Good job mate, looks well where it sits, nice weight distribution for the battery as well lol

Quick update
 

Hi everyone,

Thanks for the replies. The pulleys all line up but I will be re-routing the coolant pipes and power steering fluid to ensure they don't foul the new drive belt.

Yes, the mount is a little ugly at the moment, but I may take it to a machine shop and ask for a prettier version to be made - I'm a front end systems developer by trade so normally my tools are a keyboard, mouse and loads of coffee, so fabricating and welding is a little out my comfort zone :)

I think next I will be getting a suitable belt so I can hook up the Supercharger, plus I'll add a tensioner to ensure it stays taught - so even if the boost is going no where I'll at least have that sweet Supercharger whine!

However, that may not be for a week or two as my wife just gave birth to our first child so I'm doing 'new dad stuff' at the moment and apparently completing the Supercharger build doesn't count :wonder:

I'll post more pics and a video as soon as I get them.

Thanks

good luck with this mate.. looking forward to seeing this finished.

Hi Everyone!

Well its been a while, mainly been busy with my new son and haven't had much garage time, not complaining as its great being a Father - but I have missed the tinkering!

Anyway, the project is still ongoing and I did manage to make a little more progress this weekend just gone, but before that I had a few issues to sort!

First was my passenger side door lock - my wife has a habit of slamming doors and a few weeks back she slammed the Impreza's and managed to dislodged the lock from its mounting hole! Not a major issue, just popped off the door card and re-attached, although there is not a lot of space to manoeuvre inside the door!

Second was a bit more of a pain - went out the other morning to go to work and the car wouldn't start :confused:
So went back to it in the evening (Love working in the cold evenings...not!) and had a little look around to see if anything was obvious but couldn't see anything, initially I thought it was a split or lose vacuum pipe. However, I turned the ignition on and was presented by an odd, squeaky mechanical sound. Long story short, after listening closely and disconnecting a few electrical plugs to try and diagnose what was making the noise, I tracked it down the the IACV on the throttle body.

So I took it off and took it apart, needless to say that it was pretty gunked up in there and was nearly at the point of seizing up! So a quick strip down, de-gunk with GT85 it was reassembled, put back in and she fired up straight away! :thumb:

Supercharger wise, I have mainly been doing a little fettling. I noticed that the top of the bracket was fouling ever so slightly with the underside of the bonnet, so I took it off and trimmed it. I also took this opportunity to secure the Supercharger intake manifold tightly and applied some instant gasket/pet seal around it where there would have been a gasket.

I also bought a collection of silicone bends and alloy pipes to start putting the induction piping together. I'm really pleased with how it looks so far, the little filter is tucked away on the intake of the supercharger and the outlet clears the top of it and the underside of the bonnet and looks like it will run inline nicely to the intake on the intercooler when its fitted.

Sorry for the picture, I finished late as had to go searching for our Husky that had decided to run...and run...and run some more! Eventually she came back...bloody dogs!

I will post a better, daytime picture asap!

Thanks everyone!

http://www.clear-media.co.uk/Impreza/induction.jpg

Fantastic project, good to see something different! And on a bug :luxhello:

ill be keeping my eye on this one mate, I like it when people work outside the box with one off cars / projects

Very nice project. Seen it done a few times before so will be interested to see how you get on.

Nice work, good luck :)

Loving this!

Hi everyone,

Thanks for the recent feedback :)
Not so much has happened this month what with it being Christmas, apparently buying yourself presents for your Supercharger is not overly festive :wonder:

Anyway, I did manage to pick up something to help with the fueling - was trawling eBay one night and found a chap selling an Apexi AFC that he'd been using on his Supercharged MX-5. He'd upgraded to a Mega-Squirt stand alone as wanted to run higher boost, long story short I got the Apexi AFC for £40, so was pleased with that!

Next on the list of things to do is get the top mount intercooler fitted, which will involve fabricating some mounts, then it's finishing the induction piping and on to finding a suitable belt to run the Supercharger!

I'll post pics and updates ASAP,
Thanks!

Nice build mate, good to see something different

Hi Everyone!

Sorry for being absent for a while, its been a busy start to 2014! and the Supercharger project has had to take a back seat for a while, but thats about to change!

But first, lets catch up!

So...boxing day, the family and I go to see some relatives...long story short, the rear quarter panel is missing some paint and is not as wide as it used to be! Totally gutted as have no 'Pat Cash' to be doing body repairs! Oh well, I'm sure something will get sorted, its not in need of urgent repair...but it does totally ruin the appearance of the car!

With that issue over with and the new year in full swing I thought it high time I start getting back into the project!

Now, I'm really bored of having the Supercharger mounted and not doing anything so tonight, I have ordered a belt and tensioner which (wife permitting!) I am planning to fit this weekend! For the Supercharger belt, I simply took a tape measure and fed it on the route that the new belt needs to travel and hey presto, thats the length I need! It measured as 140cm and I have added a couple of centimetres just to be sure, but I will be taking these extra centimetres up with the use of a tensioner.

So what high performance applications am I getting the belt and tensioner off? Well that would be a diesel VW Passat for the belt and a Ford Puma for the tensioner bearing :D

Yep, it turns out that the VW Passat uses a belt that has 5 peaks/ridges and is 143.2cm long for its power steering/alternator etc - what a find! And as for the tensioner its just an idler bearing that I'm planning to bolt to a fabricated bracket that slides up and down therefore adjusting the tension :thumb:

And the cost for these 'high performance' parts? £12.44!

So there we have it, hopefully at some point this weekend my workshop will be filled with the sound of a Supercharger's whine! I'll post a video if it happens!

Thanks!

About time, i cant wait to see it on, best of luck ;-)

Gary

Hi everyone,

Really quick update. The belt and tensioner arrived today and I've got the all clear for a Sunday garage session from my wife :thumb:

I nipped out this evening when I got home and quickly offered up the belt and it looks like its going to be spot on! Might not need the tensioner as the adjustment on the alternator might be enough, but I figured it was better to have the option!

So this time Sunday I hope to be posting a video of the Supercharger hooked up and whirring away!

good luck and give us more pics :D

I'm liking the thread actually, it's nice to read something with depth and meaning rather than, I fitted this bolt in that hole and tightened it 37 times until it slipped on the spanner etc etc

Really looming forward to the outcome good luck mate!!!!!

Ok...here it is...running! Sorry its such a short video, I filmed it after doing a 10-15 mile trip to make sure everything was ok, and thankfully it was!

Thanks everyone for the comments up to now!

Looking good and got a nice whine to it. :thumb:
What else needs to be done to finish it?

Thanks for that :)
Yeah I am pleased with it so far and the whine is nice to have! There's not an awful lot needed to finish, here's a small breakdown:

1) Install (good quality!) air/fuel ratio gauge, this needs to be done first so I have a 'base' setting for the car running without any boost to compare to when the Supercharger is plumbed in.
2) Wire up AFC to the cars ECU
3) Buy and install 255 fuel pump - probably not essential but don't really want to risk it.
4) Mount intercooler - this will require the intercooler outlet and throttle body inlet to be trimmed in order to have enough room to fit.
5) Finish 'charge' piping - shouldn't be a huge job, but will need a silicone reducer as the alloy piping I have is bigger than the intercooler inlet
6) Strip down, clean, tidy, fettle, paint and maybe lacquer all the mounts I fabricated
7) Install obligatory boost gauge!
8) Enjoy! :thumb:

That's a simplified list, there will no doubt be a lot of extra little bits to sort, but I think now the belt and tensioner are sorted, the bulk of the 'heavy lifting' as such is done!

Thanks again!

Hi everyone,

Just a very quick update on the build. I now have a air/fuel and boost gauge ready to fit to the A-Pillar. Love or hate fitting gauges there, when the pod to hold them is £10 its a struggle to pass up! I had hoped to fit them this weekend just gone but those plans went out the window!

I did manage to get into the garage to make a few tiny tweaks to the Supercharger mounting bracket. Now there is the option to move it further forward or backwards to assist with aligning the belt over all the pulleys.

I also spent a little time offering up the WRX intercooler I have...in short its too big so I'm going to be moving that on it favour of either an older intercooler, which I believe are a little smaller, or if I can get one at the right price a FMIC kit...but we'll see. I'll most likely fit the older TMIC first, then perhaps upgrade to a front mount once everything is bed in and running ok.

If anyone is interested, I will try to find time to record a longer video of the charger whining away!

Thanks

Errr yes, I'd love to hear this running. sounded good in the other vid though :thumb:

Go for it, it sounds quite amusing tbh.

Well I had hoped my project would be interesting to people, but I'll take amusing...a reply is a reply after all!

Oh it is interesting and different from the norm. All home grown too. :thumb:
What power output you looking to achieve?

Thanks for the reply Ian.
I'm honestly not sure about power output. I don't expect huge gains as its going to be quite a mild tune, I'll not be taking the boost past 5psi.

I really just wanted something a little outside the curve that I could be proud of, and so far I'm really pleased with what I have achieved.

Thanks again!

looking good!

Hi everyone!

Well I had about an hour in the garage today so started making the charge piping. I have got it ready to connect to the intercooler when it arrives. As I dont have the intercooler to offer up yet, I have left enough piping to trim off, I also have spare off cuts should I need to add any length.

I also fitted a catch tank, probably pointless but I had it so thought I would fit it. Originally I was going to replace the power steering reservoir with the catch tank, but since modifying the Supercharger bracket to enable moving it backward/forward I don't need to replace or move the power steering reservoir! I'm not going to keep the awful translucent blue pipe that came with the catch tank, but its all I had today...I will replace it asap though with some better quality hose!

http://www.clear-media.co.uk/Impreza...140222_004.jpg

So thats aboout it for now, until the intercooler turns up anyway! Am hoping to get my gauges in during the week!

I took another short video from inside the car so anyone interested can hear what it sounds like - obviously there is no performance benefit as yet due to it not being 'plumbed in', but hopefully that will be sorted soon! Apologies that the video is not very stable!

Thanks again!

Hard to tell from you photo's, but, when you fit the top mount, how are you going to be filtering the air?

Very cool project, do you know any cfm specs on the blower as it will give a rough indication of power output

Hello and thanks for the replies.

mickywrx - Its a little hard to make out, but if you look at the last picture I posted, just peeking out from behind the first section of alloy pipe is a cone filter that is on the intake of the supercharger :) That will deal with filtering the incoming air, or have I misunderstood your question?

gazney101 - I don't have any data on the Supercharger regarding what sort of volume it moves etc, I will do some rough calculations at some point as I suspect a pulley change will be due further down the road. However, I was hoping to come up with something to control max boost that would mean not having to change pulley's...I have an idea in my head but am working out the kinks!

Thanks again!