Long story short its worth the money but not worth the work.
**Before you start buy a 2.00 gasket for the oil drain (dont use silicone it will leak TRUST ME) and a metal flange gasket that goes between the inlet and exhaust side of the turbo in the v band groove, also I used some high heat red silicone for the turbo front cover and black silicone for the intake horn.
I did this install about a month ago and so far am loving it. I have yet to have my truck retuned for the wheel but with running the same tunes as before I have seen a difference. The turbo definately flows more air now and power is increased throughout the entire rpm range but I can tell my turbo definately is lighting faster. Where I have really seen this part shine is in throttle response but most of all with towing. Running on the same roads with the same load as I have done numerous times with the stock charger I needed tow haul mode I now am no longer using that unless I feel the need for the grade braking feature. For those of you who are looking for whistle this wheel definately gives you that, from 3psi and up you can hear this baby whistle at ya (even over my 35 mts and dual 6" stacks). A part I would definately recommend is a Banks or BD wastegate; I ran this wheel with my stock waste gate for a couple weeks and had the problem of it making my stock wastegate blow off prematurely (dont ya hate it when that happens :rofl ). I talked to Tim at SJD about this observation and he said that another alternative to the wastegate would be a ppe boost increase valve but neither of us have tested this idea out.
Now to the negative. The price is right for these wheels but damn does it suck to put this part in. If you have ever takin your turbo apart or have a friend that has then this will be a breeze but if you have never done it before then put aside a whole weekend to do it. One big mistake I made that ate up alot of my time was I tried to take off my front cover prior to splitting the turbo apart at the v band. There are people that can do this according to this forum but after three hours of trying to get one bolt out and numerous trips to town to borrow tools and buy wrenches to bend in numerous ways I decided to undo the band clamp and take the turbo apart there then take off the front cover. The other recommendation I would make is wait till you have to change your injectors or your cp3 to do this install. I have done both and wished I had this wheel when I did those installs cuz to install this wheel the entire valley of the block has to be cleared out. Intake, air horn, ficm, fuel lines, y-bridge, coolant lines, wastegate, and Im sure a few other things I am forgetting; which all have to be removed to do an injector pump or injectors. Also this would be a good time to put a portedx intake horn on or a ProFab intake horn if you ever plan to do one.
On this install my best friend was a magnet and 1/4" drive socket set, get one in metric with numerous extensions and a swivel joint. Most every other tool I used can be found in most everyones tool box; screw driver set, 3/8 drive socket set, metric wrench set, 3/4 combination wrench, chisels/punches, allen wrenches, pliers of different sizes and I know I am forgetting something.
I will try to get pictures up soon but if anyone has any questions send them my way and I will do my best to answer them. I would have done a write up but my install started at about 2pm drug on till 3am then started over at 6am the next morning so I wasnt really in the mood to type everything I was doing on my phone. Sorry guys
**Before you start buy a 2.00 gasket for the oil drain (dont use silicone it will leak TRUST ME) and a metal flange gasket that goes between the inlet and exhaust side of the turbo in the v band groove, also I used some high heat red silicone for the turbo front cover and black silicone for the intake horn.
I did this install about a month ago and so far am loving it. I have yet to have my truck retuned for the wheel but with running the same tunes as before I have seen a difference. The turbo definately flows more air now and power is increased throughout the entire rpm range but I can tell my turbo definately is lighting faster. Where I have really seen this part shine is in throttle response but most of all with towing. Running on the same roads with the same load as I have done numerous times with the stock charger I needed tow haul mode I now am no longer using that unless I feel the need for the grade braking feature. For those of you who are looking for whistle this wheel definately gives you that, from 3psi and up you can hear this baby whistle at ya (even over my 35 mts and dual 6" stacks). A part I would definately recommend is a Banks or BD wastegate; I ran this wheel with my stock waste gate for a couple weeks and had the problem of it making my stock wastegate blow off prematurely (dont ya hate it when that happens :rofl ). I talked to Tim at SJD about this observation and he said that another alternative to the wastegate would be a ppe boost increase valve but neither of us have tested this idea out.
Now to the negative. The price is right for these wheels but damn does it suck to put this part in. If you have ever takin your turbo apart or have a friend that has then this will be a breeze but if you have never done it before then put aside a whole weekend to do it. One big mistake I made that ate up alot of my time was I tried to take off my front cover prior to splitting the turbo apart at the v band. There are people that can do this according to this forum but after three hours of trying to get one bolt out and numerous trips to town to borrow tools and buy wrenches to bend in numerous ways I decided to undo the band clamp and take the turbo apart there then take off the front cover. The other recommendation I would make is wait till you have to change your injectors or your cp3 to do this install. I have done both and wished I had this wheel when I did those installs cuz to install this wheel the entire valley of the block has to be cleared out. Intake, air horn, ficm, fuel lines, y-bridge, coolant lines, wastegate, and Im sure a few other things I am forgetting; which all have to be removed to do an injector pump or injectors. Also this would be a good time to put a portedx intake horn on or a ProFab intake horn if you ever plan to do one.
On this install my best friend was a magnet and 1/4" drive socket set, get one in metric with numerous extensions and a swivel joint. Most every other tool I used can be found in most everyones tool box; screw driver set, 3/8 drive socket set, metric wrench set, 3/4 combination wrench, chisels/punches, allen wrenches, pliers of different sizes and I know I am forgetting something.
I will try to get pictures up soon but if anyone has any questions send them my way and I will do my best to answer them. I would have done a write up but my install started at about 2pm drug on till 3am then started over at 6am the next morning so I wasnt really in the mood to type everything I was doing on my phone. Sorry guys
