R3 Shootout

My good friend and fellow CF wheeler Brembo has finished his turbo R3 with excellent results... 267 RWHP! Congratulations to Brembo, who has been extremely patient while his tuners got his turbo install right. I'll let him tell the rest...

I see an R3 shootout in the making... supercharged vs turbocharged, both making 267 RWHP. Brembo will collect general admission fees, while I'll collect on the beer sales.

cant wait to find out how that works out!!! Im going SC myself at some point i think....

Post some pics Brembo, I would love to see that set up.

Personally, I lean toward the turbo charged setup for a number of reasons notwithstanding the fact that I'm a bit more familiar with turbocharging over mechanical supercharging. The turbo is inherently simpler both in the way it achieves boost and the way it's driven itself. A mechanical supercharger need a parasitic drive whereas an exhaust driven turbo needs nothing more than a adequate exhaust flow to spin the turbine blades at sufficient rpm to drive the compressor section to overcome static intake flow and attain positive pressure (boost). A parasitic drive supercharger does have one major advantage and that is it can attain positive intake pressure entirely independent of exhaust gas flow which is commonly referred to as 'turbo lag'. Thats the time frame that takes place when the turbocharger goes from negative boost to positive boost. Other than turbo lag, I don't see many disadvantages in turbocharging. Bothy devices can attain boost values in the excess of what normally aspirated engines can deal with without internally strengthening the engine or using a waste gate which essentially allows the excess boost to vent to the atmosphere. The exhaust system on a turbocharged engine is of little consequence especially post turbo whereas the exhaust system on a supercharged engine still must provide a scavenge effect to efficiently remove spent gasses. Mechanically, the turbocharged engine is much simpler because a PTO isn't needed and it's possible to run self lubricated turbochargers today in the event that a easily accessed oil supply isn't available. While a supercharger makes a nice whine as the engine rpm's rise and fall, there is nothing more chilling that hearing a small turbocharger spool upward toward 100,000 rpm and the resulting whine.

Too much lag on turbos, coupled with little or no boost at lower RPMs kinda kills them for me Flip. It would be a different matter if the Rocket was a small displacement high reving motor (Like a 600 Gixxer that will rev to 14000 by itself) but that ain't the Rocket, is it? With a 7000 RPM top end the SC is by far a better and more streetable choice.

Plus... I like all that extra hardware. In yer face is a lot more fun than a "sleeper".

This is all dreaming for me right now, unless I hit the lotto. Plus, I have gone more of the "bagger" route so I have a lot of extra weight and wind resistance. I never have really pretended to be some sore of race bike Captain (unless I come up against a Harley ). It would be kinda fun to have the world's fastest bagger though.....

Toystoretom said:

Too much lag on turbos, coupled with little or no boost at lower RPMs kinda kills them for me Flip. It would be a different matter if the Rocket was a small displacement high reving motor (Like a 600 Gixxer that will rev to 14000 by itself) but that ain't the Rocket, is it? With a 7000 RPM top end the SC is by far a better and more streetable choice.

Plus... I like all that extra hardware. In yer face is a lot more fun than a "sleeper".

This is all dreaming for me right now, unless I hit the lotto. Plus, I have gone more of the "bagger" route so I have a lot of extra weight and wind resistance. I never have really pretended to be some sore of race bike Captain (unless I come up against a Harley ). It would be kinda fun to have the world's fastest bagger though.....

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That's old turbo thinking. Lag is a think of the past for the most part. I see more torque made lower in the RPMS with good turbo set ups than I do with supercharged set ups.

I don't know about specific kits made for the Rocket but given the rocket has SOO much meat down low, you'd never feel the lag if ever there was any.


BTW, My 2300cc turbo made 287whp and 324wtrq last november.

Down fall? I'll pulling 3100 lbs of sheet metal and glass

In my case, it was a matter of choosing the torque curve that met my needs. Every R3 Turbo installation I have studied makes max torque at 3 - 4000 RPM, then drops off going to 7000 RPM. The Supercharged R3 carries a nearly flat torque curve from 3500 to 7000 RPM. So while the turbo R3 makes more peak torque, IMO the supercharged R3 has more useful torque. While the torque curves can be shifted slightly with cams... the turbo torque curve reflects it's boost curve, while the supercharger boost is totally linear with RPM.

Hero Blob said:

Down fall? I'll pulling 3100 lbs of sheet metal and glass

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Take a can opener to it. After all, it's only a rice-a-roni anyway.

Toystoretom said:

Too much lag on turbos, coupled with little or no boost at lower RPMs kinda kills them for me Flip. It would be a different matter if the Rocket was a small displacement high reving motor (Like a 600 Gixxer that will rev to 14000 by itself) but that ain't the Rocket, is it? With a 7000 RPM top end the SC is by far a better and more streetable choice.

Plus... I like all that extra hardware. In yer face is a lot more fun than a "sleeper".

This is all dreaming for me right now, unless I hit the lotto. Plus, I have gone more of the "bagger" route so I have a lot of extra weight and wind resistance. I never have really pretended to be some sore of race bike Captain (unless I come up against a Harley ). It would be kinda fun to have the world's fastest bagger though.....

Click to expand...

I too am the 100% bagger route. I like to look at machinery but for my tastes, the stock R3 is just fine. I have no intention whatsoever in ever modifying the powerplant in any way......I like the motorboat sound.