Turbo LT-1

[Benjamin M Strader]

Yeah, Its true about the rpm thing....{kinda...}
You see he was talking about the difference between compressive and
inertial loads......
like take a con-rod and try to push the big and small ends closer to
each other....thats a compressive load.....now try to pull them
apart....thats what happens whrn the piston applys inertial loads....
so, if Force= Mass x Acceleration, then you can see that the inertial
loads grow exponentially with increase in rpm.....{I did the math}.
The thing is Corky forgot to warn about things like heat, and
detonation, and ring end-gaps closing up....these are real; problems
when trying to slap a turbo on an un-altered Lt-1.....thats the stuff
that'll bite ya!
> 
> >From what I hear in the responses, the GN V6
> >was built bullet proof from
> >the factory, so when you increase the boost,
> 
> It is, and it isn't.  The fillet crank is a nice feature, and there appears
> to be a lot of speculation of a slight increase of nickel content in the
> iron block, however the differences between the GN engine and the stock
> engine is not that great.  In fact, the 4.1L N/A engine has the same crank
> as the turbo 3.8L engine, so the extra "neat" parts are worth something, but
> not all that much in my opinion.  Don't forget the journals in the 3.8L
> engine are slightly smaller in diameter than the LT-1.  These are the kind
> of differences that have to be payed attention to.
> 
> As far as slapping on a turbo to your LT-1, its very doable.  In its stock
> form, there is room to expand power, however you have to keep in mind some
> "reasonable" limits.  Keep the boost down, or build more boost at lower RPMs
> and keep the RPMs down. THis depends on your driving tastes.  In general,
> RPM's are what kills motors (that and lack of maintanence), and using
> turbochargers merely lower the threshold of explosion on an identical
> engine, but below that threshold, there is much more power to be made.  I'll
> see if i can get the exact quote from my Corky Bell turbo book, but he had
> stated something to the effect that its not the boost level that kills
> motors, but the RPMs that do.  he phrased it in a very clear way, and I'd
> like to share that with you.