Below is a review of the buehnenginnering hybrid K04 turbo.. i thought i'd start afresh as the other topic has 40 odd pages and can be a lot of reading for someone wanting info about it.
As a lot of you may know, myself and a few others had this hybrid K04 turbo imported from the states a few months back. It was hybrid in the fact that it had a larger compressor wheel, had been polished and ported and had been thermally coated all to aid extra boost and performance when compared with the standard K04 turbo.
It was bought due to the simplistic nature of the conversion, no need to uprate the manifold, downpipe, injectors etc, We just wanted a simple bolt on mod that would take us past the standard K04 turbo's 280bhp limit, but not to the expense of an IHI conversion (£4000) Something in the middle would do us nicely
We had seen results of 270whp+ (300+bhp) from another user and by all accounts it was boosting harder and sustaining more boost than the standard K04 turbo.
We managed to import it from the states for about £950 all in, quite expensive and ill tell you at the end if i think it was worth it The fitting price was recovered by the sale of the standard turbo so it did really cost about £950 to do
I had my turbo fitted and then mapped by custom-code. I had the stage 2 remap to take all my mods into account. (Hybrid K04/Full exhaust/Induction and FMIC)
On 1st impressions i did notice it spooled very quickly, and it seemed more sustained through the mid range, its hard to explain but it just felt stronger. I was expecting a little more lag with the larger compressor wheel but this wasn't the case. 1 thing that did impress me was the noise it made, it really does sound like a jet fighter when spooling, it is far more audible than the standard K04 and you wont believe how loud it is until you actually sit in the car and listen to it. It really does sound very good
I then had a few dramas with the car (not the turbo) that made it run poorly for a while. I lost all 4 coil packs within 1 month and my dumpvalve was sticking, so i wasn't able to test the turbo out to its max until all this was replaced.
I bought myself a laptop and done some logging on the turbo to see if it was actually any better than the standard K04 turbo. I had some benchmark figures from Sie (273whp) as to what it should be doing and initially i was no-where near It still felt strong and was boosting great upto 5000rpm but its 5000rpm+ performance was near identical to that of a normal K04 turbo.
It was supposed to hold 1.5 bar upto just below 5000rpm, and then hold 1.25bar at 6500rpm. Quite a significant improvement over a normal K04 turbo.
I was pissed off a little for a while and even thought about sending it back but the manufacturer suggested tweaking the actuator as it was likely the wastegate was being blown open hence why my 5000+ performance was not good.
After lots and lots of logging and tweaks i have now manged to get it to perform how it should be doing. I am seeing maf values of 225g/s and its boosting great.
It boosts to around 1.8 bar on spool very early at around 3200rpm and then drops to the 1.54bar where vagcom can start measuring at around 4600rpm. It then drops to just under 1.5bar at 5000rpm and is now boosting at around 1.2-1.25 bar at 6500-6750
This compared with normal K04 that may spike at around 1.6 bar, hold 1.35 bar to around 5000rpm and then hold onto 1 bar at red line, there is a definite improvement
Was it all worth it?
Is it really that much quicker?
How much have i gained?
Well yes i do think its worth it I estimate the turbo is realistically good for another 25bhp on top of the standard K04, but thats 25bhp headlined figures, its the sustainment that you'll notice far better. I would reccomend it to other LCR owners if they dont really want to fork out for IHI at £4k, but dont mind spending 1-1.5k on this. I do think its an in between.
We happily spend £750 on a FMIC and dont think twice about it, the same with an exhaust system at £1000 in some cases. These combined are good for 10-15bhp, turbo at around the same price is good for more than this
So that question gets a nod from me
Is it really that much quicker? Well using vagcom as a measuring guide i have been logging 60-100 runs all weekend only using 4th gear as to rule out errors etc. My best is a 6.2sec run but i am consistantly getting an average of 6.4secs 60-100mph, which is quick. IHI would probably take you into low 5's.
A 6.4sec 60-100 mid range time is very quick in the real world, very similar and a little quicker than a BMW M3, which is around the 7sec mark. Imprezas and evos, it takes a good 1 to match 6.4secs 60-100. Yes vagcom isn't proper timing equipment but it is very good, and good for a guide. Far more accurate than a stopwatch lol.
So yes i do think its quick, its certainly an in- between normal K04 and IHI i would think
How much have i gained? Well i need to get my arse back on the rollers but i have no doubt in my mind now that it has broken through 300
As you can tell im no journalist but thought id share some of my views on the turbo and to say i think its all been worth it. Its performing very well at the moment
Santapod in a couple of weeks time i hope for a low 13 sec run
Mitch
As a lot of you may know, myself and a few others had this hybrid K04 turbo imported from the states a few months back. It was hybrid in the fact that it had a larger compressor wheel, had been polished and ported and had been thermally coated all to aid extra boost and performance when compared with the standard K04 turbo.
It was bought due to the simplistic nature of the conversion, no need to uprate the manifold, downpipe, injectors etc, We just wanted a simple bolt on mod that would take us past the standard K04 turbo's 280bhp limit, but not to the expense of an IHI conversion (£4000) Something in the middle would do us nicely
We had seen results of 270whp+ (300+bhp) from another user and by all accounts it was boosting harder and sustaining more boost than the standard K04 turbo.
We managed to import it from the states for about £950 all in, quite expensive and ill tell you at the end if i think it was worth it
The fitting price was recovered by the sale of the standard turbo so it did really cost about £950 to do I had my turbo fitted and then mapped by custom-code. I had the stage 2 remap to take all my mods into account. (Hybrid K04/Full exhaust/Induction and FMIC)
On 1st impressions i did notice it spooled very quickly, and it seemed more sustained through the mid range, its hard to explain but it just felt stronger. I was expecting a little more lag with the larger compressor wheel but this wasn't the case. 1 thing that did impress me was the noise it made, it really does sound like a jet fighter when spooling, it is far more audible than the standard K04 and you wont believe how loud it is until you actually sit in the car and listen to it. It really does sound very good
I then had a few dramas with the car (not the turbo) that made it run poorly for a while. I lost all 4 coil packs within 1 month and my dumpvalve was sticking, so i wasn't able to test the turbo out to its max until all this was replaced.
I bought myself a laptop and done some logging on the turbo to see if it was actually any better than the standard K04 turbo. I had some benchmark figures from Sie (273whp) as to what it should be doing and initially i was no-where near
It still felt strong and was boosting great upto 5000rpm but its 5000rpm+ performance was near identical to that of a normal K04 turbo.It was supposed to hold 1.5 bar upto just below 5000rpm, and then hold 1.25bar at 6500rpm. Quite a significant improvement over a normal K04 turbo.
I was pissed off a little for a while and even thought about sending it back but the manufacturer suggested tweaking the actuator as it was likely the wastegate was being blown open hence why my 5000+ performance was not good.
After lots and lots of logging and tweaks i have now manged to get it to perform how it should be doing. I am seeing maf values of 225g/s and its boosting great.
It boosts to around 1.8 bar on spool very early at around 3200rpm and then drops to the 1.54bar where vagcom can start measuring at around 4600rpm. It then drops to just under 1.5bar at 5000rpm and is now boosting at around 1.2-1.25 bar at 6500-6750
This compared with normal K04 that may spike at around 1.6 bar, hold 1.35 bar to around 5000rpm and then hold onto 1 bar at red line, there is a definite improvement
Was it all worth it?
Is it really that much quicker?
How much have i gained?
Well yes i do think its worth it
I estimate the turbo is realistically good for another 25bhp on top of the standard K04, but thats 25bhp headlined figures, its the sustainment that you'll notice far better. I would reccomend it to other LCR owners if they dont really want to fork out for IHI at £4k, but dont mind spending 1-1.5k on this. I do think its an in between. We happily spend £750 on a FMIC and dont think twice about it, the same with an exhaust system at £1000 in some cases. These combined are good for 10-15bhp, turbo at around the same price is good for more than this
So that question gets a nod from me
Is it really that much quicker? Well using vagcom as a measuring guide i have been logging 60-100 runs all weekend only using 4th gear as to rule out errors etc. My best is a 6.2sec run but i am consistantly getting an average of 6.4secs 60-100mph, which is quick. IHI would probably take you into low 5's.
A 6.4sec 60-100 mid range time is very quick in the real world, very similar and a little quicker than a BMW M3, which is around the 7sec mark. Imprezas and evos, it takes a good 1 to match 6.4secs 60-100. Yes vagcom isn't proper timing equipment but it is very good, and good for a guide. Far more accurate than a stopwatch lol.
So yes i do think its quick, its certainly an in- between normal K04 and IHI i would think
How much have i gained? Well i need to get my arse back on the rollers but i have no doubt in my mind now that it has broken through 300
As you can tell im no journalist but thought id share some of my views on the turbo and to say i think its all been worth it. Its performing very well at the moment
Santapod in a couple of weeks time i hope for a low 13 sec run
Mitch
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