So, I was wondering how many of you out there have Boost Controllers, Electronic or manual.

Did you install them yourself, was it difficult?

Where is the placement of the parts both in the cabin and under the hood?

Do you like it ?

Oh and yes, I already searched the threads, I just wanted to hear from People who actually installed one, or use one on their Z32. I bought an Apexi Boost controller and will be installing it this week, I got this one cause it taps into existing ECU and its pretty small and got decent reviews for ease of use and abilities. I'll try to take pics when I do the install and perhaps even do a write up if I don't get too frustrated and start throwing/kicking things.

 

boost controllers are really simple design and easy to install. the only difficult thing sometimes can be learning to operate your electronic one properly. its really just extending a few vacume lines located on teh turbo that controlls teh wastegate, and in the case of an electronic one, its doing that with the solenoid running a couple wires into the cabin and mounting and hooking up the electronic controller. if you can install fog lights, you can wire an EBC and if you can change the vacumme lines on your turbo to wastegate, you can route the vacume lines for a boost controller. as for on a Z32 since its a bit mroe cramped, expect it to be a little more challenging but still fairly straight forward.

 

I have an Apex-i Super AVC-R and I love it.

Not hard to install... vacuum line from the solenoid into a "T" fitting, then to both wastegate actuators, tap into an existing vacuum line for the sensor, and connect all the wiring.

For me, the hardest part was keeping it discrete (I have the solenoid mounted to the side of the engine under a shield so that no one looking at my car would know I had it - that's how I did all my performance mods though).

Setting up thte AVC-R is pretty simple too. Nice writeup on tt.net's tech pages on installing and setting it up.

 

I also chose the Apexi and this is the pic of its parts, I got to wait till after the sun goes down and the garage cools a bit before I go out there, it's like Africa hot out there today.

Hey Zlover if you got a pic or two of locations of your install I sure would appreciate it. Did you install the scramble option? If so where did you put the button?

 

No, I don't, but it's easy to explain. There's a brass bracket on the passenger's side that bolts to the upper plenum and the engine block (it shares holes on the plenum with the two vacuum hardlines). I bent some sheet metal into a 3-sided square, screwed the solenoid into that, and bolted it to the bottom of this bracket. If you're thinking of putting it there, stop now... it's impossible to do with the engine in the car, and you can barely even see it if you know where to look for it.

I'm glad you asked. I did a writeup on tt.net... almost got FAQed. :::sigh::: My attempt to get something FAQed on tt.net gets foiled again.
(pssssssssst.... go click "vote to faq" for me if the option is still there)

Apparently some of the pics died... I have no idea why though as they're all hosted on the same site.
http://www.twinturbo.net/net/viewmsg...&msg_id=951184

... and WTF? A black AVC-R??? When did this come out?!?! I've wished mine were black for a long time now! What to trade?

 

i got it for 394$ "special edition"

 

... I paid less for mine... but I was working at Ultimate Z at the time. Employee discount FTW.

I'll probably just paint mine.

 

i still wonder how you made that drive (or how much they paid you to make that drive) all the up to streamwood blah!

 

Dude, the cost of the drive to Streamwood from the southside is part of my reason for leaving (a minor reason, as compared to my frustration with the owner, but still something I considered). Between always buying parts because I was surrounded by them, gas to get there, and bills, I had NO extra money for myself. Hell, I ended up leaving there with an $800 tab... they made it so easy for me... "if you want this part, just take it... we'll put it on your tab and you can make payments on it with your paycheck." How could I resist?

 

Well, I put it in, took the front right (passenger) fender off and put the solenoid inside the wheel well (frame) ran the hoses in front of the battery into that cutout and the wire into the main wire harness grommet. I didn't take any more pictures because I couldn't get the camera to work with the flash with my batteries being so low. The display sits nicely in the glove box. The pressure sensor hangs on the firewall behind the engine. Really looks stock unless you notice the two tee splices right near the battery for the vacuum lines. Ill test it out tomorrow when the sun's up.

 

Just out of curiosity (this is something that some people don't know they should do), did you make sure that the length of vacuum hose leading from the solenoid to each turbo is equal? If you mounted it on the passenger's side, I would suspect that you ran a shorter line to the passenger's side turbo than the driver's side, but this can cause uneven boost response which will hurt performance. (Not hard to fix, just have to add some length to the one line, just throwing it out there so you know.)

 

I didn't measure them beforehand, figuring they were about the same length stock to the front where they used to be plugged into (the hoses) but to the T-splice they are pretty close, ended up cutting about 8 inches off one line.

I'll tell you what, they tell you there is a little clicking noise, and it's true, kinda neat to know when EXACTLY you are on the boost.

I am not sure what to set my duty cycle at 30% (default) seems a bit high but I guess to know for sure i'd have to get it dyno-tuned.

I am running .85bar on A and 1.05bar on B which is about stock and then about 15.25 PSI which is good enough for me. I will be hooking up the scramble boost some other weekend but it's back to being Africa hot out there again.

Did you hook your dashboard boost gauge back up just for aesthetic reasons? Seeing as it only goes up to 14 its not really going to do a lot of good most of the time but seeing it sit at 0 or just off to the left after so many years of movement is a little unnerving.

 

I never disconnected the factory boost gauge, I just tapped into it's line for the AVC-R.

As for the duty cycle, don't worry about it... after 3 WOT pulls in succession, it'll go into a "fuzzy logic" mode where it adjusts the duty cycle by itself.

 

1. Pressure sensor
2. T-splices Vacuum lines
3. Tracking line graph display
4. Analog display
5. My electric cooling fan set up...just cause

 

you should loom the wires with electrical tape to clean it up a bit and clean that bracket lol, its rusty. other than that, lookin good

 

dont use electrical tape. get some cable sleeves or some heat shrink wrap

and hide that wire

 

idk about heat shrink wrap (you know the whole heat around wires thing to shrink it) but yeah cable sleeves are better....

 

Cosmetically the under-hood area needs work to look pretty, but I plan on doing a comprehensive rebuild or engine swap with a built engine this fall. I plan on upgrading internals, doing some machine work, all the hoses replaced, upgrade the injectors, different turbos, stuff like that. This car has 145K on the original motor and although it runs strong it has a couple oil leaks that are not worth wasting time on and I don't want to keep putting new parts on such an old engine without redoing everything (at one time) we all know its kind of a pain to work on this car.

 

I just got finished COMPLETELY revamping my entire engine (after going through my original and a Faulty JDM one.)

Feels so much better to know that my innards are forged...

 

ummmmm.... ok......