Sebring supercharger manual

Also, you will need to remove the strut tower bar and its mounts. Finally, there is a vaccum hose that needs to be run from the nipple on the intake elbow to a like one on the supercharger.

Without this in place, idle will be very rough. I purchased a used Sebring blower kit, using the Miata. This was a late '94 kit with 37K miles, the early blower drive which requires an adapter pulley on the crankshaft and a complex set of rubber hoses to connect the throttle body to the air flow sensor. I had the blower upgraded to the new drive system and "S" ported by Magnuson Products. Moss supplied new idlers, brackets, etc. It took me about four hours to install, and another 2 hours each for the MSD and boost gauge.

I love this thing. It makes the car a whole lot faster, but it's manners remain impeccable. Great power from idle on up to the redline, and the wail from the blower is just intoxicating. My '90 had K miles when I installed the blower. I see no indication that it has overstressed the motor in any way. Thanks, Doug!! This is a followup to my review of about a year ago. Since then I have received several "have you had any problems yet"-type e-mails.

No problems whatever I get 7lbs of boost day in, day out. And the car is still very easy to live with. But it's a whole lot more exciting to drive! My experience with the Sebring blower on my Miata K miles continues to be very satisfactory, overall. I simply never get tired of driving this car. Day-to-day driveability and reliability remains outstanding. There have been a few minor issues since the last update. No adjustments have been needed in over a year.

And I had chronic wear problems with the belt tensioning pulleys.. Hector from R Speed suggested replacing them with the tensioning pulleys used on the timing belt. They are the same size, are made of stainless steel and are very durable.

These have been on the car for about a year with virtually no signs of wear. I remain a very satisfied customer. JR Sebring Supercharger for 1. Just read through the instructions before install to see if there were any tricky parts. Had to read the section on the power steering adjustment relocations two to three times. Would be nice to know what parts are reused for the install. You can put the belt on the pulley of the supercharger as you are mounting it to the side of the motor! Pivot the nose of supercharger on the front bolt as you feed the belt over the pulley, that's it.

I had gotten to the step to install the supercharger to the side of the motor when I noticed that the back bracket that bolts onto the exhaust manifold was missing from the kit. The hose connectors that hooked up the cross over pipe to the dummy throttle body did not want to stretch around the big lip on it. I am not exaggerating; it took me over two hours to get it on.

I then cut the outer sheath so that the hose could stretch wide enough. It 's on there, but the cross over tube does not line up when I tried to hook up to the supercharger side. Hoping to get 60 extra horsepower, but most likely at 40 to 45 HP.

No need for new clutch, granted I only have a hundred miles so far but it locks up like it did before the install. Need to have a parts sheet to look over at the beginning instead of looking through out the page manual. The only timing runs I have done are from 50 to 70 in third gear on the same stretch of road.

I have a base '95 with miles. Average was 6. Next I put the exhaust on, header and free flow cat. I fail to see why these numbers are not better. Finally the supercharger was installed. Average was 5. I have gained 1. When the finances come back to life, I will get new spark plug wires, cooler spark plugs gapped at. Love it! Had it professionally installed because I don't let amateurs work on my cars - especially me!

Slight problem with one of the rubber hose connections on the "big air tube" - popped off on the first test drive so they replaced it with a much longer one that would stay clamped. The first MSD kit was defective but, Moss was great about sending out another one right away.

Reading others comments, I'm tempted to play with the timing a little. I live in Georgia so, I can get real 93 octane gas everywhere. I'm also being very careful with my clutch since, I'm now out of money and need a "recovery period" before I can consider a beefier clutch.

When I first drove the Miata I thought, nice little car but, no power. Now that I have fully redressed that problem, I'm having a ball with it! Power is adequate.

After more than a year of use, no problems. Truly an install and forget item. Among all the stuff I have put on the car, this is the one I am happiest with. The Kit came on a Friday after noon so me and my dad decited to put it on over the week end. Only thing notably difficult was scraping old gaskets off the throttle body spent over 3 hours on that alone. Other then that we probly would have made it in the 4 hour est time.

The car now has a nice whining sound under full throttle very noticable above 4,rpm's. Miata now seem to have the needed power it was intened for. Stock wheels will spin all day long and you can easily beat any 6 cylinder and give all v8's a run for there money. I found I can now take newer mustangs 95 up.

For the money it is worth it it really brings out the life in the little car. Now if they would just offer a Intercooler I would be happy. Bolt-on supercharger for 1. Rep, Jim Goodroe sp? Kit arrived well packed and complete - no missing parts! The actual install was not very difficult I do not have any formal mechanic training but am reasonable handy with a wrench. The most difficult part of the installation for me was the necessity to bend two of the brake lines that originated from the master cylinder out of the way.

I wrapped the jaws of a spanner with masking tape and gently bent the lines out of harm's way. Another difficult task was the installation of the drive belt. I found that even with the poer steering pump adjusted as far as possible the belt was a tight fit. And finally I was a bit confused and concerned about the removal of the heat shield from the exhaust manifold. I could not determine from the installation instructions if it should be replaced.

I have left it off for now. The Miata featured in this note is a This is the second Miata that I have owned. The first was I that I foolishly traded only to regret.

Thus the second. I have also owned a S and a Cab. Both are sadly gone word of warning - don't own a Porsche in a one dealer town. I now drive a Acura NSX and feel much more financially secure. The kit was installed in a 1. Ia have also installed a Borla exhaust. Factory HP - I was told that I could expect about HP.

Torque figures were not available Remember that acceleration is most directly related to trrque not HP! I have not timed any acceleration runs but claims of 0 - 60 MPH in less that 7 sec are probably true. With the combination of the Borla Exhaust and the supercharger the engine easily revs to the redline. Thrust is most noticeable over RPM. Engagement of the unit is seemless The unit has a feature which bypasses the supercharger at times of minimal load - idle or constant speed There is even a noticeable sensation of boost in 5th gear when above RPM.

I have heard a number of people concerned about the longevity of the clutch on th 1. So far about kms have passed and no problems. All in all I have benn quite pleased so far. Although no match for my NSX the result is that the Miata is much more fun to drive Several weeks ago a brief review was posted regarding my preliminary experience with the Sebring Supercharger as installed on my 1.

At the urging of several of my Miata friends and in response to several E-mail messages I received I thought that I would add the following comments. Status: After about kms all is well. Stock clutch seems to be doing well and the Supercharger has performed flawlessly. No surprises yet!

Performance: At the time of inital installation I did not have a timing light nor access to 93 octane gasoline as recommended so I dumped a bottle of octane boost into the tank. As well I am using 92 octane as I have not been able to find I do have the seat of the pants feeling that the car is not as quick as when running the octane boost and slightly more advanced timing. I have therefor ordered a MSD ignition control unit.

The Miata Magazine article indicated that significant low RPM performance gains could be had by advancing the timing so I am hopeful. A point of concern however. As best as I could understand restarting a hot motor could prove to be difficult. It was stressed that this had only happened in a few cases but the cause was still under investigation. Instead they would try to help sort out the problem. I must say that I was a little taken aback. I will however keep you posted. Now on to the promotional war.

In the Sebring Supercharger ad from the Miata Magazine it is claimed that the kit for the 1. If these figures are assumed to be true then then perhaps the following is true: if the 1.

I assume that these figures are for HP at the crank which is more than the HP produced at the wheels. Also as noted before HP figures are less relevant than torgue when speaking about acceleration I guess that it makes for better advertizing copy to speak about horse power rather than foot-pounds of torque.

To further cloud the issue I refer you to the claims of several other manufactures. The BBR turbo kit claims about 5. I am somewhat confused by the figures provided by Bell Engineering regarding their supercharger.

They claim 8 lb of boost with a peak HP of and times of 5. These values are quite far off the claims of Sebring. Are you confused? As a comparision I will refer to three excellent Honda products that I have had an opportunity to drive.

The performance figures are supplied by Honda and therefore may be on the conservative side. From my own experience the Sebring Miata is noticeably quicker than the Integra and somewhat quicker than the Prelude. Although I have not had the stopwatch in hand I would agree with a time in the mid 6 second range for the Sebring Miata. I do have some trouble believing the HP figures of for the 1. I suspect the true HP lies somewhere between the claims of Sebring and Bell.

As far as Bell's performance claims I am somewhat skeptical as well. They are claiming acceleration figures that are approaching those of my NSX. If their numbers are true I would trade-in my Sebring in a moment, but As a point of interest I did contact Mr. Michael Hewitt, senior sales engineer, at Eaton Corporation. His concerns were that at the higher ranges of performance, temperature and detonation concerns would become more significant. All that is needed would be a larger crank pulley, a slightly smaller supercharger pulley, a modified belt roller kit to move the belt's path away from obstructions around engine, perhaps an intercooler, and ignition controller.

Sebring are you there? So in summary, the Sebring unit may not live up to its performance claims but it is less expensive than its competitors and compared to a stock Miata is does provide a good kick in the pants. First thing in the morning it usually takes about two attempts to start the car. As long as I completely turn off the ignition between the attempts there has been no problem in starting - relief!! I have been able to advance the timing to 14 degrees BTDC and have not had any problems with pinging.

I suspect that I may be able to advance the timing a little bit more. The car feels a little stronger a low RPMS. A roots type positive displacement belt driven supercarger with fuel and ignition management. The only trip I made to the hardware store was for more tie wraps. Every possible nut, bolt and screw needed for the installation was in the kit and plainily labeled.

It does not have a "hot rod" feel to it, the power is seamless and just feels like a bigger engine. Spent about a good day under the hood. EASY to put in, just takes time to bolt everything together. Worth it for any forced induction plan. I've run the Sebring unit on my '91 1. Not to say the Sebring unit isn't top notch or doesn't deliver what it's supposed to, it's a great kit and the guys at Downing are tops in customer service.

After following all the general maintenance requirements for the Sebring unit I got pinging even with the MSD Boost unit. This dilema occurred usually in third gear at full throttle. After going near insane I resorted to running octane booster in the tank and that seems to solve the problem of the pinging. The Miata Magazine has a trouble shooting page and last issue spring '96 had a couple of people complaining about pinging on their bone stock Miata's.

Curiously they were all '91's and lived in the san francisco, bay area. Yes, a NEW gas area. I was intrigued and e-mailed several Miata. These members were in NEW gas areas..

CA and TX. Miata Magazine states that the 1. They run a bit richer. So that leaves us 1. And so far, no one carries a computer upgrade or can reprogram our chips to run richer california smog rules apply. How to fix it? Quick fix Permanent fix Little less expensive would be to buy the Brainstorm "parking light" induction units which feed cooler air into the engine compartment and the filter I came up with the cooler air idea running around with my lights up and found the temp gauage dropping and the pinging quiting down a bit.

I'm personally working on a intercooler system for the Sebring unit Sebring Supercharger for pre Miatas in CA reformulated gas areas.

Spent a day working out bugs and I think I've got a cure. With the MSD unit.. Maybe 10 in the winter, 8 in the summer. I tried octane at 12 degrees.. So no go at So 10's probably pushing it. Extra safety bits So a hotspot that could raise the temp by 30 degrees.

Brainstorm makes a "parking light" intake unit that feels colder air into the engine bay. Another good idea, the Miata mag states that ambient outside air temps are the same at filter level. Heck, I bought it. Before: Miata 1. Other mods are Turbo Tuff cat back muffler and high end plugs and plug leads. All parts excellent quality, instructions could be better but with some car knowledge, no problem.

The belt was really hard to get onto the supercharger pulley. Bought a long 21 metric socket wrench with Waynes advice to turn engine over and turned out to be very simple after all. Kit did not clearly state which of the different length generic hose pieces to apply where and I used the incorrect length between the air intake and the mass air flow meter.

Took 20 minutes to change with the left hand cross over pipe hose at the dummy throttle body. Otherwise everything went fine. Started first time. A post installation problem did occur though.

The car overheated on my first test drive. I limped back home and called Wayne. Recomended I try a new thermostat. Sent me one ASAP. Tryed this one, still a problem. I then posted the problem on miata. After installing the new thermostat, the lost coolant fluid must be re-added directly into the radiator with the car running, not back into the resorvoir.

This rectifies the depressurized area from the upper radiator to the thermostat. No problem. Car runs perfectly again. So if I can offer these words of advice to anyone before installation. Check miata. They do help. This product is a must buy for anyone wanting to turn their Miata into a quality, reliable performance car. Not a highly modified race tuned, constanly checked for oil leaks over powered monster.

The car is awesome. Not an easy thing to calibrate. The car idles as before, a quality I have rarely been able to say for my previously modified VW golfs cams, throttle bodies etc. The drivability has improved!. Torque is crazy.

Drop car in third gear up a hill, put foot flat and car pulls as it did before in second. High end is dangerous. With correct outside temperature and octane boost in the tank, I did a best ever without gear crash or bad wheel spin of 6. This was measured with a accelerometer from Germany which claims to be 0. On a hot day, expect close to a 0. Final trick. Bought from Chrysler for 20 bucks! Looks great. Well worth it. Before my forced induction upgrade I had an Akimoto Ram air intake and a home made cold air induction system which I described on the list server a few months ago.

After installing the SuperCharger I realized that a huge restriction to the system was the small air intake and it did'nt tak eme long to modify and fit my two afetr market air induction devices. The Akimoto went on with the following modifications:. Akimoto I removed the front most steel flange from the drivers side wheel arch. With a steel saw and a lot of pulling and bending I shortened the hose between the mass air meter and the aluminium elbow from Sebring by half an inch.

This used to go into a nipple on the back of the Sebring Air Filter I fitted everything carefully and placed padding and shock proofing all around the mass air meter to prevent banging on the wheel arch. Pretty tight fit but no real problem Air induction system I bolted the aluminium funnel on the bottom of the driver side wheel well facing forwards.

The flex ducting was routed across the left hand wheel well and up into the engine bay, back across toward the underside of the Akimoto. Aluminium ducting was placed over the plastic ducting where it ventured past the exhaust manifold to prevent excess heat.

The ducting mouth was then fitted with a smaller cone shaped aluminium air conditioning piece and points directly under the Akimoto. Results: Huge tourque increase at low-mid rpm range Minor gain at high rpm. Car "wakes up quicker" ie. The seat feeling you get on cold mornings when the car has a virtual power band. We all know the feeling. NOTE: For all you guys concerned with water and muck getting up the tubing, the tube is vertical for almost half a yard and has a steep incline for a full yard.

No water, even in a full puddle gets anywhere near the element. As for muck, place a tight wire mesh guaze over the mouth of both ends of the system. Timed mph on Gyroscopic Potenciometer 0.

Installation time was reported to be around 8 hours, better plan a good full day. Kit went in pretty much as expected. Disassembly of old parts was very simple and quickly accomplished. Biggest problem was fitting of pieces on the intake tract alum. Takes some woring the parts in a tight area but it all does fit. Looks very factory once installed. Instructions are typical of other kits I've installed, they all leave something to be desired.

Biggest complaint, is Fig. This is a great drawing of the existing Miata intake tract, but nothing is labeled. This would be very helpful to a novice to identify the parts he will be re-using. Some mechanical ability is a real asset, but given time, any novice could install. Kit worked as advertised. Power isn't crazy but a subtle boot in the pants. Make sure you check every hose clamp at least twice. When one of these comes loose the car will not run. Attention to lubricating this contact point seems to stop the wear.

Some, including me, have found it necessary to modify the actuator rod to prevent its pushing through the lever-arm. The timing specified for 92 and 93 octane gasoline is 6 and 8 degrees, respectively. This is necessary, primarily, to prevent pre-detonation with California fuels. Increasing the timing to the stock 10 degree setting or as high as 14 degrees improves power substantially at lower RPM's.

If the timing is advanced or your Miata has a marginal factory fuel pump, a high-capacity in-tank fuel pump is offered. It is a direct replacement for the existing pump.

Improvements are available to the original compact, Jackson Racing air filter. A denser, higher-flow foam is now used with molded end-seals. This is still the Indy-approved design. The new units also use a two-bolt cover, which is easier for servicing the filter element than the earlier 4-bolt designs. Philip Airey discovered that the idle air hose connection provided a constant leak of boosted air. Since the improvement has not been uniform among Sebring users and inconsistent in their own testing, Sebring is not yet providing this feature with their new units.

The combination of being an early "pioneer" user of the Sebring unit, having an inordinate number of the potential supercharger problems, being an engineer, and basically "anal retentive" has provided me with a lot of supercharger modification experiences! In a chronological sequence, they were:. I was unable to get good initial alignment of the supercharger belt in the idler pulley.

This resulted in excessive belt wear and "dusting". A belt actually broke during a rally at Gold Rush, and I mightily impressed Frank Murphy, my navigator, by replacing it without loosing significant time in the rally!

It helped that the failure occurred during a free-time period. Replacement of the SC bracket improved things somewhat; the double idler pulley modification helped a little more; and replacing my timing belt at 60, miles helped even more. The belt no longer rubs against the flange of the pulleys, but is not exactly centered. See, I am AR! Belt wear did stop. I do run with less belt tension than specified - 50 pounds rather than 90 pounds.

The belt length has to be chosen to avoid rubbing between them. Also, considerable bending and grinding of the PS hose bracket was necessary, to avoid rubbing on the 4-ribbed belt. I installed the aluminum elbow for appearance reasons, as well as chrome plating the cross-over pipe. I had much trouble with whistling of the fuel pressure regulator. A replacement auxilliary fuel pressure regulator stopped the noise for a period.

Then I experienced surging on wide open throttle acceleration. Much testing and experimentation with fuel pressures, diaphragms, and a gain controller didn't help. Finally Norm Garrett guessed I was getting a vacuum in my fuel return line, which produced a pulsing of the fuel pressure regulator. Putting a notch in the valve seat created a slight leak on closure and stopped the vacuum and hence the pulsation. Eventually, Norm designed a new auxiliary fuel pressure regulator, which I bought and installed, and that has been extremely successful.

An added bonus is the beautiful appearance of the new AFPR. Two by-pass actuator brackets broke due to fatigue failure. I have had no further problems since going to the light-weight plastic housing and placing a stiffener under the heads of the capscrews. The plastic design has a poor stop on the actuator shaft and I had to epoxy a washer on it, to maintain its position in the by-pass valve's lever-hole.

Maintaining some grease on the bearing surface seems to have arrested the wear on the lever-arm hole.