Turbo VS Nitrous. Help/Suggestions?

junior1023

New Member
Ok, I've done some research (albeit not as much as I could have) but thought id pose these questions to some of you who may have experience with one or both of the setups. I've also seen the flaming that happens with a thread is made with not enough info so here we go...

I currently drive a 1994 Acura Integra LS. Only "power" mods ive done are just a catback exhaust and a short ram with K&N filter. I picked it up off of an owner who had it 9 years before myself who was unsure if any work was done do it before him. So for all intents and purposes we will say its the original motor. Motor has 215,XXX on it right now. Runs like a champ. Small oil leak but nothing out of the ordinary. Realistically this car will never be anything more than a fun daily driver (maybe enter it in a show or two once all the non-motor related upgrades are finished).

I'm trying to figure out which set-up would make more sense/more reliability for this car. I picked up the car itself for $1500 so I really cant justify spending more than that on a turbo build (no disrespect to those that have). My previous car was a stage 2 WRX that I built so I'm relatively familiar with turbos, but I know NOTHING about nitrous whatsoever other than what is crudely depicted in Fast&Furious movies lol. I'm just looking to gain alil horsepower while keeping my car as reliable as possible since it is and will be my daily.

If I went turbo, it would be one of the Godspeed kits from eBay for roughly $650 (or possibly a second hand kit off craigslist for the same price point). Like I said, not looking to drop much more than that on a kit for a car I got as cheap as it was. And on top of the kit I would need another $600ish towards injectors, radiator, EM and a tune.

As far as nitrous goes, I dont know much about it. I still dont really comprehend the difference between wet and dry shots. I did read that a 75 shot (50ish whp?) is about as large as anyone would recommend on a stock motor. Also, not sure of how long a bottle last someone who isnt spraying as the daily drive around town lol.

As far as pros and cons go I think ive narrowed it down to these...

TURBO PROS:
More power
Easily upgradeable
Bling factor (lol, sad but true)

TURBO CONS:
Higher initial start-up cost
Higher cost of maintainence if anything related to the kit itself were to break/crack/wear
Less MPG

NITROUS PROS:
Lower cost for the set-up with less supporting mods needing done, leaving more room in a budget for other upgrades
Its power that's at your call as opposed to stress on the motor constantly

NITROUS CONS:
Possibly more dangerous in an accident because highly flammable?
Cost of refilling the nitrous tank

Regardless of whatever option I ultimately decide on I will be doing the headgasket and timing belt (both firsts for myself) as well as a compression check to check the health of the motor. I was also thinking if I went with the cheaper nitrous option it would possibly leave enough cash for a LS/Vtec setup (which I have recently started reading may not be as good as I thought) or buying a used motor "just incase" lol. Sorry for the long read. Cliffs below

CLIFFS:
$1000 or so budget
Turbo or Nitrous?
Wanting to just gain alil more power will remain as reliable as I can
????
Profit!
 
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Sesso

New Member
$1000 is nowhere near enough for a turbo kit.

I guess you could go nitrous but I wouldnt.

If the car is in good condition, I dont know why you wouldnt spend money on it. It matters what the car is worth to you and not what kelly blue book thinks.

That godspeed turbo kit is only a small fraction of what you need. For 600 is may not come with oil feed and return lines.

you still need a :

fuel pump $100
downpipe made $100
possibly a fan. (I was able to use my OE one) $50
A civic radiator $80
injectors (injector clips and resistor box depending on what you get) $400
Extra bolts for the manifold (they always seem to send the wrong thread pitch) $5
vacuum tubing $10
hondata and OBD1 socketed ecu 7 - $800

I have done 2 recent turbo installs, one on my 96 Integra and I did one on a 97 Prelude that I had before the integra. I made and welded my own downpipe so I saved money.
 

TheSkygun

New Member
i'd say turbo but being in california takes bias to this seeing that nitrous in a car is illegal, go figure right...
plus i'd say turbo is more reliable in the long run and if you plan to sale the car what do you think a buy would be more interested in driving. a turbo setup or nitrous?
 


Havok114

New Member
As for nitrous setup's a 10lb bottle with my 75shot lasted me about 9 good runs (no bottle warmer), wet = spraying fuel/nitrous at the same time into your motor & dry = spraying just nitrous and leaving it up to your motor to supply the fuel , wet is safer but if you go nitrous two things that will make your life easier is a purge kit so your lines are always ready to go & a bottle warmer so your bottle preasure stays in the +900psi range
 

Prozon

Kris
$1000-1500 isn't enough for a reliable turbo build. But nitrous is just money down the drain. It's just a matter of time before you run out and need a refill, it will eventually surpass the cost of a turbo.
 

ZaWn

New Member
Turbo also has its maintenance costs as the engine is constantly under pressure from the turbo every time you step on the gas pedal. Something's gonna give sooner or later. NOs has an on and off switch so you can choose when and where you want to harness it's power. With the budget that you have, I think Nos is the way to go. You will be spending around 4k or so if you wanna go turbo and do it right.

-Z-
 

collkid

New Member
Neither. Do intake, exhaust, cams, and drive the piss out of it while you save for something else.
 

DC4GoFast

i have a car problem
I wouldnt boost that motor, because of the miles. It may run great now, but running spray or boost is going to shorten the life of it big time just because of the fact its old. Now that is not always the case, some people have boosted cars that are well over 250k+ running strong for years.

All depends on how you take care of it. Spray is fun but gets old, boost is always fun, because 1. it sounds sick, 2. You can turn up the boost 3. Its loads of fun!! And no matter what other people it IS possible to piece together a kit for $1000. Inclduing everything, injectors turbo manifiold exhaust you name it. Only thing it doesnt cover is Hondata. Several of my friends have done it and they werent cheap eBay kits either, they just searched the hell out of the forums.
 

dave198911

New Member
coming from the ls1 and lt1 family i say go nitrous(we refer to it as gas here) ... i just recently bought my first import which is a 92 ls integra and im going do do a dual stage set up ...... a little shot of gas off the line and then another when u get out the gate....on the 02 ss camaro we ran we would hit a 50 shot off the line and a 100 shot about mid track it worked really well on the street also...with my da i plan on a 50 off the line and a 75 down the track and plus an 20lb tank looks bad ass in the trunk of anything
 
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