Turbo vs supercharger

[rcadd1ct]

Ok I’ll bite. Superchargers are cool as they have instant throttle response and turbos can get that, but are more complicated to get “free” power.

main issue is the distributor for a blower. the 351c kit I have was bought in the early 90’s. Hoping this year is the year I get to start it. (Pending parts shipping. )

 

[Marks1]

I have worked with centrifugal, screw, and roots blowers, and at one time I was a Master WD for Turbonetics, although that was decades ago, and most of my experience is from the 80's to the early 2000's. Anyways, this is a difficult question to answer. First is that you can put a turbo or supercharger on a stock engine, but you have to limit boost to about 6 psi, and you usually have to upgrade the fuel system. There are tons of supercharger and turbocharger kits that have been sold for decades for use with internally stock engines with good success, AS LONG as you have low boost. Turbochargers are more efficient, no questions about that, but on a Cleveland you would probably have to fabricate everything. Superchargers are a much easier install, if you just wanted to put a 6-71 or an 8-71 on it, there are available kits, but you would have a massive hole in your hood and it would not be cheap. The small roots type superchargers like the Weiand ones would be perfect for a mostly stock engine, but I don't believe that there are readily available kits for the 351 Cleveland, so you would be fabricating your own, and you would need a hood scoop. On your average stock V8, you put 6 psi of boost and you will see about 100hp. If you were really good at fabricating a turbocharger kit would probably be the cheapest to build, but it takes a lot of knowledge and time. There are some centrifugal kits available, but they have big superchargers (ie: not really for a stock engine) and are not cheap:
https://thesuperchargerstore.com/ag-1781692.1781865-ford-351c-400m.html
I love turbos and superchargers. In the late 80's early 90's Paxton used to make a 5.0 Mustang kit for $1500. that was the bang for the buck then. For $1500 you installed this kit that gave you about 75-90hp, so your 5.0 Mustang went to 300+ hp in one weekend. It ran just like it did before the install, drivability was just like stock, as it was a stock engine with a supercharger on it. It was the biggest win/win ever. Only bad thing is that the supercharger was very small, so if you really wanted to push it, you would need a bigger supercharger.

Exactly right !! I put a Magnusen blower on my 2002 Vette vert back in 2003 when it was brand new with only 1700 miles on it. With bone stock internals, all my buddies talked about how I was going to blow it up. I said fine, then I'll build a cast iron block 6.0 instead, built specifically for boost. Well 20 years later her motor has still never been apart, and my wife and I just took that car from Windsor CT to Cape Coral FL and back, averaging 25 miles per gallon, sometimes getting over 30 MPG, and turned her over 50,000 miles with never a problem. She has Kooks 1 7/8 full length headers into 3 inch hi flo cats into a 3 inch X pipe to the rear axel where it dumps into Corsa Indy 2.5 inch mufflers. Car makes about 500 at the rear wheels with 6 pounds of boost. My biggest problem is getting traction to use the power, which is fine by me, because I'm not tubbing the car, the trunk space is too valuable to me for taking these kinds of trips. She's been to Bowling Green twice, Maine twice, Pennsylvania twice and Florida three times. Everytime I think I want a new C7 or C8, all I have to do is drive that *****, and I'm cured of spending any more money. LOL It was an easy bolt on job, though as 71 Project junk mentions, I needed to buy a different hood, (good excuse to get a cooler one), and the only thing I didn't like in Magnusen's kit was the stock tune was kinda flat. I ended up getting a custom tune which I actually uploaded myself from the tuner after getting two programs in my laptop to send him recordings of my runs through the OBD II port and then running a program called LS 1 Edit to upload the tunes. I forget how to do it all 20 years later, but it was fun at the time. Second pic is from the hotel room window in Lakeland Florida, our first stop after 19 hours straight thru.

 

[Marks1]

500 flywheel or rear wheel? 500 flywheel is pretty easy naturally aspirated but without extra displacement the low RPM performance can be weak. If you want power everywhere a positive displacement blower is hard to beat. Not the most efficient way to make power but the fun factor is very high. The 6-71 on my wife's car kind of makes it feel like an electric car. Power right off idle. Not a Ford but boost doesn't care who made the engine.

Right on !! Very Cool !! Like I said, traction is your biggest problem with SC, because the power is RIGHT NOW !! So much FUN though !!

 

[Spike Morelli]

You know, power adders ( turbos, superchargers ), have long been popular with the Pantera owners. You might look to see if there are any Pantera enthusiasts in your area, that may have gone that route with their 351c's. You may get to go for a ride before you decide.