PKT Turbo Does this sound reasonable?
 

I am considering this for my car and 3.8 Mustang. Does this sound reasonable. Price looks pretty good.

Talked to the turbo folks today in San Antoino. Some interesting information

They did a 2002 3.8 automatic. It orginally dyno'd at 111 HP to rear wheels. What a loss of from the 190+ engine HP advertized by Ford! The car ran a 16.7 quarters at about 79 mph. After the turbo and tune it had ~230 HP dyno and ran 13.8 quarter at 106 mph.

They have done other 3.8's with 5 speeds and got better results. Dyno tests of 260 HP to rear wheels. Looks like that would put the 3.8 right up there with GT or maybe better.

They said the automatic drains power but with quicker shift does not suffer as much from drop down like a 5 speed between shifts. Said the automatic they did was really quick off the start.

Kit comes with 42 lb injectors, passenger-side header, high delivery fuel pump and metering and all the other required parts. They will install for $300 and tune for about $500 so total deal comes to about $4400 installed and tuned before tax. This compares quite well with Vortec and Procharger SC's were kit alone can cost over $4000 and doubt will give same results.

Any comments appreciated.

Is it an intercooled setup?
That sounds on par for a non-intercooled setup to me. Hard to beat the power that you can get from a turbo, and the price is certainly right.
If it is not intercooled, the only thing I would be concerned with is high intake charge temperatures, especially since you're in Texas heat already. Water injection could take care of that also...

I'm not sure how well the 3.8's hold up to boost, as far as reliability goes. That would be something to look into. Head gasket retention, piston strength, etc.

Thanks for your reply. The kit does include air to air intercooler

Includes a T-3/T-4 Turbo, 18" Air-to-Air Intercooler, Fuel Pump, 255 lph Fuel Pump, 42 lb Injectors, & V-Band Clamps & Ball Joints for LEAK FREE operation.

PTK recommend 7psi boost. I have also had advice that if I do not exceed the current HP at the crank (193) by more than 50% the heads, pistons, etc. will be ok. So I think 230 rwhp is over 300 hp at the crank so I will be over on the 50% increase advice. More like 70% increase so you are probably right.

What advice do you give on improving the head? Is it as simple as a better gasket. Or will it have to be replaced or machined differently.

That is who I got my turbo through. Cant tell you about the 3.8 though. So far, I am grinning ear to ear:D But it is going to need a lot of tunning. Things you will need to have a lot of if you do this.

1. MONEY!!!!!
2. Time
3. Anouther car to drive.
4. Did I say money yet?
5. Be prepared to blow something up:D

If you go through with it, You will love it:cool:

You are scarring me dude! I knew about the money but I didn't know about the other car and all the tuning. I thought I could get a conservative tune and boost and get a little more pep with car that would last. I guess this much increased power is tricky. but.......... fun huh?

Fun? If you looked it up in a dictonary, it would have a picture of a turbocharged mustang:D Lets just say that I have a VERY safe tune and it will start spinning the tires in 3rd gear. I would think you would have more fun with a turbo V8, but that is just my thought:cool:

Ok now Im curious. Have you really blown something up with your turbo?

I have heard that late model GT's get about 190 rwhp stock vs the 3.8 auto at about 110 rwhp. All I want is to get 190-200 rwhp out of the V6. So I was thinking very conservative tune would get me that without destroying the car.

I didn't want the V6 but through family situtation I have it. Dealer says even though it is a 2003 in great shape with all the extras it will still take $9000 and my car to get a '04 GT with same payments. Also looked at older GT's and I would have to drop back to about '00 or '01 with all their miles, etc.and sell my car for top dollar to break even against the turbo kit at about $5000-$5500 which includes the kit, tune, install and duel exhaust.

That is the decison I am trying to make. Plus there is the intangable of having a V6 looking car that runs like a GT.

Yeah, I blew the engine ideling in my garage. I had the FMU on backwards and it hydrolocked the piston from too much fuel.

Personally, I would think you should get a 94-95 cobra and put a turbo on that. There is a guy from turbomustangs.com who has a stock 95 with a PTK 66 and he dynoed 505 to the wheels on pump gas:eek: Yeah. Having a turbo V6 that traps 107 is pretty sweet. However, my car trap almost 110 with just bolt ons. I just think you will fell better turboing a V8 over a V6, but hey, its your car.. Why not look into turboing the T-bird? I have never seen a newer turbo T-bird before:cool:

T-Bird hmmmmm hadn't thought of that!!!!

PTK could hook you right up:cool: Tell Keith (Owner) I sent you:D

this thread makes me sad because i cant turbocharge my car and still be legal in california :(

Legal - Highly Overated:D

You can forget about Turbo'ing the Tbird. Its just not a wise HP to dollar ratio. You're looking at having a custom K-member made, a totally hand built turbo kit, etc. All that = HUGE $
But I can recogmend modding the Tbird and keeping the Mustang stock ;)
In all reality, the 3.8L should live a long time behind 7psi. It's all in the tune. Put the right parts on the first time, and have it tuned right the first time and it should be a happy motor. If you want more then 7psi at the track, throw in race gas to keep things safe. A $50 tank of fuel is better then a $4K rebuild.
The trans will handle the power fine. Not sure how the 7.5" rear ends hold up under that power though. Thats something the V6 guys will have to help you out with.

WTF!!! You got Pics of this beast!! I wanna see:D

They're big pics, but its all I have
Motor
Front mount IC

Hell yeah, that is fuckinng bad azz!!!

mustardjohn - That is what you need to do

:cool:

That is sooooome sweet T-Bird. Ball park what did it cost you? Have you had it on a dyno? I am very impressed....

Theres about $25K into it. I'll have some dyno #'s in the spring.
For the record, I didn't build the car. UPR in Lake Worth, FL built it, and I bought it. I had a bolt on mid 14sec T'bird that was about to get a PI swap and some juice. I figured it was cheaper to buy a car that was 80% done, rather than spend huge money to build a low 12 sec car. So I hopped on a plane to FL and bought it. Came home, sold the swap parts, the Zex kit, the car, and other parts I had waiting to be installed and I just about broke even. It was a rediculously good deal.

$25K... I expect that was for the whole car. What do you think it cost just for the mods? I would guess about $10K.

There's about $25K just in parts and customizing labor, not including the car. You have to remember that most of the parts were customized to fit this car. I could list everything the car has, but trust me on this one. Figure in the cost of the car, and you see that the previous owner put a ton of money out to build a sleeper. To buy the 12,000 mile car, I put out only a small percentage of what he spent ;)