I wanted to start off by saying Im not a car guy. I have basic knowledge that gets me by. I have an 08 Supercharged tC. My mission was to upgrade its performance as much as I could without voiding the warranty.

I ran into a big problem and wanted some advice on what I should do next.

I bought a intercooler for the tC and took it down to a local performance place. I told them I wanted to increase HP but stay under warranty. So they quoted my $600 to throw the intercooler on. Month later when they finally finish they bump it up to $1000, but as im signing paperwork they say "now of course there is going to be a PSI loss because of the intercooler, so you will want a smaller pulley asap to correct that" which will void the supercharger warranty. Toyota completely replaced the supercharger with a brand new one (for some unknown reason, they said a recall??) only 4-5 months earlier and it only has a year left of warranty so i figured. Ok fine lets do it.

PSI dropped from 6 (factory) to 2 and its as slow as a stock unit. Take it back and said ok what do we do? They said smaller pulley from NST. So I buy the smallest they have (after asking the performance shop if that will be ok, and they said yes). They charge $180 to install the pulley. This was the 14 PSI 55mm pulley that NST custom makes. Its only pushing 8 in 1st and 2nd gear and 6-7 in the rest. And to top it off, 2 days later, it blows the supercharger. Keep in mind. I dont hot rod the car at all. I dont go to tracks or anything crazy.Another $500 later I have bearings that can handle the smaller pulley and the car seems a lot faster then it was.

My question is, did I screw myself with the intercooler? Would it perform better without it?

some pics:

 

I think the main thing you need is to get a tune.

 

The shop claims they did but to be honest i don't believe them lol. They had my car grand total 6 months to go all this!
I plan on going to another shop and just asking if they think the screwed anything up.

 

Yes especially if it is a front mount intercooler, the length of the intake plumbing causes a huge drop in PSI and a huge loss in horsepower. You unfortunately wasted a lot of money on that endeavor.

You should have either just done a 9.5 psi pulley which would have netted you a quick and easy horsepower gain of about 15 whp with no tuning required, maybe gotten a little more power out if you did tune with a piggyback, or instead of an intercooler, did water/meth injection.

with that 14 PSI pulley, you aren't going to make any power because the stock BPV will relieve any PSI over 7, you'll also need larger injectors and a tune to keep the car from detonating.

 

I would demand a refund they ripped you off, If you had 8 PSI from factory and dropped down to 2 that means there is a lose of pressure due to the Inter cooler. Now Any respectable shop knows that when you add those on you have to do a tune to compensate.

They did not do a tune....
They suckered you into buying a new pulley to get more money out of you.
As well as over charging for the inter cooler install.

 

How to properly upgrad the TRD Supercharger for teh 2azfe

1. upgraded BPV, get atleast a Bosch 110 BPV.
2. 9.5 PSI supercharger pulley: with those two upgrades, you'll get about 15 extra whp without needing to tune.
3. high performance air intake: you might require a tune as the car might start running lean.
4. if you're going to go to 12 or 14 psi, you'll need larger injectors, water/meth injection, and a tune.
5. Do not intercool the supercharger, the length of the intake plumbing would lose too much PSI to run a front mount, and a top mount will suffer from too much heat soak.

 

Well...suck

What should I do now? Is there anything I can do that would involve leaving it on? I cant stomach removing it after spending so much.

 

Leave it on but get a tune.
Also do what Drax said and get some of that stuff.

 

Anyone have some links to the parts I should be looking into?

 

the only use you'd get out of that supercharger is to convert the car to a turbocharger instead, which is way more money (and power) but it doesn't sound like you want to take it that car.

I'd try to work it out with the shop telling them that for the time and money put into the car, they essentially downgraded the cars performance, and that makes them look like a bunch of hacks who don't really know what they're doing.

you can google up BPV (Bypass Valves) for the tC and pick one you like. the supercharger comes with a bosch 102, which is virtually identical to the Bosch 110, (you can only tell the difference from the numbers stamped on the sides), so that is a quick and easy upgrade as it is literally a plug and play swap. You could also use a Forge Diverter valve or even do a BOV (Blow-off Valve).

There are no off the shelf intake's for the supercharger, it would have to be custom made, which isn't too hard.

Larger injectors and tuners are up to you, you'd probably need atleast 550 CC injectors to make use of that 14 psi pulley properly. You'll also need a piggyback ecu to tune the car, either an emanage (blue or ultimate) or an AEM F/IC. You can get all that from Dezod or P-tuning's websites.

 

They did install a Forge BOV

 

Ive been trying to do everything on this site and just realized he is talking about a 06.

Does this still apply?

http://www.superchargedscions.com/9201.html

 

Don't mess with cutting stuff out of your airbox, you don't need a turbo timer, but a catch can doesn't hurt.

 

Awesome man. Btw I cant thank you guys enough for the help. So everything else on that site is ok for my 2008? I know the 2006 S/C was different so I wanted to double check.

The airbox is actually gone and the battery too, did a relocation to the trunk:

 

main differences between the 06 to 08 is different MAF sensor, different tune since it has a different cam/compression ratio, slightly different heat shield too for the exhaust manifold...BTW a good header would free up some WHP too. not much, but you can.

 

Oh really? Didnt know there was a difference between performance headers.

I have generic ebay thing. Have any suggestions?

 

Dezod has a catt'ed header that has a high flow catalytic converter on it, and still offers increased performance.

FYI, don't buy crap welded in china on ebay for your car.

 

Ive always had my eye on that weapon R unit. Do any of the ones that dezod sells outperform the others?

 

If im not mistaken, someone correct me if im wrong, but they provide just about the same WHP. But the Dezod Green header is 49 state legal, which no other header provides.

 

Ive had my current performance header for over 2 years and the police have never said a word. Are the nicer headers really that much louder?