3.4L supercharger

(2) Can a 25-Year-Old SUPERCHARGED Tacoma Beat a new Toyota and the Mighty Ram TRX in a Drag Race? - YouTube

 

Is summit racing sold out? They just shipped me a new one like around 6 months ago. The casting quality was crap though. It took a ton of Dremel porting inside to make it smooth but am glad they replaced the old one

 

I could use some assistance with a P0171 code I've been getting on my truck.

I have a 1st gen, gray supercharger with a URD 7th injector. The truck is a 2003 5vzfe, 4wd, auto transmission 271,000 miles. The super charger has been on for almost 25,000 miles.

When I first put on the supercharger I was getting the same code. It turned out to be a vacuum leak from a torn injector o-ring after I put in newly rebuilt injectors and a small hole in the back of the supercharger casting. Both were easily fixed.


I started getting a P0171 code a little while ago.
Around the same time my brake booster failed.
I assumed and hoped these were related. However, after the brake booster replacement the code came back.

It seems the code comes on at idle, I'm not 100% sure of this but this is my perception.
My AFR gauge looked normal...high 14's at idle.
Long Term Fuel trims were in the high 20's to low 30's
Short Term Fuel Trims were in the high teens
Both super high.
When I turn the engine off I can hear hissing for about 10 seconds. I was thinking this is the vacuum in the engine equalizing through the leak. The hissing did not last long enough to locate the leak.

I have a cheapy ebay paint can smoke machine I hooked up to an evap line that goes in to the rear of the supercharger. I plugged the intake tube with a nitrile glove and watched for smoke and listened for the leak and sprayed soapy water to narrow down it's location.

It appears to be coming from either this bolt or just below this bolt on the back of the supercharger.

https://www.instagram.com/tv/Cf73zh-OJCE/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=&__coig_restricted=1

The bolt is tight.
I'm thinking I'll have to take the supercharger off. I've done it enough times it only takes a few minutes.
Before I do take it off does anyone have any ideas on how I can eliminate this leak before I take it off?

 

Is it not where the two casting parts are bolted together as the 1st gen is not a one piece casting?

 

That would make sense.
Here’s some better pictures.
(I wish I hadn’t painted it black. This would be so much easier to see in photos)

The spurting is where the red arrows are.

this is the view from the drivers side.


This is the view from directly overhead.
It’s just below the nipple for the fuel pressure regulator

 

Looks like it has to come off to seal that leak

 

That's what I'm thinking too.

After I take it off and before I take it apart I want to take the stock intake which I still have and use that as a template to make a cover for the intake to engine side of the SC out of some aluminum sheet metal I have and plug the remaining holes where the throttle body attaches to the SC and the vacuum line holes and do a smoke test on just the supercharger itself. Maybe, just maybe I can get away with sealing it with out taking it completely apart.

I figure I'll do an oil change while I'm at it. I never did get a machine shop to install an oil bung for changing the oil.

Oh yeah, guess who rebuilt this for me?

 

I guess you could get a can of carb cleaner because it has no residue and clean that area really well then use some heat resistant sealer.
Man, so sorry they messed it up,

Something definitely changed there with the rebuilds and all went south with the quality 2 years ago

 

Yeah, it's too bad. However, to be fair this supercharger was a disaster before it got to them. Maybe they could have done better but it was in very rough shape before.

So, I blocked off all the ports with rubber end caps and blocked off the intake holes with scrap peices of wood, drawer liner and lightly snugged ratchet straps. This actually worked pretty well. Air still escapes between the wood but not enough to hide were the leak is.


The leak is clearly coming from that nut only.
I scrubbed it with an old toothbrush and carb cleaner, unthreaded the nut as far as it would go, scrubbed some more, glopped on FIPG (good to 482F), let it sit for a few minutes and re-tighted the nut. Then I glopped on more FIPG all over it.

I'm going to let it sit and cure for a day or two and pressure test it again. I have the compressor set to 20psi. I think that should be sufficient for testing.

I'll have to remove the FIPG before the next rebuild which is due around 81,000 miles from now and have it looked at then.

 

You don’t want to remove the top section of the supercharger and then reseal the leaking gasket section there where that bolts is?
Would not be that difficult to do,
Those 4 bolts hold the main part of the supercharger to the intake part of the supercharger, I’m guessing the leak is not so much the bolt but from the bolt seam area ,if you reseal that gasket section you should be good to go.
I would reseal that area in yellow,
HSL probably didn’t torque it down correctly or didn’t put enough gasket material on there

 

Those pictures are super useful.

I thought about taking it apart but got
Lazy.

I agree they didn't put enough gasket material in there.

When I pressure tested it I sprayed soapy water all over and did a smoke test as well to confirm the only leak is from that bolt.

At first I unthreaded the nut as far as I could and coated the threads in FIPG, let it sit for a few minutes and threaded the nut on all the way. This didn't stop the leak.
Then, I added a little FIPG at a time around the nut and let it cure for at least 2 hours and would pressure test again.

I was trying to use as little as possible as this is going to be a giant pain to remove for the next rebuild which is in around 81,000 miles if I rebuild it every 100K.

I ended up having to completely encase the stud and nut.

It's all sealed up now and no longer leaks. I'll have to remove the FIPG before I send it off on it's next rebuild in 81,000 miles.

The bad news is this isn't the leak I've been hearing.
The AFR is better and the fuel trims are better but still had the CEL come on with a P0171 code.
I hooked up the smoke machine and got out the soapy water and mechanic's stethoscope again last night.
I'm going to ask a friend to help out with a second set of eyes and ears this weekend. It might be right in front of me and I'm missing it.

 

FWIW, I had a very similar scenario when my brake booster was failing. It was likely hissing all the time but because of all the engine noises while running, I couldn't hear it until the engine was shut off. For about 5-10 seconds after shutdown I could hear what sounded like air escaping or pressure releasing. It was an internal leak within the booster.

 

It would actually be pretty easy to take apart,
4 or 5 bolts on top and 4 at the rear,
You don’t have to open the core part of the supercharger

 

Oh nice, no messing with the rotors sounds pretty good!

 

No messing with rotors or snout

 

Buying premium unleaded feels like getting raped at the gas ⛽. My innovate AFR/Boost combo gauge has a valet mode. I have mine setup when in valet mode the boost control valve is set to always open, making boost impossible to make. I set it up for when I went to Mexico if I got subpar gas and pinging was bad I could essentially turn boost off. Never dreamed I'd use it to make the gas pump rape a little bit more tolerable.
Here's what found running regular unleaded gas in valet mode. Gas mileage was pretty close to what it was before supercharger install, no pinging. There is some power loss over a stock non supercharged motor due to power lost spinning the supercharger. So if money's tight and you need to save some $$ you could run low octane gas with a flip of a switch.
A 12v three way vacuum solinoid valve a vacuum source and vacuum resivior. Also a switch or some way to control it. If anyone is interested I can draw up a diagram if needed and add some pics.

 

That sounds like a great idea.
I also go to MX from time to time. However it’s been a few years and have not been with the SC installed.
Bad gas was a concern of mine and was planning on carrying a bunch of boostane or something but this sounds better.

I just had a thought. In an emergency could you zip tie the control valve open?

 

You could. My last trip to Mexico I had no problem with the gas though.

 

New toy showed up after a lengthy wait.

 

And the rabbit hole begins..................