Installing A Blower System On a Corvette - Force-Feeding A C6

Some trimming of factory components was necessary in our case in order to mount the intake and discharge plumbing for the blower and intercooler. It included trimming the tabs at the top of the radiator. The aluminum material is easy to cut-almost too easy, so care must be taken to be precise with a cutter and/or grinder.

Another component to be trimmed is the passenger-side lower apron, near the factory brake cooling duct. A larger hole must be cut into it to provide routing room for plumbing from the blower to the heat exchanger.

Next, the large heat exchanger for the air-to-air-style intercooler is hoisted into place in front of the radiator. The air-to-air design speeds the kit's installation, as it doesn't require a separate cooling circuit that goes with the typical liquid-to-air intercooler design.

Here, a 90-degree silicone hose is shown feeding into the side of the heat exchanger. It's the discharged routing from the supercharger, which blows through the intercooler to reduce air temperatures and provide a more powerful, denser air charge at the engine. The denser charge also minimizes the chance for detonation in the Vette's relatively high-compression LS2. Note, too, the location of the bypass valve, which bleeds off excess boost when the throttle closes.

After all the intake and discharge hoses are plumbed under the hood, the rest of the engine work involves adding new, colder-range NGK TR-6 spark plugs and replacing the fuel injectors with the 60-lb/hr units that come with the blower kit. An engine with higher-capacity fuel injectors shouldn't be started until the ECM has been updated to reflect their presence, or big problems can occur.

Rather than replacing the factory in-tank fuel pump, the A&A Corvette kit comes with a Kenne Bell Boost-A-Pump system that increases the voltage to the factory pump and effectively "supercharges" its output. It mounts in the driver-side rear fenderwell. The inner fender liner is removed and re-installed over the system, for a hidden, well-protected installation.

Here's the completed installation of the supercharger kit. The close-out plate, with its OEM-looking black finish, looks great under the hood and is wholly appropriate for the premium feel of the Corvette. Stuffing all of the kit's plumbing into the nose of the Corvette wasn't exactly a cakewalk, but no major problems developed, and the general fit and finish of were excellent.

A custom calibration for the engine controller was performed by Stenod Performance upon the completion of the kit's installation. Stenod's techs tuned it not only for the supercharger, but for the additional engine modifications as well. These included L92 heads, a "blower" camshaft, an LS3 intake manifold, headers, and more. Then, it was onto Stenod's Mustang dyno to evaluate the shop's many hours of labor.

On the rollers, the supercharged LS2 delivered a stunning 508 hp at the rear wheels and 439 lb-ft of torque. And remember, this was through an automatic transmission and on a conservative-reading Mustang dyno. Peak numbers aside, that's a whopping 170hp/110-lb-ft jump over the baseline 338hp/329-lb-ft numbers. Talk about bang for the buck!