This car is my first turbo build... it is a 2011 Dodge Charger, 3.6 Pentastar with the NAG1 5 speed auto. Prior to boosting it I had installed a 3.92 SRT rear end to help get the car out of the hole. Now that its boosted, it seems I have a hard time getting boost to build down low which is what this car really needs. at 3500rpm in second gear it comes on strong, but off the line its still a bit of a dog.

My conventional wisdom told me that I needed to go with a stall converter to get the car into its sweet spot. Its a daily driver and likely will never see a track, I am just looking to make it more fun to drive and get it to bark the tires off the line. Then I read about turbo cars liking shorter gears to load the car up more, and now I am conflicted. My V6 stock was pretty light on the torque department anyways, so I am now split wondering if I should go with the converter, or go back to my stock gearing.

Any suggestions?

 

Might need both but if you already have the gear why not start there first? fwiw I have 2 turbo cars both have 3.08's out back.

 

Definitely converter before a gear change imo. More load below the boost threshold will only make it worse. Numerically lower gears are the trend, but the torque curve, weight, rpm, and tire size can make a gear like that work very well.

 

Sounds reasonable, I will likely go with the converter. My main concern is how can you actually "lower" the boost threshold? I dont start pulling until 3500 and am not hitting my peak until 4500. Would freaking love to be able to make full boost no later than 3k... is that plausible and if so how can I achieve it?

 

Load can help a little, but the tune, and turbo choice are the biggest factors. Get it in a higher gear and roll into the throttle starting at about 2500 rpm, and see where it makes boost, that should take most of the load factor out of it. From there you can decide where to go, but a good converter will help. It won't bring boost in any earlier, but it'll put the rpm in a place to make boost much quicker, and you may not care that it's at 3500....

 

What turbo are you running? You might need something a little smaller that will spool quicker.