This is what I’m doing for alternative turbo options!
Mirror image (1 standard and 1 reverse rotation) Garrett G25-550 turbos! Internally wastegated w/1bar actuators, vband in and out and .72 A/R! Capable of up to 1100hp but realistically probably around 900 crank.
Bit the bullet and bought these bad chickens for just over 5k. Which was the end result from talking with Matt Robinson some more about his Gen3R and why I sold them. He said I’d likely max out at 550-600 wheel as no matter how big of a wheel you cram in it, the airflow is restricted to the stock housing. I’ve spent a lot of money on my build since 2020 and at the end of the day, I had to ask myself if it was worth it to be around 550-600….and the answer was quickly no. As much as I did
NOT want to spend that much more money…..if I didn’t get the G25-550…all the money I spent wouldn’t feel worth it…if that makes sense. I honestly came to the conclusion that I’d rather blow up my transmission than be underpowered by hybrid turbos. I didn’t blindly pick the G25-550, I was between them, G25-660 and G30-660 but consulted with Matt Pohnan who built my engine and who also hand picked these based on turbo maps, efficiency and what makes sense. Some ppl like to say take turbo maps for a grain of salt bc all engines are different but what better person to recommend a turbo based on your engine than your engine builder?
And so the next fun part is going against the grain and reusing my 2013+ ported and thermal coated exhaust manifolds, by doing some cutting, welding, vbands, whatever. I’ve enlisted the help of a friend who tig welds and he loves connecting A to B. Because I’m using my manifolds I won’t be fully optimizing the new turbos, however it’ll be a ridiculous upgrade from all of the current hybrid turbo options. I’m going to cut and weld and add or remove piping to my downpipes to get them connected. That is why they are mirror image, once attached to the manifolds the hot side will be facing the downpipes like OEM. Physically these turbos are only about 3/4” wider and 1.5” taller than OEM. The cold side will be facing upwards, the 550’s can be rotated 360 degrees, so getting the cold side facing up is no problem. Likewise getting another coupler or adding another few inches of piping will be no problem to reuse almost all of my hot pipes and dual CAI.
And I’ll film the steps and process so no excuses for anyone else wondering about this. Likely look for a “overhaul” of future exhaust manifolds/downpipes/exhaust in the future but for now this will suffice quite nicely.
Also, @aaron240 is making me CF block off plates for where the OEM mirrors went, bc we both have APR CF GT3 mirrors we’re going to be installing on the doors. I actually have it mocked up wrong, this should be on the driver side but you get the picture.
