iOnic wrote:Ello again. I'm a bit curious about the anti-surge compressor housings. Are they worth getting? Does anyone here run an anti-surge front cover that can give some opinions? Not sure if it's just a gimmick-y thing or whether they actually are worth having. I'm looking at getting a turbo and I have the option of a normal front cover and an anti-surge front cover with the latter one being ~$100 more
Ultimately depends on whether it is actually needed or not - its usually used where the surge point of the compressor is likely to be hit on a given application. What kind of grasp do you have compressor flow etc? The anti-surge ports are usually put there by manufacturers and I'd imagine the ones that came that way have a certain amount of design put into them to ensure they ensure flow from the right point of the compressor wheel as to not wreck the aerodynamic effect but still allow some of the flow to recirculate to avoid surge.
The turbo on my Skyline has a "proper" antisurge housing which isn't so much like a set of holes drilled into a "normal" compressor cover as an after thought as a set of ports that were machine into the cover to start with:
Given the fact that the slots allow a bit of air to flow back out of the compressor to the intake side there is a bit of a sacrifice to airflow, which can affect spool and peak flow slightly versus a compressor cover without surge slots - however if the combination is likely to surge then it is definitely the lesser of two evils.
Which turbo are you looking at getting, and which engine is it going on? I am assuming a 3SGTE? If so, the odds are in the US or even NZ there are plenty of people who have done similar upgrades who you can probably hunt down and read threads/ask if they have had any problems with surge and determine from that whether or not it would be needed in your instance.
Given that the slots are an added option as opposed to just being how the turbo comes, I am assuming its probably a turbo unlikely to need it so much as a new market demand for surged housings after people realised that anti-surge slots are what is responsible for the "whistle" some larger turbos (like T51R SPL, GT42RS etc) make.