..

I didn't personally, but that's the first thing the shop did when I took it back. The tuner even happened to be on-site that day, and both the shop-owner and tuner said the logs looked great, and it felt like it pulled very solid. And I kinda have to agree. I was messing with a CTS-V a few weeks ago, and yes, he obviously pulled on me (640hp stock?), but I was still very happy with how long it took him to pull away.

I'm seriously stumped and open to suggestions.

[003]

Originally Posted by mfindigital

So what power did you end up after all the kinks were worked out?

3rd dyno was still mid-300's. All 3 dynos were at different shops, which i'm hoping is the problem. Maybe they don't know to not floor the gas pedal? I always mention it, and turn off traction, and tell them to build up to 3k rpm, etc, but I can't tell if they're hitting the downshift button on the floor or not.

Bummed, but not enough to keep looking for a problem.

My commute to work is about 15 minutes, and it takes about 10 minutes for the car to warm up and JB4 to kick in anyway. And we drive my wife's car on the weekend since she has a lease with about 5,000 extra miles to burn up in 3 months.

Thoughts?

[WeekendWarriorz]

Originally Posted by 003

I didn't personally, but that's the first thing the shop did when I took it back. The tuner even happened to be on-site that day, and both the shop-owner and tuner said the logs looked great, and it felt like it pulled very solid. And I kinda have to agree. I was messing with a CTS-V a few weeks ago, and yes, he obviously pulled on me (640hp stock?), but I was still very happy with how long it took him to pull away.

I'm seriously stumped and open to suggestions.

Post a log for us to see boost and timing and everything, are you sure the pure stage 2 is even installed?

[003]

Originally Posted by Furqwan

got rb super Evo 19t's going to put them in the new year! they look great, and got a great deal super excited. just getting the supporting mods and maintenance

Congrats!! Keep us posted.
Try to do a before/after dyno. That's one thing I really wish I did.

[003]

Originally Posted by WeekendWarriorz

Post a log for us to see boost and timing and everything, are you sure the pure stage 2 is even installed?

I asked my installer for a log (I have no idea how to go about obtaining/creating one...)
He said he wants to take my car and one other car to EuroCharged (I guess they have some sort of partnership?) for a dyno and tune because my numbers are bothering him as well. I'll keep you posted!

Sorry to hijack your thread Furqwan...

[WeekendWarriorz]

Originally Posted by 003

I asked my installer for a log (I have no idea how to go about obtaining/creating one...)
He said he wants to take my car and one other car to EuroCharged (I guess they have some sort of partnership?) for a dyno and tune because my numbers are bothering him as well. I'll keep you posted!

Sorry to hijack your thread Furqwan...

Sounds like they haven't even tuned the car properly or you don't have a pure stage 2 in the car..

[Furqwan]

Originally Posted by 003

I asked my installer for a log (I have no idea how to go about obtaining/creating one...)
He said he wants to take my car and one other car to EuroCharged (I guess they have some sort of partnership?) for a dyno and tune because my numbers are bothering him as well. I'll keep you posted!

Sorry to hijack your thread Furqwan...

no worries I plan to keep this post updated with my progress but it's enjoyable to see others progress.

what are some "while your in there" things Todo while I get the turbos done. gonna save up Todo it right the first time.

[003]

Originally Posted by Furqwan

no worries I plan to keep this post updated with my progress but it's enjoyable to see others progress.

what are some "while your in there" things Todo while I get the turbos done. gonna save up Todo it right the first time.

The water pump is right behind/above the turbo-fold, so if you've never had the water pump changed, I'd consider it. Your shop might do it for a lot less since 80% of the labor is already done. I got lucky that the previous owner actually replaced the water pump in the last year or two already.

My shop also insisted on replacing the low-pressure fuel pump, as getting enough fuel to the motor is a common issue after upgrading the turbos, I guess/assume. He suggested replacing the fuel pressure sensor while in there as well, but I declined. I was back 2-3 weeks later to get it replaced...

And finally, my high pressure fuel pump went out a month or so later, as I mentioned above. (sorry if I'm repeating some things. It's been a month.)
The fuel pump (I forget which one) is already a sore spot on this platform, so try to address it on your own terms, versus after getting stuck on the side of the road.

I hope this goes without saying, but a fresh oil change too. It's the lifeblood of your turbos.

[WeekendWarriorz]

Originally Posted by 003

The water pump is right behind/above the turbo-fold, so if you've never had the water pump changed, I'd consider it. Your shop might do it for a lot less since 80% of the labor is already done. I got lucky that the previous owner actually replaced the water pump in the last year or two already.

My shop also insisted on replacing the low-pressure fuel pump, as getting enough fuel to the motor is a common issue after upgrading the turbos, I guess/assume. He suggested replacing the fuel pressure sensor while in there as well, but I declined. I was back 2-3 weeks later to get it replaced...

And finally, my high pressure fuel pump went out a month or so later, as I mentioned above. (sorry if I'm repeating some things. It's been a month.)
The fuel pump (I forget which one) is already a sore spot on this platform, so try to address it on your own terms, versus after getting stuck on the side of the road.

I hope this goes without saying, but a fresh oil change too. It's the lifeblood of your turbos.

Your shops are just screwing you... my assumption is they loaded an MHD OTS map after installing your turbo or they haven't installed the turbo at all. They're people making 430whp + on PS2 with e30 on stock fuel system.

[pepper135I]

I went pure and could not be happier!

[Furqwan]

maintenance I'm getting ready for are , oil pan gasket and hpfp. anything else you guys would recommend to change out while I the turbos are being done?

[PA135ii]

I'm at 127K and had my turbos/wastegates replaced under warranty at 49K. Have had recurring check engine lights since September and my indy shop says it's the wastegates that have failed. He plans on replacing them with upgraded ones that won't fail like the BMW replacements back at 49K.

He says that the turbos themselves probably won't need replacement. It has been his experience that the wastegates are the failure point. He said that he will look at the turbos to be sure but if it was his car he would only do the wastegates.

Didn't want to hijack the thread .. but I'm just confused on what to do.

[003]

Originally Posted by PA135ii

I'm at 127K and had my turbos/wastegates replaced under warranty at 49K. Have had recurring check engine lights since September and my indy shop says it's the wastegates that have failed. He plans on replacing them with upgraded ones that won't fail like the BMW replacements back at 49K.

He says that the turbos themselves probably won't need replacement. It has been his experience that the wastegates are the failure point. He said that he will look at the turbos to be sure but if it was his car he would only do the wastegates.

Didn't want to hijack the thread .. but I'm just confused on what to do.

Whats the cost of only doing wastegates? But yes, I think the wastegates are also a known pain-point.

[003]

Originally Posted by WeekendWarriorz

Your shops are just screwing you... my assumption is they loaded an MHD OTS map after installing your turbo or they haven't installed the turbo at all. They're people making 430whp + on PS2 with e30 on stock fuel system.

What's wrong with an OTS map? Would I see power losses that big if so??
Not installing the turbos is quite the accusation. I might think the same tho, I guess. I did show up to the shop during the last bit of the installation so I definitely saw the turbos installed, and the old ones on the ground. Also, they were smoking before, but no smoke after! But I agree with you that something isn't right. I'm still digging for an answer.