- Joined
- Dec 18, 2024
- Messages
- 11
Alright lads as promised here's my SUPERCORE 2.5inch intercooler write up.
What's involved, how it went, what happened etc.
If there are any questions more photos needed etc please pm me or ask in the post and let me know I'm happy to share my build and any info needed or help with your own install!
I want to start this out with one thing, I have NO cradle spacers NO hood spacers NO anything special and it clears fine. i have the extra stuff here so I tried the l67 tb on my Gen 5 car and the northstar, both cleared without issue. I also tried this on normal dogbones and my shorter dogbones and still cleared perfectly fine l67 tb and northstar.
Now to begin I'm in the military and ocd is honestly a part of life here lol. So the first thing I do with any auto work is i lay everything out.on a table to see, view, and check for anything and know what all I have. I am not dogging ZZP at any way shape or form. My car is practically sponsored by these guys and I don't plan to stop truthfully. I had a hard time finding any forum discussion or layed out video that fully shows or explains the install and what's involved properly. Hence the post.
So for starters I started with in my eyes the more complicated parts I wanted to Install the core first. This was simple intake tube out of the way, wiring and pulling the supercharger is often found d online for swapping to the gen 5 kit a gentleman who runs a youtube channel called 3800 daily has a great video on the gen 5 swap itself. I had to get more involved as I was replacing intake gaskets regardless. I chose not to use the warlock gaskets the kit comes with. The few things I have seen about the kits wether full stack short stack or whatever claim these gaskets are a complication and I didn't want to run into it down the road. Personally I have had 0 issues with these gaskets before and the military uses them also without issue so that is more personal preference. What I opted to do was run the higher end aluminum intake manifold gaskets and the gen 5 aluminum supercharger gaskets I used rtv between the manifold and core and core and super both for added assurance, light 1/16" bead along needed points. The install of the super is fairly basic as well and nothing major changes here from normal.
FUEL RAILS.
lads. Let me tell you, I am not proud to admit how hard these were for me to install more due to me simply overthinking the install process and not just installing the dang things. They are easily labeled clearly. They only go on one way. I still managed to complicate this part. Once I finally had the injectors swapped over (common sense says buy new o rings for all of your injectors here at this time, good maintenance moment). I mounted the rails and began to assess my fuel lines. The rear rail had to be tweaked here the mounting tabs that are on them are correct but the tabs need bent a small amount to reach each stud and correctly seat. This isn't major just a bit of tweaking. The fuel regulator on our series 2 cars has to be swapped over to the new system that comes with the setup also. I opted to purchase a brand new oem at the time which is a simple clip style requiring a special clip tool to remove and install. The hardest part of the rails is the plastic lines that are used for the factory rails. These boys are longer and are not happy to flex at all. I managed to reroute the inlet line to work and mount to the regulator without troubles, the return side on the other hand was a absolute pain. More due to me not having alot of experience with the nylon/plastic lines. I ended up trimming this line and running a fuel line from the hard line point up to the regulator piece as well but the inlet side was usable. The AN lines are self explanatory the longer line runs from the front rail on the accessory side under the snout and around to the regulator. The other line goes over the inlet and is a very tight fit but usable for sure, it could use another 1/2" or 1" for easier fitment but it can be worked around and used fine. Vacuum lines are roughly simple you just run from boost solenoid to under the snout, after the snout so much then a t for the fuel regulator and the map sensor. Simple just rerouted.
At this point I rerouted and installed my harness spark plug wires etc to get everything hooked up and if needed I could drive as is until I finish this project. I do not have the slimmer vacuum t at the top of the super and was on a l67 throttle body on the gen 5 at the time again with 0 fitment issues! Car started and did what I needed for the day then continued the next day.
INTERCOOLER INSTALL
The 40k transcooler I had installed a month or so ago and I'm more then happy to share that install as well and how that went but I tucked it as high up as I could so I had clearance for the intercooler to mount later on. Ironicallythe bottom of my 40k I had mounted down where the front bumper bolts to the crash bar section on our regals you have 2 clips on the bottom of the bar that hold the bumper in basically above the fog lights but under the grill. I used these 2 clip points to mount my 2 lower transcooler tab mounts to for bracing purposes not just mounted on the top side. Turns out these same 2 clip points are where your intercooler mounts. I used the little nut and bolt grabber tool from harbor freight to shimmy the bolts down into the 2 holes for the intercooler. I held this up with my knees sort of and installed the nuts for the cooler all again provided by zzp. These style nuts will tighten up once tension is on them so I didn't even end up using a tool to hold the bolt head just a bit of pressure from the intercooler. The rear of the intercooler has a 3rd tab for the hood latch. I will state personally after mounting my 2 bolts and tightening them I saw no reason for the third mount bolt. As I tightened my cooler in on the first 2 is slightly leaned on that tab against the hood latch bracket and it is VERY secure. It is not even remotely wobbly or loose.
HOSE ROUTING
As far as hoses go I tried multiple routing options that seemed correct, the final pictures I have here are the only routing that was usable and made the most sense even though the belt placement around it gives me mini heart attacks when I look at it lol.i actually have the provided zip ties in strategic placement to more or less pull the hoses either direction needed to sort of "loop" the hoses through and clear the belts. I ran the pump to the bottom intercooler spot. The top intercooler spot to the core itself. Finally the other core side to the pump all between the washer reservoir and battery in the fender. I did add a small pit of foam tape to the fender where the hoses run through so the hoses aren't cut or rubbing badly against the fender sheet metal.
PUMP AND ITS WIRING
The pump comes with a mount and the included zzp paper includes what metal needs removed at your core support section to make this work. Realistically if you go from your most front point of the curve of the metal and go 3 to 3.5 inches back and cut it out the pump has more then enough to mount to and still clear as needed. The pump comes with a plug similar in looks and clip to the injectors with roughly 10 inches of wiring. The paper that does come with the kit claims to ground this pump up near the fuse box on the firewall and a vampire clip is provided to tap into a pink key on wire on the back of the fuse box. I personally hate the vampire clips and refuse to use them so I waited on this till later after the hoses were mounted. Later on after I mounted these hoses I realized I can not mount my fog light due to clearance on the passenger side. Neither of my fog lights have worked for the entire time owning this car and I've never honestly cared to investigate it past the bulbs that immediately blew when installed. Just so happens these fog lights run a 2 wire system simar to the pump, it's even better once I realized the pump can now be ran on a toggle switch style(not saying it's ever off but if for whatever reason I need it off I can now) and the wiring is long enough to perfectly work for this. 2 shrink tubes and solder later I have a working pump. I will add here the coolant info as I decided since I still run the dexcool in the car I chose green coolant for my intercooler side. Neither mix but I can now see which system is leaking by the color if it ever happens instead of looking through double the systems for the leaks.
GEN 5 ISSUES
Ok so this part was random issues I came across during this install as I did the northstar swap at the same time. First and foremost I ordered the northstar kit at the same time. I have 0 issues as is but I wanted to do the swap at the same time. I have the gen 5 swap done again following many guys on here and forums with great success. The only thing I couldn't find well was the evap purge solenoid I saw mixed answers through out the research I did. I ended up using the gen 5 evap solenoid and haven't had any issues, on the l67 throttle body I drilled/tapped the brass plug on the bottom of the throttle body. This is where I ran a bung and hose to the gen 5 port near the pcv spot. The car ran fine this way. For the northstar though the linkage will contact this solenoid. Here's where it got fun. So at first I considered blocking this solenoid off, maybe tapping it and running a hose over to relocate it. Not sure I finally decided to flip the north star upside down and see how it acts? Let me tell you it actually mounts upside down and it all worked out. I added a picture for possible fix to this issue and to run a hose from this bung over to the evap solenoid elsewhere for more room.
BELT ISSUES
I run a 3.4 pulley on my Gen 5. I had a major issue where this setup wouldn't take a belt at all. The zzp guide called for a 685 belt for this swap on a 3.4 pulley. Let me tell you a 695 is what I have and even it was super tight but it worked. I'd recommend a 700 belt for this or if you want a super tight fit the 695 also. Regardless the belt was hitting my ICM. Not the bracket it mounts too but the actual icm it's plate and coils. The bracket the icm plate mounts to is actually cut out perfectly from the factory to clearance itself it's the plate and icm that hit. I ended up removing the bracket and it's bolts for the icm plate getting longer bolts and adding a 10 washers to each bolt to space the icm off the bracket and clear the belt. roughly 10 to 12 washers is enough to space the icm off the bracket enough to clear the belt and not cause issues. You can do the washers like me or measure that many and make a spacer for it also. Other then spacing the ICM and finding a 695 or 700 belt i had 0 issues here. The spacing did not affect the plug wires, icm connector etc. All worked same still.
NORTHSTAR UPSIDE DOWN
So this i found very little info on, nothing about linkage, the connections nothing. That is where I had to get creative here. Zzp makes a great northstar/lq4 swap kit, it had everything and worked great. No complaints what so ever. When the throttle body is flipped it definately makes a difference in clearance (not that it mattered for me I already cleared!) But for others it benefits to look into. So at the strut top you have a clip that mounts and holds the 2 cables for the throttle bodies. This clip is undid to give me enough to install them both then once I moved it where needed I proceeded to receipt them in a new spot to hold them down. The end of the throttle pedal cable is not the same style as a northstar. I saw people will cut the cable and make a barrel style work etc. That wasn't my plan. So if you actually press the factory line barrel in it does fit and work as designed it's a bit crooked in there but it works perfectly fine. I needed a longer hose to run from the gen 5 around to the spot on the northstar throttle body also. The only issue this arose for me at all was the IAC valve. The connector for it is roughly 4 or 5 inches short I ended up soldering a extension into this connector so I could run it over and plug it in correctly. This was my only issue this IAC valve connector and the line itself. Everything else was direct swap. Mind you the IAC plug is the same on the l67 and n* throttle bodies ZZP does not do anything with this plug. They don't have too though if you don't run the evap purge solenoid or the gen 5 one you clear the northstar the correct way god intended this thing to go on and don't have this issue.
CLEARANCE
To operate this and to mount my bumper in removed the fog lights. ( you can mount this kit and install the fog lights also if you "clock" the pump and go around it.) Personally I never use the fog lights so I never cared to remove them that is a personal preference.
I had to trim the bottom of my bumper to also clear the pump to cooler hose due to the mounting I did again you can "clock" the pump and work around that also.
The 2 clip tab points I discussed earlier the bumper used but then the intercooler uses i removed flush with the bumper. They are not usable and honestly I have not noticed a difference in the flex or issue of the bumper not having these clips.
I think the only thing else removed was the little corner air dam pieces that are on each side roughly 2 or 3 clips hold them on and the soft felt thing that is on each end of the radiator was removed also.
And there you have it ladies and gentleman. A northstar and supercore 2.5inch intercooler install write up and if have pictures to look through also I took during the install. I can add more pictures or explains more as needed wether on here or a pm regardless. Thanks for reading and hope this helps anyone
looking to go big on the 3800 platform.
What's involved, how it went, what happened etc.
If there are any questions more photos needed etc please pm me or ask in the post and let me know I'm happy to share my build and any info needed or help with your own install!
I want to start this out with one thing, I have NO cradle spacers NO hood spacers NO anything special and it clears fine. i have the extra stuff here so I tried the l67 tb on my Gen 5 car and the northstar, both cleared without issue. I also tried this on normal dogbones and my shorter dogbones and still cleared perfectly fine l67 tb and northstar.
Now to begin I'm in the military and ocd is honestly a part of life here lol. So the first thing I do with any auto work is i lay everything out.on a table to see, view, and check for anything and know what all I have. I am not dogging ZZP at any way shape or form. My car is practically sponsored by these guys and I don't plan to stop truthfully. I had a hard time finding any forum discussion or layed out video that fully shows or explains the install and what's involved properly. Hence the post.
So for starters I started with in my eyes the more complicated parts I wanted to Install the core first. This was simple intake tube out of the way, wiring and pulling the supercharger is often found d online for swapping to the gen 5 kit a gentleman who runs a youtube channel called 3800 daily has a great video on the gen 5 swap itself. I had to get more involved as I was replacing intake gaskets regardless. I chose not to use the warlock gaskets the kit comes with. The few things I have seen about the kits wether full stack short stack or whatever claim these gaskets are a complication and I didn't want to run into it down the road. Personally I have had 0 issues with these gaskets before and the military uses them also without issue so that is more personal preference. What I opted to do was run the higher end aluminum intake manifold gaskets and the gen 5 aluminum supercharger gaskets I used rtv between the manifold and core and core and super both for added assurance, light 1/16" bead along needed points. The install of the super is fairly basic as well and nothing major changes here from normal.
FUEL RAILS.
lads. Let me tell you, I am not proud to admit how hard these were for me to install more due to me simply overthinking the install process and not just installing the dang things. They are easily labeled clearly. They only go on one way. I still managed to complicate this part. Once I finally had the injectors swapped over (common sense says buy new o rings for all of your injectors here at this time, good maintenance moment). I mounted the rails and began to assess my fuel lines. The rear rail had to be tweaked here the mounting tabs that are on them are correct but the tabs need bent a small amount to reach each stud and correctly seat. This isn't major just a bit of tweaking. The fuel regulator on our series 2 cars has to be swapped over to the new system that comes with the setup also. I opted to purchase a brand new oem at the time which is a simple clip style requiring a special clip tool to remove and install. The hardest part of the rails is the plastic lines that are used for the factory rails. These boys are longer and are not happy to flex at all. I managed to reroute the inlet line to work and mount to the regulator without troubles, the return side on the other hand was a absolute pain. More due to me not having alot of experience with the nylon/plastic lines. I ended up trimming this line and running a fuel line from the hard line point up to the regulator piece as well but the inlet side was usable. The AN lines are self explanatory the longer line runs from the front rail on the accessory side under the snout and around to the regulator. The other line goes over the inlet and is a very tight fit but usable for sure, it could use another 1/2" or 1" for easier fitment but it can be worked around and used fine. Vacuum lines are roughly simple you just run from boost solenoid to under the snout, after the snout so much then a t for the fuel regulator and the map sensor. Simple just rerouted.
At this point I rerouted and installed my harness spark plug wires etc to get everything hooked up and if needed I could drive as is until I finish this project. I do not have the slimmer vacuum t at the top of the super and was on a l67 throttle body on the gen 5 at the time again with 0 fitment issues! Car started and did what I needed for the day then continued the next day.
INTERCOOLER INSTALL
The 40k transcooler I had installed a month or so ago and I'm more then happy to share that install as well and how that went but I tucked it as high up as I could so I had clearance for the intercooler to mount later on. Ironicallythe bottom of my 40k I had mounted down where the front bumper bolts to the crash bar section on our regals you have 2 clips on the bottom of the bar that hold the bumper in basically above the fog lights but under the grill. I used these 2 clip points to mount my 2 lower transcooler tab mounts to for bracing purposes not just mounted on the top side. Turns out these same 2 clip points are where your intercooler mounts. I used the little nut and bolt grabber tool from harbor freight to shimmy the bolts down into the 2 holes for the intercooler. I held this up with my knees sort of and installed the nuts for the cooler all again provided by zzp. These style nuts will tighten up once tension is on them so I didn't even end up using a tool to hold the bolt head just a bit of pressure from the intercooler. The rear of the intercooler has a 3rd tab for the hood latch. I will state personally after mounting my 2 bolts and tightening them I saw no reason for the third mount bolt. As I tightened my cooler in on the first 2 is slightly leaned on that tab against the hood latch bracket and it is VERY secure. It is not even remotely wobbly or loose.
HOSE ROUTING
As far as hoses go I tried multiple routing options that seemed correct, the final pictures I have here are the only routing that was usable and made the most sense even though the belt placement around it gives me mini heart attacks when I look at it lol.i actually have the provided zip ties in strategic placement to more or less pull the hoses either direction needed to sort of "loop" the hoses through and clear the belts. I ran the pump to the bottom intercooler spot. The top intercooler spot to the core itself. Finally the other core side to the pump all between the washer reservoir and battery in the fender. I did add a small pit of foam tape to the fender where the hoses run through so the hoses aren't cut or rubbing badly against the fender sheet metal.
PUMP AND ITS WIRING
The pump comes with a mount and the included zzp paper includes what metal needs removed at your core support section to make this work. Realistically if you go from your most front point of the curve of the metal and go 3 to 3.5 inches back and cut it out the pump has more then enough to mount to and still clear as needed. The pump comes with a plug similar in looks and clip to the injectors with roughly 10 inches of wiring. The paper that does come with the kit claims to ground this pump up near the fuse box on the firewall and a vampire clip is provided to tap into a pink key on wire on the back of the fuse box. I personally hate the vampire clips and refuse to use them so I waited on this till later after the hoses were mounted. Later on after I mounted these hoses I realized I can not mount my fog light due to clearance on the passenger side. Neither of my fog lights have worked for the entire time owning this car and I've never honestly cared to investigate it past the bulbs that immediately blew when installed. Just so happens these fog lights run a 2 wire system simar to the pump, it's even better once I realized the pump can now be ran on a toggle switch style(not saying it's ever off but if for whatever reason I need it off I can now) and the wiring is long enough to perfectly work for this. 2 shrink tubes and solder later I have a working pump. I will add here the coolant info as I decided since I still run the dexcool in the car I chose green coolant for my intercooler side. Neither mix but I can now see which system is leaking by the color if it ever happens instead of looking through double the systems for the leaks.
GEN 5 ISSUES
Ok so this part was random issues I came across during this install as I did the northstar swap at the same time. First and foremost I ordered the northstar kit at the same time. I have 0 issues as is but I wanted to do the swap at the same time. I have the gen 5 swap done again following many guys on here and forums with great success. The only thing I couldn't find well was the evap purge solenoid I saw mixed answers through out the research I did. I ended up using the gen 5 evap solenoid and haven't had any issues, on the l67 throttle body I drilled/tapped the brass plug on the bottom of the throttle body. This is where I ran a bung and hose to the gen 5 port near the pcv spot. The car ran fine this way. For the northstar though the linkage will contact this solenoid. Here's where it got fun. So at first I considered blocking this solenoid off, maybe tapping it and running a hose over to relocate it. Not sure I finally decided to flip the north star upside down and see how it acts? Let me tell you it actually mounts upside down and it all worked out. I added a picture for possible fix to this issue and to run a hose from this bung over to the evap solenoid elsewhere for more room.
BELT ISSUES
I run a 3.4 pulley on my Gen 5. I had a major issue where this setup wouldn't take a belt at all. The zzp guide called for a 685 belt for this swap on a 3.4 pulley. Let me tell you a 695 is what I have and even it was super tight but it worked. I'd recommend a 700 belt for this or if you want a super tight fit the 695 also. Regardless the belt was hitting my ICM. Not the bracket it mounts too but the actual icm it's plate and coils. The bracket the icm plate mounts to is actually cut out perfectly from the factory to clearance itself it's the plate and icm that hit. I ended up removing the bracket and it's bolts for the icm plate getting longer bolts and adding a 10 washers to each bolt to space the icm off the bracket and clear the belt. roughly 10 to 12 washers is enough to space the icm off the bracket enough to clear the belt and not cause issues. You can do the washers like me or measure that many and make a spacer for it also. Other then spacing the ICM and finding a 695 or 700 belt i had 0 issues here. The spacing did not affect the plug wires, icm connector etc. All worked same still.
NORTHSTAR UPSIDE DOWN
So this i found very little info on, nothing about linkage, the connections nothing. That is where I had to get creative here. Zzp makes a great northstar/lq4 swap kit, it had everything and worked great. No complaints what so ever. When the throttle body is flipped it definately makes a difference in clearance (not that it mattered for me I already cleared!) But for others it benefits to look into. So at the strut top you have a clip that mounts and holds the 2 cables for the throttle bodies. This clip is undid to give me enough to install them both then once I moved it where needed I proceeded to receipt them in a new spot to hold them down. The end of the throttle pedal cable is not the same style as a northstar. I saw people will cut the cable and make a barrel style work etc. That wasn't my plan. So if you actually press the factory line barrel in it does fit and work as designed it's a bit crooked in there but it works perfectly fine. I needed a longer hose to run from the gen 5 around to the spot on the northstar throttle body also. The only issue this arose for me at all was the IAC valve. The connector for it is roughly 4 or 5 inches short I ended up soldering a extension into this connector so I could run it over and plug it in correctly. This was my only issue this IAC valve connector and the line itself. Everything else was direct swap. Mind you the IAC plug is the same on the l67 and n* throttle bodies ZZP does not do anything with this plug. They don't have too though if you don't run the evap purge solenoid or the gen 5 one you clear the northstar the correct way god intended this thing to go on and don't have this issue.
CLEARANCE
To operate this and to mount my bumper in removed the fog lights. ( you can mount this kit and install the fog lights also if you "clock" the pump and go around it.) Personally I never use the fog lights so I never cared to remove them that is a personal preference.
I had to trim the bottom of my bumper to also clear the pump to cooler hose due to the mounting I did again you can "clock" the pump and work around that also.
The 2 clip tab points I discussed earlier the bumper used but then the intercooler uses i removed flush with the bumper. They are not usable and honestly I have not noticed a difference in the flex or issue of the bumper not having these clips.
I think the only thing else removed was the little corner air dam pieces that are on each side roughly 2 or 3 clips hold them on and the soft felt thing that is on each end of the radiator was removed also.
And there you have it ladies and gentleman. A northstar and supercore 2.5inch intercooler install write up and if have pictures to look through also I took during the install. I can add more pictures or explains more as needed wether on here or a pm regardless. Thanks for reading and hope this helps anyone
