Turbo vs Supercharger

For those contemplating fitting a supercharger as a means of performance enhancement, whose knowledge of its operation is small, this is how a supercharger works. Put simply, supercharger is an air pump that forces air into the engine. As the power of an engine is dependent upon the volume of air that can be fueled and burnt in the cylinders, supercharging is a vastly superior method of induction than allowing the engine to suck its fill of air, as even with the most efficient engine it will not suck enough to fill the cylinders. A supercharger is similar to turbocharger insofar as it acts as an air pump; the crucial difference being a supercharger is a mechanically driven pump whereas the turbocharger uses the power of hot exhaust gases to power the pump.

Why a supercharger rather than a turbocharger? Turbochargers are inherently more difficult to control due to the tremendously high temperatures they generate and the way they produce a dramatic rise in air pressure, resulting in instantaneous large horsepower increases. Although this may sound ideal it usually results in uncontrollable wheel spin and loss of handling to the point of making driving dangerous, forcing the driver to back off and losing the benefits of all this power, always assuming he's still on the road. All these problems of a turbocharger can be tamed to a certain extent but it involves much extra technology and cost.

Turbo pluses

Only one, where max boost / max power is required in full race, track application, where other considerations can be rejected, e.g. cost to build and develop, life expectancy etc.

Turbo minuses

-much higher boost pressure is needed in a turbo for the same bhp due to pressurized air being much hotter, due to conduction from red hot exhaust manifold.
-much more complex management needed in a turbo, to control fueling and ignition due instantaneous rise of boost pressure.
-higher pressures and temperatures encouraging detonation, turbo is the big engine destroyer.
-more intercooling needed to cool inlet air.
-much higher under bonnet temperature making everything hotter and so reducing power.
-much higher incidents of fire due to red hot turbo and manifold.
-compromise exhaust manifold and system function due to restriction of turbo not letting the gas flow freely.

Basically all the things the turbo is bad at the supercharger is good at.
Article by Richard Dobson. Read more on tuninglinx.com