370z Stillen Supercharger System

As with all R&D at STILLEN, we assessed our ultimate goals and priorities during the development phase as we planned this supercharger kit. Some of the most important factors to the development team were hood clearance, expanding power later on, CARB legality, air to water intercooler, reliability, and obviously performance. We feel that we have met or exceeded each of our goals.

When looking at different forms of forced induction the engineering team and Steve Millen decided that the best choice would be the Vortech centrifugal supercharger. We have partnered with Vortech in the past on vehicles like the Nissan Maxima and Pathfinder, Mercedes CLK430 and others. One of the great things about the Vortech supercharger is the ease of installation as well as the ability to easily add more boost and increase power. The engineers at STILLEN also wanted a supercharger system that offered little to no maintenance needs so the ultimate decision was made for the V-3 series supercharger.

The Vortech V-3 series supercharger uses a self-contained lubrication system. That means no need for running additional lines from the oil pan or separate coolers. Simply bolt on the blower and you're good to go. Oil changes are very easy with the drain tube located on the bottom of the blower and the fill tube located on top. Changing the oil in the supercharger itself is a quick ten minute job.

One of the most important aspects of supercharging is also cooling. Superchargers build a lot of heat during the compression process so the air needs to be cooled back down before entering the engine for maximum performance. To do this we have incorporated a cast aluminum intake manifold which houses an air-to-water intercooler. During our testing we saw temperature drops of over 100 degrees of heat after the intercooler immediately before the air enters the engine. Air-to-water intercoolers have been proven to be the most efficient intercoolers available. The intercooler system uses its own separate coolant path that does not get routed in with the engine coolant. An added benefit to the air-to-water intercooler design is that the heat exchanger (mounted in front of the radiator to cool the coolant) is very thin. The Nissan 370Z has already shown that these engines have an issue with overheating. To reduce the risk of overheating we have strategically placed the heat exchanger and intakes to ensure that we have sufficient air flow to all of the vital components and additional coolers without impeding airflow to the radiator.

Airflow was another major consideration for the supercharger system. Because even stock 370Z's are seeing increased oil temperatures in just a few laps around a race course, we wanted to make sure that the heat exchanger and intakes did not interfere with our other coolers. We are very excited to confirm that the STILLEN race oil cooler, automatic transmission cooler, and power steering cooler all fit perfectly together. To bring the air into the intake path we have chosen to go with a Y-pipe designed cast aluminum intake tube that relocate the MAF sensors, retaining a "draw through" configuration. This means that the MAF sensor are located in front of the forced induction device to get an accurate reading of air volume. We chose to do this because this is what NISSAN recommends. During our many years of building superchargers for NISSAN vehicles as well as our great working relationship with NISSAN we have learned that the MAF sensor that NISSAN uses is not designed to be "blown through", or post forced induction. Example of this are the two NISSAN vehicles that use forced induction from the factory. The NISSAN GT-R and the 300ZX. Both cars use a draw through MAF sensor setup.

At the end of the day, the most important aspect of any forced induction system is "Performance". Performance is more than dyno numbers or horsepower claims. Performance means, how does it "perform" at a race track? How does it "perform" in daily driving conditions? These questions had to be answered during our testing so we went to El Toro air force base with our auto gearbox Infiniti G37. This car was equipped with our race oil cooler and auto trans cooler. This days testing consisted of multiple 0-140mph runs.. Hard driving on a very tight course with excessive revving and redlining. Then we parked the car for five minutes to let everything heatsoak and get really warm then immediately ran another series of 0-140 mph runs. We could not be happier with the way the car was able to handle these extreme tests. During those tests we had numerous data logging devices inside the car keeping track of a number of different data points.

Parts included in the kit:

- Vortech V-3 Series Compressor with Pre-Assembled Laser-Cut Billet Aluminum Mounting Assembly 

- (6) 600CC Fuel Injectors
- ECU Based Tuning Device
- High Output Fuel Pump
- Air-to-Water Intercooler System (Intercooler, Heat Exchanger, Pump, Hoses, Mounting Brackets)
- Polished Aluminum Intake Charge Pipe
- Cast Aluminum Intake Manifold
- Cold Air Intake Y-Pipe with Draw Through MAF Sensor Bosses (as recommended by NISSAN)
- Genuine K&N Intake Filters