Garrett Electrically Assisted Turbos

[kmartind]

Article:

http://www.autofieldguide.com/articles/050103.html

What are the chances of us ever getting our hands on one of these? It should virtually eliminate lag and make the turbo more efficient. Why didn't anyone think of this earlier? If it only adds $100-$200 to the cost, that's very reasonable, but I assume that doesn't include the necessary electronics to control it (this seems likely to be the biggest potental problem with implementing something like on our cars, right?)

 

[Defiant]

I'd thought of doing it a while back, then found out Garrett was doing it.

I don't know about the air-bearing idea.... but that's why they don't hire me to design this stuff, isn't it? I assume they've found a way (or, more likely, it's already in the characteristics of the bearing type) to deal with the question of shock-protection.

I'd like to see a tach on a turbo (like an infra-red eye looking at a dot on a fin or two- or, maybe just the passing fins). I'm sure it'd scare the hell outta you. Like F-1 and racing motorcycle engines aren't enough.

 

[kmartind]

I too would really love to see what RPM the turbo is running. That would provide some useful performance data, and it would be easier to tell if you had a boost leak or if your BOV was leaking, you'd see higher RPMs than expected for a given boost pressure. It seems a little risky that the only thing keeping the turbo from spinning so fast that it explodes is the wastegate (and I guess the limit of flow on the exhaust side, high pressure on the compressor side and incedental friction in the bearing). That's another thing I wonder about with hybrid turbos. They run wheel combinations that were never intended by either Garrett or Mitsubishi. It seems like the wrong combination could be a recipe for disaster, but luckilly they're fairly well tested in real cars before being sold. It would be interesting to see how far out of RPM spec some of them may be running though.