Here are some early spy photos. Will add explanation to pics as the day goes on. The colder spark plugs and the HKS supercharger itself has been installed. No issues from this. My mechanic had to use an app to convert the instructions in the HKS manual from Japanese to English but you can figure out what's what from looking at the picture and trying to translate what you can.
This is an up close picture of the supercharger. It is AN HKS GTS7030 140188 model.
A view of the engine bay looking from the passenger side. You can see that the ECU on the driver's side wall is in a slightly different location. This is to make way for the piping that be routed to the drivers side wheel well and foglight area. The one pipe you see is the piping that goes to the intake manifold. The remaining piping is on it's way and will be fabricated and/or welded to fit. The piping from the intake filter to the supercharger, the supercharger to the intercooler and the intercooler back to the intake manifold will all be going to and coming from the passenger side area. Stay tuned for the finished product.
![Image]()
![Image]()
The supercharger cooler is on top and the transmission cooler (bigger unit) is on the bottom. Was looking to put a front mount intercooler here but there is only about 3" of space between the radiator and the front bumper beam. Also, both of these would have had to be moved to another location. So to keep things simple, it was decided that the intercooler be moved to the driver's side wheel well area.
![Image]()
This is the same top mount intercooler that comes with the HKS supercharger kit. This particular intercooler was already modified to fit Monkeywrench Racing's stock RAV4. So it is a little smaller than the intercooler that comes with the kit. This kit is top mounted (meaning on top of the engine) but heat rises from the engine. And there is no way to get cool air to it on top of the engine (Outside of a hood scoop). So my shop mechanic thought it would be good to put the intercooler in the wheel well area (Inside the mudguard/shield). Toyota Supras have their intercooler situated this way, side mount. See a video example here of the Toyota Supra's side mount intercooler ~~>
There is plenty of space for it in this location and it's easy to mount here. There will be a hole on the backside of the intercooler for the air to go through it and come back out. We talked about two future modifications that could be done once this is finished. He knows of a fan that can be installed the whole width of the intercooler in this location to draw air to it and through it. Also, custom ducting can be made up to isolate the air in this area to force all of it through the intercooler and out the backside. If this route is decided upon in the future, I'll update this thread with information and pics.
Here is just a full shot of the front of the RAV4 with the bumper off. More to come.....
Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk
ETA for this is sometime next week. The Wideband O2 sensor is supposed to come in today and will be installed on the exhaust header that is on the front of the car. It needs to be installed upstream of the catalytic converter to work properly. The exhaust header coming down near the firewall has the cat converter right off the exhaust manifold so this seems like the best place to put this wideband at for now. It's just a tool to use. Ideally, you want to measure the combined O2 coming from all the six cylinders but before the cat converters. This will have to do.
Also, the HKS supercharger kit has the maf sensor installed between the air filter and the supercharger. This does measure the intake air temperature that is benig pulled through the air filter however my mechanic and I agreed that the most ideal location for the maf sensor would be between the intercooler and the intake manifold. This way, you are measuring the air that is entering your engine, since this air is being heated up by the supercharger then cooled by the intercooler. I was considered that the reading of the maf and the maf sensor itself could be affected by the boost pressure from the supercharger but my mechanic doesn't think that is a concern. So, this will be another modification from what you typically see.
And thanks again to Moondogg and Techsmrt for their intake insulation for cooler temp posts in another thread. The piping from the supercharger to the intercooler will be insulated. I will be considering insulating both the intake to the supercharger as well as the piping from the outlet of the intercooler to the engine.
And lastly, R9K has just finished the first reflash of the ECU for supercharger duties. This will be swapped back in and installed when the supercharger kit is ready. I can drive with the ECU that is in there now but the R9K ECU tuning is being modified to support the kit. It's in beta so it may have to be tweaked a little depending on what data I am able to get from running with the kit.
That's all for now. :wink
