Aviator_JPN

Hi guys,

I wonder if I could have your input/thoughts on installing a supercharger to 2004 (18 year old) Z06 with 49K miles.
I was told by a tech that installing the supercharge on any engines beyond 20K-30K miles tremendously shortens the engine life while it also depends on how you drive.
Will I have continuous issue with the supercharger?
As long as you don't keep your foot all the way down on the gas all the time, it should be no problem at all down the looooong road?
Which supercharger do you recommend? Used one as good as new one?

Thanks!

road pilot

My2 cents. I have a 2000 Corvette and my Vortec
SC has been on my car almost 20 years. I have had
zero problems with the blower. Most guys think they
can install a SC and that is it. Wrong. You will need to spend
money on the entire drivetrain. As well as bigger brakes.
The engine as well will need to be strengthened. If you are
thinking short term ,yea you can throw a SC on and you will
be good to go for the short term. I also run Meth which cools
the cylinders. I dont know if you have headers and a cam and
heads . If you dont you will need at least headers. It is expensive
There are other ways to produce street hp without spending a lot
of money. First decide your goals and be realistic. My car was tracked.
Yours wont be. I bought new, You may find a rebuilt blower to cut
down expenses. Oh , and dont forget your suspension will need upgradeing
including tires. The list goes on and on. But I have a 22 year old car that still
is new. Modifed takes Time, energy ,vision and money/ You need all of them
Good luck

mocoyne

From everything I've seen these motors are pretty bullet proof as long as you use a reputable blower kit. Hard to beat the hp/$.

I have an E39 M5 and while you can make cheaper N/A power with the LS6, the consensus with that car feels similar to this one if you want to go faster: put a blower on it!

50 ANV C5

Go with a basic kit. I did a ECS kit. Headers also. I’ve had no need to upgrade suspension. Rear end . Tranny. It’s such a wonderful instant power boost. Your not on all the time if ur just going to street it. Only thing remove cats if you can and install a catch can. The drive train is good to 600 hp easy. Do it your only issue down the road is you’ll want more hp. Lol lol. Good luck.

SSkull

I did an A&A Kit on my 01 Z06 at around 85k miles or so. Got the car at something like 71k if I'm remembering right. Between doing the supercharger and originally getting the car I also did a Texas Speed cam kit with long tubes, and ended up swapping back to the original cam and stock manifolds(It was a spur of the moment choice cause a spring failed on me, and after experiencing the cam changed my mind on what I wanted and went with the easy, california legal power since I guess I got spoiled by seeing how the power was put down in my dads LS2 C6 with a Procharger when I was younger). I don't baby my car, it's daily driven, and haven't had any issue in the 2 years it's been supercharged. I do still have the upgraded valvetrain from my Texas Speed kit installed, and then aside from other drivetrain mods(rear brace, McLeod RXT Twin Disc Clutch, Tick Adjustable MC) the car has put up with it perfectly aside from one problem I had. The torque tube hadn't completely held up to my type of driving(never any clutch drops/burnouts, and no track drag racing along with always having street tires and aftermarket wheels so no slicks/drag radials). I picked up a billet coupler to take care of that eventually, but aside from that it has held up to being driven hard on a daily basis(except maybe saturday/sunday if I don't happen to go anywhere or might need more than 1 passenger seat).

I would say as long as you do all regular maintenance and don't see anything standing out that needs to be addressed go for it. I'm hard on the car, but I don't neglect it, and I have addressed other things in advanced that could be issues down the road/maintenance coming up like all seals and gaskets being replaced, sensors being replaced, plug wired, thermostat, timing chain, etc that kinda stuff just because I don't plan to be getting rid of the car in the foreseeable future.

I did also upgrade my shocks to C6 Z06 shocks in my first attempt to address wheel hop, and then ended up getting the rear brace which took care of most of it at that point.

And 50 ANV C5 is right, eventually you'll be like everyone else and start thinking,"Well I'll just do a pulley swap." and then it'll continue on. My plan is to do wide rear quarter panels, get my car repainted, and then run Meth with maybe a 3.4" pulley and call it a day. In cars these light, 650-700 rwhp is plenty for fun on the street, and honestly just with a kit bolted on to an otherwise stock engine, it's more than enough to thoroughly enjoy the car.

road pilot

And dont forget the tuner. A good one is not cheap.
Good luck

Aviator_JPN

Thank you guys! Great info!
I have done below on my Z6 in 2020 since the clutch died on me. I did extra at that time.
You think the car should tolerate the sc?
Maybe I should do the valve spring replacement?
Since I work from home, I won't put lots of miles on the car.

Install Longtube Headers-C5
Kooks Longtubes/Xpipe w/ Cats
NGK TR55 Spark Plugs
Fire Sleeves
MSD Wires
Remove Complete AIR system while installing headers(includes removing Intake manifold)
Install Clutch/Slave-C5
LS7 Clutch Kit(Includes new flywheel)
Hinson Speed Bleeder
OEM GM Slave cylinder
GM Rear cover w/ rear main seal
Install Cold Air intake
Halltech C5 Venom
Mobil 1 Oil change
Custom Dyno Tuning

Thanks!

lewislgZ06

Lots of good advice already provided above.
My .02 cents, don’t pulley it down and over boost it. The LS6 is 10.5:1 CR and the rings and pistons won’t hold up with a lot of boost. About 8 psi and a good safe tune and it should perform well and be fun.

Robby04

I’ve had my 04 z since new, put an a&a kit on at about 5k miles, have had it for years with no issues whatsoever. The powerban from a simple bolt on kit is incredible, car gained 50% more power. A little tip. Stick w 3” exhaust over the axels, you’ll have to weld them in place. But I’ll save you like 50hp that 2 1/2 reduction on all the kits kills the flow. I’m straight piped from long tubes all the way to bullets . Cars loud like that. Doing it again and being 15 years older now, I’m 35. I’d put some nice high flow borla mufflers in somewhere.
get ready to need a real clutch also. Smoked the stock on very quickly. Radials didn’t help matters. 5-6k later got a mantic 9000 and cars solid, fast. More than most ppl even want. I’m use to it now and would like another mod, but it’s unnecessary. The supercharger kit is awesome, I’ve had other turbo setups and many’s cars in general, this has been my best car and one of the 2 I’ve kept and will keep till I die. Other being my pop’s stingray.
supercharge it and don’t look back. Bump up to 15/50 Mobil one and change it every 3k. Good luck

Aviator_JPN

What do you think of the below package and price...

Price: $11,995.00 Intercooled Supercharger Package

Corvette 1997-2004 LS1 - LS6

Intercooled Supercharger
550 - 575 BHP / 500 - 525 lbs - ft of torque

Supercharger package includes:

TVS 2300 Magnacharger - black painted finish
Intercooler base, pump hoses and cooling system
160 Degree thermostat
NGK TR55 Spark plugs
160 degree thermostat
Hi flow air intake
Dyno testing before and after installation
All necessary gaskets, bolts and fluids
Professional installation and edit tuning
Painted Supercharger hood

Normal installation time required: 3 weeks with prior notification.

Items on this page are not legal for sale or use on California pollution controlled motor vehicles.

All power figures shown are crankshaft numbers unless otherwise stated.

road pilot

Price seems fair but now is the time to
add headers. Think about it ,a SC pushs
more air in to the engine and the exhaust
air needs to exit the engine faster and efficently.
Labor cost will be low to install headers with the
engine apart.
Good luck

wydopnthrtl

I'd suggest:
- New clutch
- High pressure oil pump
- Diff mount
- Fuel pump (KB boost pump is ok)
- Larger injectors
- 8psi boost max (rings and rod bearings are high wear parts w/a SC)
- Pin the crank pully (I'd use a high quality aftermarket pulley)
- Use ECS or A&A kit (a roots type will add a lot of low end TQ which may not be the kind of power curve you want?)
- Use a quality tuner

(I've rebuilt stock engines that were supercharged. Make sure you have enough fuel and don't overload the rings and rod bearings and you'll be fine)

Aviator_JPN

Thank you all!

grinder11

You might want to look up MWWarlord. He has had a supercharger on his C5 for years, with excellent results.....

ArmchairArchitect

You'd also be disrupting the ethos of the car being a lightweight, great handling supercar. Not to mention that weight is added to the front, upsetting the near 50/50 balance.

MWWarlord

I have an A&A supercharger on mine. I HIGHLY recommend them. Their kit comes with pretty much everything that you'll need. The only thing that you'll likely want to add is a catch can and aftermarket harmonic balancer(no need to buy a crank pin with it as this comes with the A&A kit.. A&A has been doing this for a long time. They really have their kit well sorted out. The biggest thing is really the tune. That's what will determine the reliability of your setup. My car had over 70K miles on it when I put on the supercharger. I'm over 100K miles now. As long as the car is properly tuned, and you do all of the required maintenance, the supercharger will not cause you any issues at all in terms of engine reliability.
I do agree that there are certain supporting mods that you'll want to strongly consider. Although, not as many as others have suggested. There's absolutely no need for headers or a cam swap unless you want them (I know you already did headers). That's not to say you won't see additional gains by doing these things, but the car will run and drive reliably just fine without them. You don't need to forge the engine internals or do anything with the bottom end as long as you keep the boost at a reasonable level.
Some things that you will definitely need to look at are tires and clutch/transmission. If you don't already have them, you will NEED Summer tires. All season tires just don't have enough grip. Without Summer tires you'll be living in spin city. The transmission in the Z06 will be okay if you don't thrash it too hard However, you might want to consider an RPM transmission just for piece of mind. Regardless of which transmission you choose, you WILL need to upgrade the clutch. The next step after these will be suspension, and brakes. Neither of these is absolutely necessary. However, you will be much happier and SAFER with them.
If it's something that you're interested in, I highly recommend it. Don't let people tell you that the car is too old, or that it will destroy your engine. If you do it right, it works great with no issues. It's only if you have a bad tune, or run with too many PSI that you'll have problems. GOOD LUCK!

easilypleased

It's an LS. Take proper care of your car and you'll be fine.

Robby04

Like the other guys, I’d recommend the a&a kit. It’s the best most complete one and you have to cut only one 3” circle in the passenger side under body plastics. Every other kit I’ve seen has really chopped up the plastics in the engine bay, I like bolt ons, being able to take it off down the line if any problems arise. Hoping to keep it all married forever, the quality of the a&a kit is very good, it compares to one equipment, I’m confident in the car and the mods. I hope to keep it set up a supercharger for life of the car.

like stated in my first post on this topic, you will need a stronger clutch, the cheapest option is the McLeod. If that installer is putting it in without a new clutch, it will smoke the stock clutch in a week or two weeks of romping around will be about all you get.

id definitely definitely buy a complete a&a kit. Good luck

wkcarson

Everyone is saying the OP needs a stronger clutch. He is running a new LS7 clutch. Won’t the LS7 be stout enough for street use with mild supercharger set up?

Eshoremd

For a while probably but what's the point? If he's replacing it then go with a better clutch. What's the additional cost over an LS7 for a good Monster or McLeod? $750? I've been reading good things about the Summit clutches as well and they're priced pretty good.

I'm in the same boat as the OP. 2001 Z, heads, cam, headers, RPM dif w 3.90s.

I'm GUESSING to go A&A w RPM trans, balancer and aftermarket clutch all tuned and installed I'm looking at $17/18k ish????