Precision-Turbonetics NX2 turbo EcoBoost build thread

[StealthStang]

If you want to the car to last, you need to get it tuned for the NX2, that Roush canned tune isn't gonna cut it.

All good an well saying that, but what exactly would be the problem as is ? Cause to be honest the car seems fine.

Definitely im going to get it tuned before i put any serious mileage on it, but id like to know from a technical standpoint what could go wrong, since these modern ECUs are very good at adapting to changes in hardware.
Its hard to trust a tuner when they main purpose is to sell you a tune yet they arent willing to provide any logical explanation as to why their tune would be safer.

Sponsored

 

[Jaymar]

All good an well saying that, but what exactly would be the problem as is ? Cause to be honest the car seems fine.

Definitely im going to get it tuned before i put any serious mileage on it, but id like to know from a technical standpoint what could go wrong, since these modern ECUs are very good at adapting to changes in hardware.
Its hard to trust a tuner when they main purpose is to sell you a tune yet they arent willing to provide any logical explanation as to why their tune would be safer.

Do a little more research into how the EcoBoost engine uses torque tables to manage the engine and you'll see why your new turbo isn't going to respond any different than the factory without a tune developed for it. These engines don't work at all like a naturally aspirated mass air motor. With regard to running an NX2 without a tune, aside from making no additional power I believe that the wastegate was designed to fit within the factory PID limits just to keep the unit safe if installed on a factory tune but I wouldn't push that limit too far. That wastegate manages the speed and output of the turbo and it is currently being controlled by an ECU that expects it to behave much differently than what it is.

 

[StealthStang]

Do a little more research into how the EcoBoost engine uses torque tables to manage the engine and you'll see why your new turbo isn't going to respond any different than the factory without a tune developed for it. These engines don't work at all like a naturally aspirated mass air motor. With regard to running an NX2 without a tune, aside from making no additional power I believe that the wastegate was designed to fit within the factory PID limits just to keep the unit safe if installed on a factory tune but I wouldn't push that limit too far. That wastegate manages the speed and output of the turbo and it is currently being controlled by an ECU that expects it to behave much differently than what it is.

Thats pretty obvious that it wont make significantly more power, and yes I know it works with a torque target. My question was how can it damage it the engine, really from all I've looked into shows that it is just a power efficiency issue, which i already mentioned.

Secondly, the NX2 wastegate and actuator are calibrated to work with the factory wastegate actuator strategy and also the the compressor shroud is ported to handle the extra air coming in when the throttle closes. Its designed to be a drop in replacement that you can basically use an an aftermarket turbo replacement and then tune for later if you want, its not some generic turbo kit.

I think if you don't know how the NX2 works...rather don't answer, Im looking more for people who know as a FACT what could go wrong and have experience with it, not guesstimates on faulty assumptions.

Granted it wont work perfect without a tune, but its generally accepted as safe, so what i want to know is if anybody has EVIDENCE to prove otherwise, if someone has a Ecoboost than went boom from running one of these on a stock tune and knows why, thats what id like to know.

 

[Jaymar]

Thats pretty obvious that it wont make significantly more power, and yes I know it works with a torque target. My question was how can it damage it the engine, really from all I've looked into shows that it is just a power efficiency issue, which i already mentioned.

Secondly, the NX2 wastegate and actuator are calibrated to work with the factory wastegate actuator strategy and also the the compressor shroud is ported to handle the extra air coming in when the throttle closes. Its designed to be a drop in replacement that you can basically use an an aftermarket turbo replacement and then tune for later if you want, its not some generic turbo kit.

I think if you don't know how the NX2 works...rather don't answer, Im looking more for people who know as a FACT what could go wrong and have experience with it, not guesstimates on faulty assumptions.

Granted it wont work perfect without a tune, but its generally accepted as safe, so what i want to know is if anybody has EVIDENCE to prove otherwise, if someone has a Ecoboost than went boom from running one of these on a stock tune and knows why, thats what id like to know.

Ok, sorry I couldn't tell you what you wanted to hear. I'm sure someone will be along shortly to confirm what you've already decided so you can keep spanking your compressor with all the surge you like.

 

[StealthStang]

Ok, sorry I couldn't tell you what you wanted to hear. I'm sure someone will be along shortly to confirm what you've already decided so you can keep spanking your compressor with all the surge you like.

Theres a difference between telling "someone what they wanted to hear" and spouting plain old boll*cks thats for sure.

And yes, theres compressor surge, again off throttle compressor surge is a non issue, JDM cars have being doing that for years, its on throttle surge thats bad, which i dont have.

But hey why believe me right ?


Theres only like thousands of videos about it.

Again, sorry if it offended you, but your information was not useful at all and you clearly have no experience with the NX2 so why are you trying to act like you do ?

If im mistaken, and you HAVE tried it on a stock tune and noticed actual issues, thats what i want to know. Im running it, it works fine the car isnt given any issues, i know its not ideal but im not convinced its going to damage anything, but hey I could be wrong, but id like a REAL reason as to why.

 

[Scootsmcgreggor]

Isn’t the bigger question why does it matter if it will damage the engine or not? You spent a bunch of money on a bigger turbo to make more power, so why then would you leave it on a tune that doesn’t make any more power? Who would do that?

 

[StealthStang]

Isn’t the bigger question why does it matter if it will damage the engine or not? You spent a bunch of money on a bigger turbo to make more power, so why then would you leave it on a tune that doesn’t make any more power? Who would do that?

Because I wanted to see how well it would work while my handheld tuner comes from overseas. All research showed that it would work fine, so i tried It and it did, and Im trying to learn more about why it works.

Secondly, it absolutely makes more power on this Roush tune, its very very noticeable, basically what its doing is its able to hit the boost at RPMs that the stock turbo wasnt able to due to flow limitations, its able to hit the ECUs limit and just stay there for much longer than it did on the stock turbo.

So yeah, my point remains, it actually works far better than I expected, so obviously, 1. the system is far more adaptable than most think, 2. The NX2 does actually work as a drop in replacement, as claimed by precision.

Is it all good ? Of course not, but like i said its about learning, many people said it wouldnt work and youd get check engine lights or it would stall etc etc, none of that proved true.
I know im not the only person that tried it, thats why id like to hear from others who did.

I think this is information that will be valuable to people in future.

 

[Jaymar]

Theres a difference between telling "someone what they wanted to hear" and spouting plain old boll*cks thats for sure.

And yes, theres compressor surge, again off throttle compressor surge is a non issue, JDM cars have being doing that for years, its on throttle surge thats bad, which i dont have.

But hey why believe me right ?


Theres only like thousands of videos about it.

Again, sorry if it offended you, but your information was not useful at all and you clearly have no experience with the NX2 so why are you trying to act like you do ?

If im mistaken, and you HAVE tried it on a stock tune and noticed actual issues, thats what i want to know. Im running it, it works fine the car isnt given any issues, i know its not ideal but im not convinced its going to damage anything, but hey I could be wrong, but id like a REAL reason as to why.

Dude, I have no reason or intent to argue with you. I have an NX2, I'm a reasonably experienced technician and I merely offered you my advice. I agreed with you that it was designed to be able to function with the parameters of the stock tune, we just disagree with how far that functionality goes. I believe that functionality covers enough to fire it up and check for basic operations before you introduce the large variable that is a tune. I encourage you to be sceptical of myself and everybody else offering advice but I'd suggest you also extend that scepticism to youtubers and people who sell you replacement turbos telling you that compressor surge has no side effects on a turbo. If you don't want my advice, you don't have to take it, I'll refund everything you paid for it.

 

[StealthStang]

Dude, I have no reason or intent to argue with you. I have an NX2, I'm a reasonably experienced technician and I merely offered you my advice. I agreed with you that it was designed to be able to function with the parameters of the stock tune, we just disagree with how far that functionality goes. I believe that functionality covers enough to fire it up and check for basic operations before you introduce the large variable that is a tune. I encourage you to be sceptical of myself and everybody else offering advice but I'd suggest you also extend that scepticism to youtubers and people who sell you replacement turbos telling you that compressor surge has no side effects on a turbo. If you don't want my advice, you don't have to take it, I'll refund everything you paid for it.

Fair enough brother, like I said i wasnt trying to offend you, its just since I got the NX2 ive had too many people who claim to know about how it works tell me absolute nonsense because when i decided to trust what i read and how the car works it proved otherwise.
Now that youve re worded what you said, I understand you better and I agree with what you say.

So basically my current stance based on my own findings is, yes the NX2 can work on the off the shelf tunes like my Roush tune ( many said it wouldnt run properly at all ).
Also, the second thing being people said it would make no extra power over stock, again I dont believe this to be true, just monitoring the boost levels on the cars own computer shows that its definately making more boost in areas it wasnt before, and it also feels more powerful.

Id dyno it to prove this, but at this point Im in agreement with you, I dont think is THAT safe to dyno an untuned car on this turbo without a better understanding of whats going on.
At least one issue, is that the car does have off throttle compressor surge, its very slight, and ive seen way more compressor surge on other cars than have since lasted 10+ years on their turbos. So is it an issue ? Maybe, maybe not id like to know for sure which is why if somebody came and told me their NX2 died from bearing failure and they had no custom tune, id believe them...but for now im a skeptic.

Why do I think this is important if im going to get the car tuned anyway ?
Well for one I asked this question I think on this forum and didnt get an answer, i searched a lot about it and got mixed answers too, so why not try it right for science right ? I didnt see how running it for a few hundred KM could be catastrophic but hey thats the game we play as DIYers.
Now I think this info is useful because in a few years time we may have many guys who need to replace a turbo on their Ecoboost Mustang, not everybody has the money to splash on an accessport, new turbo and custom tune at once. Somebody might want to replace their borked stock turbo with say a new/used NX2 and just run it for a month until they have the money to buy the tuner and get it tuned, remember even on a NX2 base map its going to still need 2~3 revisions to run perfectly anyway so whatever risk is on the stock tune is also there for the base map (it would be nice to know exactly what these risks are).

Lastly, ive heard of a few cars that had catastrophic failures running an NX2 and a custom tune, in theory that should have been safe right ? But the reality even on a good tune theres risks of engine failure from other factors such as gasket or block failure from the extra boost. Personally i think it would be interesting to know if theres more risk of the engine failing from just the risks that come with running the bigger NX2, or if theres a higher chance of failure running the NX2 on a lower boost canned tune.

 

[RubyRed15]

Oh my derp.

 

[mJolnir]

Hello,
The car works and you will be able to drive it everywhere. Your car is tuned for a 9psi wastegate actuator spring, the nx2 spring is a 15 psi one, so it will make the boost, but will also tend to overshoot the targeted boost, that will make the system close your throttle down to 50% trying to prevent it from going over the targeted boost. On my testing that made the car be slower than it was with the stock turbo.

 

[Hinzel]

it's a great way of proving that you can replace an $800 turbo with a $2400 turbo while not going any faster

 

[dausmus]

......ummm where do you get that information? Lol I dont see anyone on stock turbo making 520whp on stock turbo. Pretty sure that 500+ whp is faster than a stock turbo pushed to the max

 

[pezzar]

I decided to create this thread so that people who have already installed the PTE NX2 turbo can post information about the installation, their experience, advice for other people, questions, dyno results, datalogs, etc. Hopefully with time the information posted here will help other people interested in this turbo kit find the answers to their questions. So, feel free to post everything related to the Precision-Turbonetics NX2 turbo.

I will create the first post, as I just had the PTE NX2 kit installed on my car. The photos below show how it looks compared to the stock turbo before the installation and after it was fitted on the car.

As you can see the PTE is significantly larger than the stock turbo. The wastegate actuator is a large silver canister and the mechanic who installed the turbo told me that the spring tension is much higher compared even with the Tune+ WGA that I had on the stock unit.

Adam sent me the base tune for the new turbo and I had the opportunity to drive it for a while last night before doing the first datalog this morning. First impression is that the car pulls all the way to the red line, even with the base tune. Also I didn't feel any lag at the lower RPMs and this made me happy, because I liked the behavior of the stock turbo at the low RPM range. My only concern is that I observed a couple of boost pressure spikes, one at 27.74 psi and another one at 27.95 psi during spirited road driving. During the 3rd gear pull the boost pressure topped at 25 psi - still high, but I suppose that the revised tunes will improve this.

I will update this thread as I go through the tune revisions.

Hi
does the NX2 take the same recirc valve as the stock turbo?

 

[Jaymar]

Hi
does the NX2 take the same recirc valve as the stock turbo?

Yes, the recirc valve remains the same as it was with the stock turbo.

Sponsored