Turbo 'hybrids'

[Mr Whippy]

I keep hearing about turbo's and hybrids.

Pretty clued up what a turbo does and so on, but unsure what a hybrid really is.

I've seen some places cut back the impeller/expellers for some reason or another, but also heard of basically a blend of front/back ends from different turbo's.


I have seen JBS Auto Designs put K04 internals in a K03 body. Is that ultimately a hybrid, albeit really just a K04 in K03 clothes?

Is that quite common?



Main reason I ask is that my turbo is a K03 (wastegated, diesel app) and I'm looking at potential solutions to an easy upgrade. Would it be possible to do what JBS do and get K04 spec compressor flow/efficiency and mass flow in the turbine into a K03 body, hence being able to just continue using all the stock piping and surroundings?

Not quite sure what is possible really, but that sounds like a good solution.


Thanks for any help/advice.

Dave

[stevieturbo]

There are so many variations of turbocharger now, that you could call every single unit a hybrid.

[eliot]

The original hybrid turbo as far as I'm aware is the T34 as fitted to the original homolgation escort cosworth, known as the "big turbo". It was a T3 turbine (hot bit) with a T4 compressor (the blowy bit) hence the name T34. (I have a pair of these little turbos on my 5.7 chevy and they work great, so you can see how over specced they were for a 2L 4 pot)

Nowadays any turbo that is a combination of bits can be called a hybrid - just another name for a customised turbo.

Edited by eliot on Friday 14th March 19:29

[Mr Whippy]

Cool, that makes sense.

So is it possible in any case to uprate the internals of a turbo for efficiency and flow etc, while retaining the existing 'body'

Just curious how JBS manage to make K04 spec turbo's for performance while retaining the K03 body... unless they actually use a new body, just with compatible connections to the old manifolds etc... hmmmm...

Just a tight fit behind my engine where the turbo is. Just interested if there is a way to easily uprate what is already there/fits there...

Dave

[stevieturbo]

Obviously when you squeeze bigger components, into smaller housings, efficiency drops. But often the gains are still worth it.

This usually requires specialist machining to make sure the housings can accomodate the larger turbines/compressor wheels

[Mr Whippy]

Ah ok, so I guess to get increased performance from my housing is limited to new, very likely modified existing internals, rather than stock internals from a different model.

Sounds expensive, and therfore not so great.

That said, any rough price ideas would be handy if it's not a 'how long is a piece of string' type thing to ask

Thanks once more

Dave