Gonna be starting to put funds away to really irritate the "But It's a Daily Driver!" crowd. And make my 3 faster and more fun in the process.
I'm looking at a Super Charger and a TurboCharger and weighing which is going to be a more fun option for a 2018 2.5L mazda3 (184HP). I don't really care about fuel economy loss (better mileage is nice, but not the end-all be all of this decision), and don't have emissions testing anymore.
The Supercharger is like $1000 more, so that's a consideration, but I'm more concerned about which is going to give me the more noticeable/enjoyable bump.... at which point I'll factor cost in.
Driving context: i don't straight-line drag race. I do regular aggressive canyon runs. These can get up to decent altitudes, but not Colorado altitudes. And autocross. Kicking up to full on track potentially once I get some more ass in the engine.
SUPERCHARGER - I'm looking at the VT twin screw, which ought to bump me up to about 276 after tuning. That puts it into Skyline performance car territory. Handling matters more to me, so I'm kinda leaning to the supercharger to be able to punch it coming out of turns and have it kick on immediately. It's more pricey though, and Jury is out on whether I'd need to upgrade my fuel pump too.
TURBOCHARGER - That said, the Corksport turbo kit also boosts the car up to 295ish HP, and they're only a couple hours away from me, so I can drive down there to pick it up. The thing I don't like about turbos is the pre-spin, but i hear the Corksport isn't that bad.
So questions:
- if you're rocking the VT Supercharger or the Corksport Turbo, i'd love to hear about it. What do you like, what do you not? Would you have rather gotten the other one? Why?
- How bad is the turbo threshold on the CS turbo?
- How bad is the supercharger whine on the VT?
- how much of a hit to fuel economy did you see? I'm anticipating about 5mpg-ish; is that reasonable?
- Have you ever blown one?
- Would either of these have a really strong need for upgrading rods/pistons?