I do this stuff for a LIVING every day at Ford Research. Been doing boost work for over 35 years.

You seem to be missing a lot of stuff in your thought process.

1) You need a minimum for 30 psi of oil pressure and at least a .120" inside diameter feed line to each turbo.

2) You need a scavenge pump to remove the oil from a sump that the turbos drain into. You need a VENT on the sump to keep from pressurizing the drain side of the system otherwise you will push oil past the oil seals on the turbo shafts and into the intake (from the turbo compressors).

3) You need a fail-proof method to make sure that the turbos always see oil pressure or you will be replacing a lot of turbos. Not a manual switch that turns on the turbo oil pump(s) that you will forget to turn on at some point GUARANTEED.

4) The scavenge pump need to be larger vs the feed pump(s) because it it trying to push the oil and foam back into your oil reservoir.

5) You need a cooling circuit for the oil as the oil will not live long without cooling on the street (vs drag racing) so the scavenge pump has to be able to push the oil thru that cooler too before it gets to the oil reservoir.

The best system out there for a Low mount Turbo set-up was the Porsche Cayenne system that used normal engine oil pressure but also used an engine driven mechanical scavenge pump to remove the oil from the low mount turbo drain boxes. In your case you are a long distance from the engine and scavenge pumps do a lousy job of pushing oil very far back to the engine.

So you are like #63 of the people I have talked/written to who wanted to do rear mount turbos. Even the drag race guys like Mike Moran got away from that deal. So why are you trying to do this? John Meany has a 1000+ HP twin turbo street driven Corvette with the turbos mounted in a normal under hood position.

I also was involved with a Twin Turbo set-up that fit under the hood of a 68 Corvette. (With mechanical fuel injection).
You can make 1100 HP with 2 basic T-61 (small) turbos. 1100 real hp on the street is a lot (ask John Meany)

Tom V.

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I love the net. Tom could be a 10 year old living in mom's basement. haha Sorry Tom.

What sort of flow rates we are talking about? Any recommendations on what pumps to use?

 

I am not missing any of the things you mentioned. i am trying to achieve a min of 30 psi and have at least .125 ID hose. if you look at my crude diagram you will see I have two pumps one to feed and second for scavenge. I planned on it being less powerful than the feed pump. I have an oil cooler and plan on all of this hooking up to the starter or ign to ensure on and off withe the vehicle and the pump voltage controlled with a pwm. if you look at my tank I built you will see there is a port for a breather on top.the reason I am doing this is because of what you said. even mike Morgan got scared and ran away from it. I am not a conventional guy and could give a shit what john meany did or if he put the turbos on the hood, I did not choose the location based on how much power I will have or loose because I'm not building a pro circuit race car, I am making my dd faster and more fun, and that has been proven time and again by rear mounts so I'm going against the grain because I can its interesting to me and I like the challenge. sorry for my rant but I don't enjoy people trying to hold others back because they think its hard.

 

do some research on ls and corvette forums and you will see the success stories of these oil systems working....for long periods of time.

 

Then what exactly are you asking questions for if it's already been perfected?

 

haha good question people tend to skip out on some components like oil coolers, filters, etc. so I am basing this off their concept and adding components, changes things like flow rate so cant copy 100% because its not the same. In my OP I was asking for incite from those who have gone down this road and would change something based on experience. ie used pump "a" it sucked (< no pun intended) use pump 'b" or put the cooler here instead of here.

 

That photo was taken in 1977 when I was working for Holley carb before I went to work for Ford on their Turbo programs. I have 35 years doing boosted engine research work, I have consulted on 5 World Championship drag cars, Raced at Bonneville 3 times, raced in the Baja 1000 3 times, was a National Tech Inspector (Scrutineer/Sound Chief/Assistant Regional Executive ) in SCCA for 13 years. So no I am not a 10 year old kid. 35 years OLDER vs that photo.

If the man wants to experiment with his own stuff, so be it. Have replaced turbos because of lack of oil in friends cars. Have seen scavenge pumps fail, have seen turbos push oil due to high pressures on the drain side of the turbo. So all of my comments are based on 35 years of actual experience doing boosting work for the Ford Motor Company every day as well as advising on many race teams.

Tuition COST MONEY. Lots of guys I know do their own thing and eventually come around to my way of thinking. Some are slower learners vs others.

If the man can properly drain the turbos, cool the oil, maintain proper pressure to the turbos, have no electrical failures, have no cooling issues, then maybe he might be successful. Good Luck.

Tom Vaught

 

I plan on all of these ^ things

 

I don't run a vent on my scavenge pump, and I have yet to see any oil in any of my piping, nor do I have a tank/sump on the drain of the turbo. I use engine oil pressure to feed my turbo though. I'm not saying Tom is wrong by any means, just sharing my experience with my conglomeration of backyard engineering.

I don't see a reason to use a dedicated oiling system on a turbo.

 

One thing you need to look at is pumps, those you listed are not for pumping hot oil and will not last for shit. Read what it says they are used for and no temp ratings. You need to look and do some reading on RBracing.com about pumps, they need to be bronze gear pumps.

 

I have been researching the pumps and will be looking into turbowerx pumps. Turbowagon, I think I am looking at this from a different perspective. There may not be a reason specificly, for instance clean oil or turbo longevity bla bla bla. these may be benifits (obviously arguable) but not why. If I went conventional I would have to tap my oil pan and run a scavenge pump regardless. To take my pan off is PITA. So if my pump were to go down the road I would be taking it off again. it may be a little more leg work on my research now but I would rather that and be able to keep my engine untouched.

 

I figured the experts like Tom would have some sort of idea on flows and pump recommendations. Instead we get a poor attempt at a Dice resume. Are you sure your not living in moms basement?

Looks like the turbowerx are for the return side. The RBracing.com link appears to be something else. Do you have a working link?

 

It is a lot easier to tap a valve cover or an oil fill cap. If you are pumping it back into the engine who says it absolutely needs to go directly to the pan?

STS has been using the OE plastic oil caps on LS engines just by drilling and installing a fitting.

 

HAHAHA

 

This is true and this is my back up plan.

 

Sorry about that, their site is more bike related but if you click on products at the bottom of the page it takes you to the pumps and they carry all the goodies to go with them, timers , check valves and so on, i've been dealing with the lowmount problem for a few years and they seem to have the best info & parts.

http://www.rbracing-rsr.com/oilsystems.htm


Are you sure your not living in moms basement? Hope not she's been dead for 31 years.

 

Hey, i'm just curious, but what does your job resume look like?


(edited to maintain professional forum)

 

Turbohwagon, leave the guy alone with his opinions. Thanks for having my back though.

I gave my Opinions based on 35+ years of experience that things can go wrong with electric scavenge pump systems.
Why should I post about oil flows when any engine has a pump with enough capacity to support 2 turbos feeding thru a .120" id feed line with 30 psi of pressure. I knew a guy who ordered a turbo from me, read all about that checking oil flow stuff, disconnected the feed line to the turbo fired up the engine (with no oil to that turbo) and killed the turbo. Did not understand that you read the oil flow after the turbo (coming out of the drain). So now you want me to post all about oil flows and someone else will do the same stupid thing.

You have a lot of answers, post them up. Always willing to hear new info from another Turbo System Expert.

Tom Vaught

ps Every Vortech Supercharger Guy had to mod his pan to add a drain (without taking the pan off) up until Vortech did the "self contained oiling" superchargers. The process is in every set of installation directions. (On the web too) So it sounds to me like the guy does not want to do the work vs do it the way Vortech has recommended for years with their kits.

 

Yep i thought the same thing but kept my mouth shut for a change, and still posted the link, go figure.

(edited to maintain professional forum)

 

A little off topic but the site has some good info on it.

"Early Kawasaki and Suzukis had roller bearing cranks and had problematic turbo feed and drain problems due to low oil pressures and a propensity to send debris to the turbocharger bearings. This lead us to separate electric oil feed systems."

"In any of these systems the rider had to avoid stupid mistakes like having the turbo spinning 180,000 rpm and then suddenly killing the engine and pulling in the clutch to do a "plug check". Bye bye turbo bearings."

They are right about the low oil pressures with the roller bearing engines but most of us solved those problems without the need of an additional pump. The one thing they did not mention is that many bikes will use a slider type clutch (drag use). There is no lever. When you cut the throttle, the engine speed will drop along with the pressure. I have heard of a few people running a slider with a turbo but it's not the norm. I have heard of a few using an accumulator as well.

Most of the systems from back then were draw type with gravity drain. For the front mount setups, many are using the engines normal pump to scavenge as well.


"You have a lot of answers, post them up. Always willing to hear new info from another Turbo System Expert."

Sorry Tom but I have few answers and am not an expert in much of anything.

"Why should I post about oil flows when any engine has a pump with enough capacity to support 2 turbos feeding thru a .120" id feed line with 30 psi of pressure."

The old roller motors that site talks about is where we run into problems. I assume this is why they started that site in the first place.

"I knew a guy who ordered a turbo from me, read all about that checking oil flow stuff, disconnected the feed line to the turbo fired up the engine (with no oil to that turbo) and killed the turbo. Did not understand that you read the oil flow after the turbo (coming out of the drain)."

That's funny. I would hope what goes in, comes back out.

The reason I asked you about the flow is the original poster talked about setting up some sort of test jig off the motor. I had mounted a clear drain tube at one time and watched how much the oil flow changed. That site has a video that shows something like this with a catch pan under the turbo but they never show the bike on the 2-step making any boost.

If the original poster is planning to have the turbos sitting static, the flow is not going to be near what it will be once hot and the if the turbos were spun up. So I was wondering if he would be better off with some sort of fixed orifice to simulate a worst case flow rather than having the turbos hooked up and.