Boosting the efficiency of a tubocharger

[Tygen1]

If your using stainless, then I'd wrap it. Under a light load cruise situation, you won't be creating much heat. I'd try to retain as much heat as I could, and then vary the VGT to optimize the combustion vs. backpressure. IE, pull your fuel back to get it as lean as possible, but you need boost to do that, thus a heat wraped VGT might work very well....mabye...I'm just thinking out loud.

It would be fun to try, I hope to see you progress with this project.

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by Phantom

One thing I will recommend is to keep the exhaust temp up after the turbo so it does not slow causing back pressure.

I am going to use a 3.5'' to 4 inch straight pipe that dumps forward of the rear tire. Back pressure will be nearly 0.
I have looked at pictures of different setups using the banks turbo manifold and it looks like a good idea to at least wrap some stuff on the passanger side.

Originally Posted by Tygen1

IE, pull your fuel back to get it as lean as possible.

I am running a diesel engine so it always runs as lean as possible at light and medium load. Stuffing more air mass into the cylinder will help it run even leaner.

[Firefighter181]

What type of budget are you thinking of for keeping the heat in? Having owned a few of high performance turbo vehicles in the past and I can say that heat wrap is a great thing.....in a controlled environment. The draw backs can be that it is fiber, and fiber tends to have absorbent qualities. I have seen on occasion vehicles having engine bay fires that were inadvertently made worse because there was heat tape wrapping the exhaust. It is a budget solution to keeping heat in the exhaust manifold to the turbo, and keeping engine bay temps down though. There is a way that is a bit more costly, having the manifold ceramic coated can keep the heat in, keep engine bay temps down, and improve the look, and durability of the manifold(s). Coating a manifold in and out can help reduce thermal variations in cast manifolds, reducing the likely hood of the part cracking as it cycles, and ages.

[oil pan 4]

I have no budget cut off to speak of.
So far I have spent about $1200 on just parts for the truck to do the turbo and water injection install that got me about 90% of the major parts and inclueds all the expensive ones like the turbocharger, manifold and every thing but the tank for water injection.

I just weigh the cost of the mod against possible gains. I like to see +1mpg per $200 spent or $10 per hp or ft.lb of tq (with out effecting MPGs).
Rounding down, the turbo install alone should give +60hp +110tq and +2mpg. So to me the turbo upgrade is worth at least $1400.

The water injection (about $200 of that total so far) should add a solid +1mpg to that and give an additional +10% to +20% increase in torque and hp. The water injection is right on the dollar limit line for an eco mod, but its power increase, EGT reduction and its engine cooling effects will be a welcome addition too.
Water injection has been known to cure the nearly unsolveable over heating problems the 6.5L is known for.

I am considering a DIY header coating, since it is cheap and I have a full sand blasting set up at home, other wise the $220-$240 I have been quoted just isn't going to work.

You can keep exhaust wrap from absorbing oil by coating it with heavy silicone spary designed to seal header wrap.
Design Engineering DEI 010301 - DEI HT Silicone Coating - Overview - SummitRacing.com

For my manifold cross over pipe I have an oil and water proof silicone sock that I salvaged at an industrial junk yard. Wrap and spary will be used on the first few feet of down pipe.
I dont want my vehicle to catch fire.

[Patrick]

Since you have the turbo off the vehicle, you might want to consider using a dremel tool to smooth away any casting marks and to match the port openings.

[oil pan 4]

You read my mind.
The turbine houseing is coming off for sure for slag blasting and will at least get ceramic coating on the out side. I will be putting dremal to torus, but how far I go with it is unknown. I have a good set of cast iron porting tools so working and finishing cast iron is no issue for me.
In standard non VGT turbos smoothing the torus is pretty common because you have exhaust gas moving at about mach 2 along a rough cast iron surface during high power load. Smothng out the torus gives more boost with less back pressure, win-win.

I am also going to smooth and widen some of the turbo manifold near the outlet. My friend tells me that turbo looks to be a T4 flange and the manifold is a T3. I could buy an adapter but I think I will make my own.

[JasonG]

Shouldn't you cote the inside of the turbo, not the outside ?

[oil pan 4]

I may coat it inside and out, but will have to get home and take it apart and see just what I am working with. If this were a standard non-VGT I would coat the inside for sure.

[oil pan 4]

I am thinking of boosting the efficiency of my turbo charger by adding another turbocharger. Add a little T76 to feed the HE351VE.

[oil pan 4]

I bought the T76 and its on its way.