So the other day I saw an ad on CL for some turbos and after several emails with no pictures or details I asked where he was located, ended up being like 30 seconds off of my way home so I stopped by. I looked at the turbos and since the guy was going to scrap them today I talked him down on his price and figured either I'll be able to use one albeit a little laggy maybe or I'll just Ebay both of them and at least make my money back

So now I have to big turbos sitting in my basement freshly degreased, both of them look to be in good condition with no shaft play at all and they spin nice, one of them has a little damage on a couple fins but it doesn't look that bad at all.

I took the numbers on one of the tags:
Cummins
Model No. T46
Serial No. 1067612
Assy. No. 3018066

And Google'd it and come up with the following from this website:
"T46 is old turbo and it was replace by HT3B , so the size is same.
This T46 is made for Cummins NT(NH)855 maximum hp 360, and turbo housing is 'single entry' style."
Turbo / CFM
HX35 / 600
HX40 / 800
T66 / 800
B1 / 900
H2E / 1000
HX50 / 1000
HX55 / 1050
HT3B / 1100
T76 / 1350
HT60 / 1400
B2 / 1500
HX60 / 1550
T88 / 1450-1750
HT4B / 1800
Big Brother / 1900
T91 / 2000
HC5A/HX82 / 2450
T100 / 2600
T105 / 2900

So I still don't have any idea as to whether my truck would be able to spool one up, despite bad lag (within reason of course, I don't want it to not spool until redline or something crazy) or whether I'm strictly looking to resell. I know some guys run them in a compound setup but I don't think I want the work entailed with that and the possibility of lifting the heads with all that boost. Here shortly I'll have access to a nice machine shop at my new college that I can use for pretty much whatever I want, so if this turbo will work I can be under the cost of a $1600 kit by a lot

I know some of you are pretty good with turbos or finding information on the net, so if someone can help me out that would be great or if you can scrounge up compressor maps for it that would be awesome too. I'm sure if I can use it I will have many more questions come that time.

And here's some pictures to give you something to look at and an idea on physical size:

 

And some more pictures:




And since I can't seem to find the sig edit in my UserCP here's my sig from other sites I'm on:


New Truck: 1989 Ford F350 XLT dually extended cab 2WD pickup. 7.3L NA diesel, ZF 5 Spd, 10.25” sterling full float, 4.11 open. 119K miles
RIP 1998 F150 V6 2wd Auto

 

You have to have 20-25 posts to have a sig.
I think....................

Nice sig though..."Bringing ugly to a whole new level" Cracks me up.

 

Ahhh, I see. That's okay with me, with all the info I've found on here I'm sure I'll hang around to get that many posts, I've got a couple thousand posts on the forum for my F150 that I'm on...just getting the hang of the diesel thing.

According to the equation I found, CFM = (CID X RPM X VE) / 3456

I have no idea what the VE of my engine is, so guessing at 85% which is probably low for a diesel but average for a gasser. I am going to pick 3500rpm as my redline too. So,
CFM = (446 X 3500 X 0.85) / 3456 = 384 CFM

Then I'll say I want a design goal of 8 psi at 3500rpm, so that puts me at around 593 CFM desired...hmmm...10 psi at 3500rpm would be 645 CFM...so I'm sure the rated CFM number I found for the turbo was a maximum, but just for curiousity's sake lets take 1100 CFM and that puts me at 27.4 psi That's gonna be too much I think, but I don't think my exhaust will be able to spool it up that high anyways (which is I think how a non-wastegated turbo works, by oversizing it).

So how do I figure out whether my exhaust will be able to spool the turbo?

 

Your turbo boost is also limited by your fuel flow, so you should be able to limit your boost that way. But actually fitting one of those things could be a problem.

 

As long as it'll spool up in a reasonable time, not looking for a racer or anything just something to add some power, I can get it to fit up. My main concern is whether it'll spool. If it will, I'll have a 3" exhaust manifold to Y/turbo flange made up and mount it on the frame rail.

 

I'm actually toying with the idea of putting a bigger compressor on my turbocharger, but info is limited, may not even be possible.

 

What do the measurements on your turbo look like compared to what you see in the pics? How much smaller is it (exhaust, etc)?

 

It appears you have a BIG turbo designed for an 18 wheeler, I found an article that stated this;

"Turbochargers : The big cam 350 and 400 engines have almost identical turbos: You can use an HT3B Holset or T-46 Cummins turbo from an N.T.C. 350 or an N.T.C. 400 engine. For 400 h.p. engines you must have at least 24 lbs. of turbo boost (manifold pressure). Purchase a manifold pressure gauge for $40 and you will know if your turbo is adequate for an N.T.C. 400. If you have an N.T.C. 290 or an N.T.C. 300 you will have to purchase a turbo for the N.T.C. 400."

If it will make 400HP on a Semi it may be a little too big for your Ford.

 

forgot, here is the site.
http://www.dieselinjection.net/BRUCE...beginning.html

 

On mine, the exhaust inlet is 2" (crossover is 2.25), the outlet is 3".

I don't remember the exact dimentions of the compressor, but I think they are very close to that of the turbine housing, 3" inlet and 2" to the intake of the engine.

 

Yeah, I saw the same article and it made me wonder. It says that if you have the 290 HP model you can use the T-46 or HT3B, so I'm only what 100 HP short of the 290?

I was definitely thinking the idea of an external wastegate to keep from overboosting. Maybe I'll ebay the one turbo and see if I make enough to get a small turbo from a Honda or Eclipse or something, I just really didn't want to hassle with a compound setup, would rather put one on there and deal with a little lag. I'm still up in the air though, it would be another month or so until I start back to college anyways to do any work on it.

 

A 290 HP Cummins big truck engine is 10 liter displacement with an RPM ceiling of 2100 RPM.
And that turbo on 290 engine would produce about 30 PSI boost.

To keep the head gaskets in a 7.3 at 30 PSI boost you are looking at internal engine mods.

7.3 = 444/2*3300/1728 = 423.9 CFM
10 = 608/2*2100/1728 = 396.4 CFM

Because of the higher RPM level, the 7.3 uses more air per minute than the larger Cummins motor does.
The boost potential of the turbo would be more than your engine could stand without being able to limit the boost.

 

So if I'm picking up what you're putting down I could use the turbo? Looks like the 7.3 is flowing more air in, so more air in means more air out, so I could spool it to it's potential...right. So then I just need to worry about wastegating it, or controlling the boost through some other way to keep it under 10 psi so I can have a happy motor.

Am I reading what you're saying right?

 

With a 7.3 you could go 15 or so on boost without to many worries.
But over 20 and you will be replacing head gaskets in very short order.

I would say it will spool, you should have plenty of flow for that.
Mounting may be a headache though.

Knowing how tight space is in the engine compartment, it will be a challenge to get it mounted and plumbed up.
Usually the turbo needs to drain down to the oil pan to return the oil.
The stock turbo dumps oil into the engine valley.
Limiting the boost reliably may be more problems.