Supercharged Rex,

I would like to be the first in line to purchase one of each (thermostat housing and bracket). Let me know if I've "made the cut."

Dave

PS - sorry to hear about your recent problems!

 

Sorry to hear about your woes.
About the bracket, are you having them cast or machined? A Friend of mine who has forgotten more about metallurgy than I will ever know highly recommended machining out of “6061-T6511”
Any thought to adding gussets at the air pump stanchion?
I guess I dropped the ball on getting the bracket drawn in AutoCAD. It’s almost done, but I keep getting sidetracked with work.
Lars

 

I've shipped the parts on to Black-Clawson for duplication, they'll be delivered by Monday afternoon at the latest. Ron Bowering of BC will call me with a price estimate before producing them. When I spoke with Ron last week, he indicated a 2-3 week turnaround time.

The thermostat housing will be machined out of block aluminum, the bracket out of plate aluminum with a boss welded on for the airpump to bolt to.

Stay tuned.

PS - Thanks for the concerns about my "woes" but believe me, I'm much better off now than I have been in over a year.

 

I've investigated this a little further for the dIY'er. My Metals Depot catalog says that a 6061-T6 aluminum 8" x 12" x 1/2" flat bar stock goes for $28.40 and 1" x 12" round (for the air pump stanchion) is $6.80. After cutting out the shape with a jig or bandsaw, a aluminum welding shop could weld on the stanchion and perhaps some stanchion gussets for about $40-$60.
I wanted to compare the hardness and yield strength of the cast aluminum piece vs. 6061-T6, but I do not know the type of cast. I'll assume it's a "ALMAG 35" alloy, which is prety decent as casting aluminum goes.

ALMAG 35:
Tensile 38,000 psi
Yield 20,000 psi
Brinnell - 70 psi

6061-T6
Tensile -45,000 psi
Yield 40,000 psi
Brinnell - 95 psi

Lars

 

The strength of the cast aluminum is going to depend on how well each individual piece was cast. And I can assure you, based upon getting to see the inside of both my bracket and one of Phil Garrott's, the casting was quite porous. I'm actually amazed mine lasted as long as it did.

As for pricing, I know that Phil also had a machine shop make him a one-off bracket from plate steel for around $200.

BTW - Parts should be ready for shipping from Black-Clawson the end of this week.

 

[IMG]C:\PhotoWise Images\March 19, 2002\Image02.jpg[/IMG]

Bracket reinforcement option

 

???

 

[IMG]C:\My Documents\Mazda\conversion\scbracketsvgpj70.jpg[/IMG]
from http://pbgarrott.tripod.com
As you can see, and judging by your posts you already know that the brackets like to fail around the air pump stanchion. The additional gussets that were added (for $10 at my favorite marine aluminum shop) are good, cheap insurance. However, Phil Garrott's steel bracket is still the better solution.
Lars

 

Well guys, I finally received some of the parts from Black-Clawson. They shipped my original parts, as well as one copy of each, and the new ones look very good. I'll be using the bracket to replace my busted one so that leaves me with one extra thermostat housing until they ship the remaining parts.

A word of warning though: While the quality of the workmanship on the parts is good, B-C has been horribly unresponsive and uncommunicative during this process, not returning calls or providing info (e.g. UPS tracking number) when they said they would. The original estimate was 2-3 weeks turnaround time, it has been over 2 months, and I still don't have all the parts yet. I am completely dissatisfied with their level of support outside of the actual workmanship.

Therefore, beyond completing the transaction for the 3 sets that I've already ordered and allocated, I'm finished dealing with B-C. They have the measurements for the bracket and thermostat housing, and can reproduce them at will. If anyone wants the parts, they can contact Ron Bowering of Black-Clawson at 315-598-7121.

Guys, I wish this had gone better, I'd hoped to make it possible for there to be more NA's converted over to boost. As for me, I realized tonight that two of the three holes that the bracket mounts to in the waterpump housing are stripped, so mine still won't be up and running just yet.

Chuck

 

Just got my waterpump housing, so everything will be installed this weekend. I can't wait to drive my RX-7 again, its been a long four months of driving a Kia.

 

Haven't had time to put my own car back together yet, but did manage to take some pics of the extra parts that you guys will need for the setup, you can see them at http://www.geocities.com/boatseason/...er_pieces.html and I've also updated the parts list http://www.geocities.com/boatseason/sc-parts-list.xls (you might need to right click the link and Save As)

Since one of the three original guys backed out on me, I'll be putting one of the bracket/thermostat housing sets up on ebay later this week, I'll post up when its there.

 

Alright, since I had one person cancel on me after I'd purchased the bracket and housing, it is now up for sale on ebay.

If anyone has any questions, please don't hesitate to email me, but please use my boatseason@yahoo.com account rather than PM'ing me here.

 

Does anyone have that stock elbow replacement thing for the supercharger setup??? Were can I buy used paxton parts..or new. Can someone show me a site?

 

Von, the spreadsheet (Sorry, you'll have to right click the link and Save As to get the file, geocities doesn't allow linking.) lists the vendors for the parts, but that elbow was originally custom made by Nelson. It is just a 90 degree bend of 2 7/8" o.d. aluminum piping. An exhaust place can mandrel bend you the part if necessary, but you can also buy pre-bent tubing from places like www.magnumforce.com and then cut to size.

BTW - The Paxton centrifugal blowers are now handled by Craig Conley of Paradise Wheels 760-740-0954.

 

SuerchargedRex,
Have you had any experience with Craig Coneley?
I would like to send my supercharger there to be sure it's operating properly and that it isn't a source of my problems. (i'm only getting 3 psi max.) I hope he's honest, but I have the usual reservations.
Another question:
On you car, does the duct betw. the afm and the rear of the sc get squished under the sc and cause some rubbing/vibration transfer to the body? I can feel vibrations in the footpedals.
Lars
p.s.
I hope the bracket sales are going well. Nice website pics.

 

I had an extremely long conversation with Craig when I first looked into fabricating the kit; he seemed quite reasonable and upfront. It was actually Paxton’s customer service department that told me they’d been outsourcing service on the SN series of blowers to Craig for a few years, so at least his workmanship should be good if that’s what you need.

My duct doesn’t get squished, but I did mount my afm a little lower where there’s more room. Are you using the black rubber elbow between the sc and duct, or are you just mounting the duct onto the sc with a clamp? If you’re doing it the second way, I could see where the duct would get crushed.

I’m surprised you’re only getting 3psi, have you made sure you don’t have any leaks? If you had a vacuum leak, say for example one of the vacuum lines off the manifold, you’d just blow a lot of your boost out through there. Are you getting a lot of belt slipping? It would show up as what appears to be a black dirt on the underside of your hood, its really the belt disintegrating.
Bracket sales aren’t going well. I’ve sold 2 of the 3 originally ordered, with a buyer on the line for the last one. Apparently, there wasn’t as much willingness to lay out cash as there was simple curiosity.

Let me know if there's anything I can do to help.

 

SuerchargedRex,
A few questions for you:
I pinned down part of my boost / tuning problem, I think. I removed the upper intake manifold before installing the sc to replace some vaccum hoses. After reinstalling, putting on the sc bracket, rerouting the wire harness, I gave it a tune-up. When I adjusted the tps ala (2) led lights it was so far out of whack that the lights were indicating a good position! After 4 good full turns of the tps screw I got it back to normal. Black smoke no longer billows fro the tailpipes.
Anyway, back to the questions. What kind of boosts do you see along the rpm range? What's your boost at redline? Is your sc's whisling noise loud or just audible. Thanks again for sharing all you experience.
Lars

 

Lars, I see 8-10psi at 6-7000rpm, but this is where I start overspinning the sc. Typically 6-8psi 5-6000rpm range and 5-7psi in the 4-5000rpm range. Sorry I can't be more specific, but its kinda hard to watch both gauges and keep my eyes on the road. With my pretty loud exhaust, I don't hear it until 3500-4000rpm, when the sixports open up and its flowing better.

Good luck with your setup, and let me know if you have any other questions.

 

Are you using the smaller pulley included with the kit?
3 1/4" I think it is?
Lars

 

Yes, I'm still running the undersized pulley that was included in the kit; its another one of those "I'll get to it eventually" things.

 

I am the proud new owner of a 90 Slow Vert with 57,000 org mi, any info like this is great. If you guys can keep me updated that would be great. Also can anyone give me info on upgrades for HP and body for my 90 vert. It just does not have enough go power. I am a new member and this seems to be a very informative site. Thanks Again!!

 

i am very interested in this kit and set up. but im worried about overspinning the SC im getting ready to get a rebuild done and im going to streetport and add series 5 rotors(lighter) so my redling is going to change are there differnt pully sizes avaiable also im not running a airpump(no emmision testing) is that going to be a problem? but superchargedrex you have been a amazing help i was looking into the paxton kit and ive seen your website and i didnt know what to do about it but u have been the guiding light to my SC 7 dream

 

Yes, you can order different pulley sizes from Craig Conley at Paradise Wheels. As for not having the airpump, that makes the installation that much easier; you'll only need to figure out what serpentine belt you need because it'll be shorter than the Goodyear #4060522 that came with the kit.

 

all these blowers people are using are too small... due to the fact we can rev so high you need a blower rated at ~600-800hp, and a blow off valve, possibly an intercooler. You'll get so much more out of it if you can make your own mounts and tensioners.. i wouldnt doubt the limit being close to 28psi or more.

 

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