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Kinugawa Turbo, Heard of Them?

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I ran a kinugawa 20g in my evo 8. It had a 11.5cm twin scroll turbine housing with td06sl2 wheel and a ported shroud 3 inch compressor cover. I ran 26psi through the midrange falling to 21 at 7k and put down 408whp on 93 octane. Best ET was 11.8 in my heavy SSL with sunroof. I bought it brand new and had it for 4000 miles. zero issues. I parted the car out and sold it to someone on evom.

EDIT: I originally typed 10.5, but it should have been 11.5cm housing. I had the same housing that michael is referencing below. I can't comment on any issues as I "only" had my turbo for 4000 daily driven miles.
 
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Taking off my FP hat for a second this is not a message from an employee of FP just a very informed consumer.

These turbos are the same Chinese 16G stuff that people bought and found out the hard way they were junk. These turbos are built in Taiwan by inexperienced people and are sold to wholesalers for <$300 w/ no work on their end. Most wholesalers are happy to make $50-100 per unit and call it a day and offer zero support for the product if and when you have a problem with it. There is no QC and no "revolutionary design" work going on they take other peoples stuff clone it poorly and sell it as their own.

Where Kinugawa differs is they take the time to market it a whole lot better but still don't do any qc work to make sure the turbos they send out are quality. In fact the majority of people who get them come straight from Taiwan still in the original manufacturers boxing and everything. They mark it up to make up for marketing and build in enough profit to cover a replacement should your original fail. CXRacing sells the same turbos on Ebay for $300, the same EXACT unit. Just they don't offer support or really a warranty to speak of and the price reflects that.

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That is their 11.5 EVO 9, during an attempt to machine it out at a customers request the housing melted. We're not talking about 1000* or anything, just the friction from the machining process caused the housing to melt and couldn't even be machined out 2MM over.

You get what you pay for and sooner or later when enough units are in the wild their failure rate will become evident and people will finally wise up and look past the price of these cheap units.

Ok FP hat back on.

-Michael
 
Yes, there's not a lot out there on how well some of the individual parts are holding up, or if any parts are worth using (like the compressor covers they pitch, compressor/exhaust wheels, etc.).

This is the first I've read about something other than the turbo as a whole failing, so I'm curious.
 
Any experience with how well their exhaust wheels hold up?

I'll chime in on this one. I have a MHI (Genuine) TD06H turbo that had the compressor cover machined to accept a 3076r compressor wheel, and it has a Kinugawa TD06H4 (11 blade) turbine wheel. I have had no issues at all with the turbo. The car made multiple 11 second passes on the turbo while trapping in excess of 125mph. The wheel is still in great shape, no pitting, no cracking, no distortion, etc. I would recommend only buying directly from Kinugawa, if you buy from other retailers you never know what you might get. I haven't had any bad experiences with them.
 
theres a bunch of good reports of the evo 8/9 25g holding up on evom forums. and there are reports of failures. they arent junk but they certainly not the quality you will get from mitsubishi or FP or any other builder who charges a serious penny for their products. I have used the 20g parts from kamak and they hold up quite well. I think I got 10k out of it before the turbine wheel lost part of a blade. 11 blade 6sl2. the quality does get better and better every year. and now they are selling quite a few billet compressor wheels. the KTS billet wheels are as good as anybodies. really strong material. many on tuners have just bolted the compressor wheels on with no balancing and there are no failure threads on doing it. and if turbos are really junk where are the failure threads?

I have personally not tried anything new lately. my fp turbos are going strong. :thumb:
 
Does their cover fits the real evo3 16g turbo? I really like the down firing housing.
 
i purchased the 20g upgrade package with the 20g housing and 20g compressor wheel.
built it in the garage and been running it at 25-27psi for about a year DD.
also got a 34mm wastegate turbine housing from them to put on the 20g, and it's a great piece.i have seen my egts get to 1650 with this turbo repeatedly.
i also bought a big 16g compressor wheel to do a 14b upgrade and that turbo is still spinning 24+psi with 1650 egts on my summer car, 2+ years old.
 
I don't necessarily agree with what Michael has stated above. Kamak/Kinugawa has been around a good while now and makes parts that mimic OEM quality in my experience. They were the first company to market an upgraded-thrust parts kit for TD05H/TD06 turbos over 10 years ago...now those kits are everywhere, so it's safe to say that these other companies have copied Kamak's superior design.

They're definitely NOT the same poor quality as Chinese CXRacing/Godspeed turbos. In fact, I've bought new 7cm2 turbine housings from Kamak/Kinugawa that were the exact same identical housing that came on the early generation FP DSM HTA Green/Red turbos, prior to FP's release of the MHI 8cm2 clone, clear down to the casting stamps and wastegate flapper hardware.
 
over year ago sold new old stock 20g turbo to a local. the turbo was a kamak turbo that I bought maybe 4-5 years ago an d never used.. I bolted in a KTS billet wheel on it without a rebalance. he religiously beats on the car at 20psi and there has been zero issues with the turbo. not great data but some is better than none.
 
I don't necessarily agree with what Michael has stated above. Kamak/Kinugawa has been around a good while now and makes parts that mimic OEM quality in my experience. They were the first company to market an upgraded-thrust parts kit for TD05H/TD06 turbos over 10 years ago...now those kits are everywhere, so it's safe to say that these other companies have copied Kamak's superior design.

They're definitely NOT the same poor quality as Chinese CXRacing/Godspeed turbos. In fact, I've bought new 7cm2 turbine housings from Kamak/Kinugawa that were the exact same identical housing that came on the early generation FP DSM HTA Green/Red turbos, prior to FP's release of the MHI 8cm2 clone, clear down to the casting stamps and wastegate flapper hardware.

Jus, Do you have experience with Kinugawa internal WG's? I need one for my 16g and came across theirs which is the cheapest I found $85 with your choice of spring. It almost sounds too good to be true. Thanks
 
I have a 23# Kinugawa waste gate for my 16g that my son ran for a couple years and it works great, still.
This is an old thread but you can ask Justin in a PM if he doesn't get back to you.
 
Jus, Do you have experience with Kinugawa internal WG's? I need one for my 16g and came across theirs which is the cheapest I found $85 with your choice of spring. It almost sounds too good to be true. Thanks
Not personally, no. I'm still modding Holset actuators to fit MHI mounts on turbos I build so I don't really need to buy anything like that.
 
Jus, Do you have experience with Kinugawa internal WG's? I need one for my 16g and came across theirs which is the cheapest I found $85 with your choice of spring. It almost sounds too good to be true. Thanks

I run their 22psi internal wastegate on my V1 HTA68 and it kicks ass. Holds boost so much better than the stock MHI unit that came with the turbo originally. Almost 6 months with it and no issues whatsoever at 30psi!
 
Taking off my FP hat for a second this is not a message from an employee of FP just a very informed consumer.

These turbos are the same Chinese 16G stuff that people bought and found out the hard way they were junk. These turbos are built in Taiwan by inexperienced people and are sold to wholesalers for <$300 w/ no work on their end. Most wholesalers are happy to make $50-100 per unit and call it a day and offer zero support for the product if and when you have a problem with it. There is no QC and no "revolutionary design" work going on they take other peoples stuff clone it poorly and sell it as their own.

Where Kinugawa differs is they take the time to market it a whole lot better but still don't do any qc work to make sure the turbos they send out are quality. In fact the majority of people who get them come straight from Taiwan still in the original manufacturers boxing and everything. They mark it up to make up for marketing and build in enough profit to cover a replacement should your original fail. CXRacing sells the same turbos on Ebay for $300, the same EXACT unit. Just they don't offer support or really a warranty to speak of and the price reflects that.

You must be logged in to view this image or video.


That is their 11.5 EVO 9, during an attempt to machine it out at a customers request the housing melted. We're not talking about 1000* or anything, just the friction from the machining process caused the housing to melt and couldn't even be machined out 2MM over.

You get what you pay for and sooner or later when enough units are in the wild their failure rate will become evident and people will finally wise up and look past the price of these cheap units.

Ok FP hat back on.

-Michael

Ok,
Soooo when are you guys going to sell genuine td05 turbochargers for less than $1000
 
Ok,
Soooo when are you guys going to sell genuine td05 turbochargers for less than $1000
Those days are done my friend- turbos like the MHI Evo III 16G haven't been in production for a few years now so any you find will be leftovers / new-old-stock from guys who bought them and never used them. I have a new MHI Small 16G, Big 16G, Evo III 16G, and 20G here but I'm not sure I'll part with them as I'm as much a collector as I am rebuilder/distributor.
 
Those days are done my friend- turbos like the MHI Evo III 16G haven't been in production for a few years now so any you find will be leftovers / new-old-stock from guys who bought them and never used them. I have a new MHI Small 16G, Big 16G, Evo III 16G, and 20G here but I'm not sure I'll part with them as I'm as much a collector as I am rebuilder/distributor.


No, they could make them if they wanted. It's not like the 67hta popped out of a mysterious hole in McKinney Texas

I'll redact my "genuine" statement, I would like a reproduction or widely available solution to the tdo5 shortage. (Without spending $869 from a site sponsor)
 
Without spending $869 from a site sponsor

FP is no longer a sponsor here, and they haven't really contributed on the forums for quite some time.
 
when i looked up the part number with ASA, it showed MR239346 but i keep seeing MR239345 around the internet.

assuming that the 46 number is right, a quick search brings up THIS SITE with a list price of $688.41 for the turbo.
Chances are they will be out of stock if somebody orders one, but its worth checking out.

HERE is another "OEM parts" site that has them listed for $733

--
i almost forgot. If anyone gives a F.U.C.K, Apparently 2 guys started Kinugawa turbo but one of them left the company because he didn't like the quality of the parts. He started Mambatek in 2014. I read some reviews on their shit and everyone said parts are decent. so i guess they aren't ebay shit turbos.
 
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I run their 22psi internal wastegate on my V1 HTA68 and it kicks ass. Holds boost so much better than the stock MHI unit that came with the turbo originally. Almost 6 months with it and no issues whatsoever at 30psi!

Ok thanks! I pulled the trigger on one yesterday. Hopefully it'll last. Fingers crossed. Thanks
 
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