Oilless Turbocharger?? (remote mount option)

[david85]

Just found out about this while browsing some forbidden fruit (remote turbos). Like roughly 75% or more of you guys who run turbos, I want more. Not too much more...just more.

Remote mounts have a few disadvantages, but not having to cram everything under the hood (bashing the firewall, etc) has some advantages. The engine bay also stays cleaner, and you can maintain ease of access that helps make this one of the easiest diesels to repair. When combined with water cooling of the turbo center housing, it seems to me this would solve a lot of problems with turbocharging an IDI for the 10-20 PSI target range. My biggest concern so far, was how to get the oil back to the pan. But apparently that could be eliminated with an oil-less turbocharger???

Any opinions??

 

[idiabuse]

now what in the hell tarnations did you say, son?

You must be registered for see images attach

 

[hce]

oilless turbocharger

 

[david85]

oilless turbocharger

^^Yup, that's the one.

 

[IDIoit]

lots of bends and tubing required with a set up like that.
not really an issue for people with fab skills and equipment.

worst thing i see in doing it this way is that if you mounted them up front like that,
it would make swapping belts a pain in the ass. and you would have to run electric cooling fans.
ive been thinking alot about running a twin turbo set up, IMO id rather have them mounted ontop of the valve covers.

the only real difference inbetween running water cooled vs oil cooled is the type of bearings.
but then again, i like the comfort of having bearings lubed with oil.

many many ways to skin a cat, but if youre going through the hassle to skin one, may as well use explosives and create a gnarly mess!

 

[BrandonMag]

oilless turbocharger

Wow, that's pretty cool.

Gotta give the guys who put out a product that's different from everyone else credit for thinking outside the box.

 

[david85]

Actually if it were me, I'd still prefer to mount it behind the engine under the floor of the bed or cab - whatever's easier. Behind the rad is an interesting option, but I personally wouldn't do it on one of these trucks. Is it more work than using an off the shelf turbo setup? Absolutely, but when you mount it remotely under the truck, it becomes way simpler than trying to shoe horn a custom setup under the hood. I see a lot of guys trying to put together some very nice custom setups that mimic banks/ats/hypermax, but those are time consuming and generally require an engine out of the truck in order to mock everything up properly. I did consider under hood twins long ago. I even bought a bunch of T3 cores to see if it was feasible and in my opinion - it isn't. The only way I'd consider putting twins under the hood was if the turbos are mounted to the side of the engine but that would likely require relocating the batteries. It would look awesome though, especially in polished SS.

A truck fitted with a true dual exhaust could in theory be easily converted to twin turbos using the remote method though. For me the big bonus is, the engine bay would be no more cluttered than stock. How's that for a sleeper?

Main question for me remains though: Are the oil-less turbos reliable enough for long term service? Seems like they are still relatively new.

 

[BDCarrillo]

Notice the CHRA in the photos had normal oil bosses? Reading through the tech stuff it has o-rings instead of piston rings, and grease for lube that needs to be serviced. Basically a normal cersmic bearing turbo with grease instead of oil and better lube retention.

So... What's the difficulty with using a traditional oiled turbo with a remote mount? Use the stock lift pump to scavenge oil and return it through a fitting in the pump mount boss.

Supplying oil is easily done from the oil pressure sensor port with an adapter or two.

The oilless ones still require a loop off the coolant system.

 

[Greg5OH]

twin turbo under the floorboards would be awesome! Still have to fit the upipes back to the intake somehow, or intercooler ideally. Could get a little tight tbh..

 

[BDCarrillo]

If I were to do a remote setup I'd install it where the factory muffler was. I'd put in a skid plate to keep rocks away, and pipe the oil/coolant along the frame rail. Pull coolant from the heater hoses (always have flow) and return oil with and thru the lift pump.

Charge pipe oughta fit next to the exhaust and run it into an intercooler with inlet on the bottom passenger side.

Dump the exhaust post-turbo in front of the axle.

The hard part would be fitting an intake and air filter... Maybe a big truck filter in the corner of the bed, below the bedrails.

Just me engineer $.02

 

[david85]

Notice the CHRA in the photos had normal oil bosses? Reading through the tech stuff it has o-rings instead of piston rings, and grease for lube that needs to be serviced. Basically a normal cersmic bearing turbo with grease instead of oil and better lube retention.

So... What's the difficulty with using a traditional oiled turbo with a remote mount? Use the stock lift pump to scavenge oil and return it through a fitting in the pump mount boss.

Supplying oil is easily done from the oil pressure sensor port with an adapter or two.

The oilless ones still require a loop off the coolant system.

Yes, the periodic greasing is something they are a little vague on. How often? How much? What kind? They're claiming oilless can out last conventional turbos in racing conditions but I wonder about normal use where service life is measured in years, not hours.

Fuel pumps aren't really designed to pump engine oil. I'd be leery of using them to pump higher viscosity liquids like engine oil long term. Normally they sell an electric gear pump for oil scavenging, but those can also fail. If I were to use a scavenging pump, I would insist on some form of in-cab instrumentation to tell me if it stopped working properly.

I don't have any problem with routing coolant lines, since I like the idea of a water cooled turbo anyway. If I were building a custom turbo setup, that would be a part of it regardless. It increases efficiency by helping to control heat at the turbo, it reduces thermal stress on the bearings, it reduces underhood temperatures, reduces EGTs (by helping to cool the inlet side) and eliminates the need for cooldown on shutdown.

twin turbo under the floorboards would be awesome! Still have to fit the upipes back to the intake somehow, or intercooler ideally. Could get a little tight tbh..

There would be need for more pipes, and longer lengths, but none of them between the engine and turbocharger would have to be 3", like most downpipes are right now (no more firewall banging or body lifts). Fabrication should be simpler due do more clearance options. They wouldn't have to be routed on top of the engine either. Any exhaust system behind the turbo(s) would be a simple, straight shot over the rear axe. True duals out the side or under the back bumper would be my preferred choice.

 

[BDCarrillo]

The electric scavenging pumps are friggin expensive, $300+ for a quality unit.

Hot oil is very thin... I'd bet the lift pump would work just fine. Plenty work fine on WMO... (Mine included)

Now if you could find a turbo with it's own scavenge pump...

 

[david85]

The electric scavenging pumps are friggin expensive, $300+ for a quality unit.

Hot oil is very thin... I'd bet the lift pump would work just fine. Not sure if I'd bet the life of a turbo.

Yes, that is the rub in all this...always was.

 

[OLDBULL8]

When the average turbo lasts ~200,000 miles or more, who needs an oilless turbo. There pic showed there turbo mounted in an Arctic Cat snowmobile which would be easy to get at for any maintenance. Snowmobiles "most" have oil injection anyhow.

 

[SDEconVan]

Been doing a bit of research on this topic, remote turbo has a lot of advantages in a van like mine

Not too confident with the ceramic's duty cycle since it is not stated on the CTT website, although it is implied that racers would
use this concept (Rebuild after every race???) They warranty their ceramic rebuilds for 30,000 miles...

For a long-haul, dependable turbo, I have to sit back and stay on the fence.

In their verbage they show a calc that their bearings can withstand six times the single-angle (annular) load the bearing will ever
see. I beg to differ, this may be true "in the lab," but off-road, with washboard vibe loads, I bet I can shake the **** out of their
ceramic oilless turbo fairly quickly. (In a previous life, I did lots of dynamic load analysis, and vibrations can be equivalent to up
to 80G's; significantly more than six times the lab loads. This is especially true for the added gyroscopic impingement of something
spinning at 100,000 rpm.) The oilless loose ball concepts tend to fracture catastrophically, regular turbos usually put up a fuss first.

Could not find any testimonial regarding the idi's situation (6.9-7.3L, 8 cylinders) of a (relatively) low-performance turbo
charger requirement. We actually require a pretty crappy turbo in the modern sense, unless you're doing a competition
sled pull, mostly we need boost right off idle, it would be nice to generate 2,300 rwhp, but really I want off-idle boost and
a steady climb matching demand for pulling, which implies a low compressor chamber volume, trouble is at high rpm I'm
overstepping required boost so a blow-off or variable-geometry system may be needed. The oilless could possibly be
adapted to one of these. I found some compressor maps on their Tech Bulletin #4, but again too hard to reference to our
situation, with our desire for low-rpm grunt and our low-rpm diesel redline.

This begs the question about remote turbos, as I mentioned, I am considering locating just after where the present y-pipe merges (are trucks
the same as my van?) with a return to a forward-mounted intercooler. The problem I am having is water submersion like crossing
a stream, not sure how oilless would handle thermal shock, since contraction rates of non-metallic vs. metallic can be a sticky point,
esp with tight tolerance bearings that have no slop (normally bushing/bearing voids are filled with oil, like standard turbos have,) to give
them some "cushion."

I'd like to find some testimonial/reviews on the oilless used in our config.

Don't get me wrong, I REALLY want this to work, maybe it does, but the tried and true existing oil-fed bushing is still a good option...

...except for the below-oil pan dilemma. I got a lot of time in this, (that's why my long-winded response ) but right now I am
entertaining the use of two small oil sumps in which the first one also acts as an oil cooler just under the turbo, some sort of check
valve inline, and the second sump above oil pan's altitude, staged for return into the crankcase. Some sort of activated remote lift
pump would live between the two little tanks.

There is also the issue of back flow/escape of turbine oil which could induce a run-away, another reason to seek out something like oilless
turbo chargers.

Great thread!

Best regards,
George