Ok guys, I'm new to this site as well as my Mazda3 that I just purchased on Thursday. I've been looking at the car for some time, and I finally bought it. There are a few things that I would like to put on/in the car. I run and operate a lawn and landscaping business, and I help a friend with Northstar engine repairs on the side. I'm experienced in fixing and taking things apart. So here are my questions...

I want to put in a Magna-Flow exhaust. Is it possible for me to put it in myself, or should I take it to a shop?

Is the Cold-Air intake really worth the money? Or should I just get a supercharger....?

Im looking at a new stereo with a 7" touch-screen. I'm not sure if anyone has put one of these in before, but if you have, was it worth the buy?


http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Car-D...#ht_3549wt_748


Thanks for taking the time to read my Thread.

 

wow, cai or supercharger. the obvious answer is to state another question; what do you want to spend on the car? an intake isn't going to do much, but a supercharger will make all of the difference in the world. the intake will cost you $2-300, while a supercharger will cost you closer to $2-3k (if you are a smart shopper). the difference there is all the difference in the world.

an exhaust isn't really that hard to do if it is direct fitment and you know how to turn a bolt. if the exhaust is custom install and you don't have any experience with welding and fabrication, part it out to someone else. the money will be worth saving a headache.

 

Hi van, and welcome to the site.
Wes is quite smart about these things and I bow to his knowledge, except the super, of which there is only one being developed that I just recently found out about is closer to $4k than 3.
Some say a turbo is a better bet for a 4-cyl. I don't know from personal experience, but I say that there are at least 3 kits out there, and they are all around $4k, some with tuning/ECU, others, that is an option.
A super will draw power from the engine to make power, but it is available at a much lower rpm that w/a turbo.
Plus turbos usually run out of snot at a certain point in the rpm range (55k seems to be to norm,) whereas I have not heard of the same happening with a super. I believe they are good through the entire range, exception being down low, of course.
A turbo running any kind of boost would require an engine rebuild using forged internals, and lowering stock compression or it will not last.
Supers usually don't run high boost (5-8lbs vs. 8-28lbs.) and you can get away with the stock cast internals.

 

yes welcome, to start out with if you just do a intake and exhaust you wont see any major whp/tq (8 at most to the wheels) but what you will get is more response.

A supercharger is going to make a nifty hole in your pockets even more so because it just came out for the 3 and its only is setup for an 04-05 model, but the power increase will quiet nice but not as much as a turbo, safer? yes and no take your pick

Knowing what you wanna build your car for will give you a more general direction in what mods to do and what to expect. What year and displacement is your 3?

 

Congrats about your buy!
What year and model?
Like everyone else has stated, it all depends on how much you want to spend.
As for a supercharger or turbo, I think it depends.
Do you want to be more of a pioneer on trying out the new supercharger? Or would you want a turbo, where youd have alot more help with videos and advice and etc?

 

You could always build your own supercharger also. Not the easiest thing to do, but the results don't lie. We have a few rx7 owners who build their own because of the availabilty (or lack thereof) of kits. The compressor by itself will run almost 2k though. You still need management and supporting mods. Not to mention the brackets and pulleys to make it work.

Long story short, turbo is a good bet due to the options from the handful of kits out. Also, you don't want to add a ridiculous amount of power at the bottom end or else you will always be hopping the front tires.

 

Ok. All of that makes sense. I have a 2006 Mazda 3 s. I believe it has 157hp. I'm definitely going to put in an exhaust. As far as the supercharger goes, I wasn't aware of the price. This is what I found, http://www.yourhotcar.com/prod/RAM/P...System/18149/#

Also, are chips safe to install? Benefits?

What is the difference to the supercharger and the turbo? Will I have to make modifications to my engine when installing this?

Thank you all for answering my questions, as I am ignorant to souping-up my Mazda.

Thanks again!!

 

Do not spend your money on that thing.

 

i definitely wouldn't waste my money on that thing.

turbo kits are essentially bolt-on. you need to keep the boost down to a minimum so as to not destroy the motor, but there are plenty of options (affordable) to handle that. you will also need to tap the oil pan for the turbo's oil lines unless you get a turbo kit that includes a new oil pan. you can work around everything else and the sensors that you need to upgrade won't need an upgrade until you are running higher boost numbers. pretty much the same goes for the exhaust. they will give you the pieces to tie the stock exhaust into the turbo.

most of the chips that you will find on ebay are just a bunch of diodes and resistors. they are a total rip-off. there isn't any reason that you need to deviate from the stock tuning until you are heavily modified. if you go turbo, you can just get a kit with engine management.

here is the most complete kit that i can find;
http://www.hiboost.com/KITMAZDA3.htm

 

Several of the guys running the hiboost kits have had motor-blowing problems.... mostly because that kit tends to put more boost through a stock engine than it should really have. Plus they're apparently hard to get answers and feedback from.

I've heard a lot of good things about the F2 kits (http://www.f2usa.com/138/index.php?m...oducts_id=4694) from members on other forums. Still a complete kit, and less likely to blow your motor up on stock internals.

To the OP. Both a supercharger and a turbocharger compress air from the intake in order to force more air into the cylinder. The car adds more fuel to the mixture to compensate for the increased air. More air plus more fuel equals a bigger explosion and more power. The difference is how they do that. A turbocharger uses the exhaust gas to spin a turbine which then compresses the air. The downside to these is depending on the size of the turbo you can have a lot of turbo-lag (the time between hitting the gas and getting boost). A supercharger is a belt-driven compressor. Since it's running off the belt it gets it's power immediately. However since it's running off the belt it's also making the motor work a little harder to turn that extra pulley. They general consensus is superchargers are better for use on larger engines that already have some muscle behind them as the extra draw of the SC pulley won't make much of a difference. That said a small SC on a little engine could still knock you up to 50 hp higher than stock, so even that small amount of drain on the motor gives you more HP than you started with. I know there are some SC's for the 1.6L Mz3 engine, but I haven't seen anyone put one on a 2.0/2.3.