heyben

Hello All,

My supercharger just quit on me and started making a horrible grinding noise while the engine is running. It sounds like there is something loose and knocking around inside of the casing. The noise is definitely coming from inside the SC, not the engine. What do you think? Is it shot, or possibly salvageable...

Any help or insight greatly appreciated.

BB

Elton

how many miles are on it

heyben

I bought the Runner with the SC on it, but I believe that there are fewer than 20K miles on it.

heyben

Also, I found the reciept in the truck. Dealer installed in May of 05 and it has approximately 20,000 miles. Any idea if it's still under a warranty?

MTL_4runner

Call the dealer and give them the serial number, they should be able to tell you.

Otherwise you'll need to tear into the S/C and have it rebuilt. I'd at least take off the nose to inspect the gears and check for bearing play. If you're lucky, all it needs is to have the nose rebuilt....worst case the rotors or case is in bad shape and it is NG. Best case it's still under warranty and the dealer fixes it all for free.

heyben

No luck with the warranty...Looks like I'm going to have to tear into it after Xmas sometime.

heyben

Just got my SC back from Magnuson and put it back on. HUGE credit to David over at Magnuson, those guys are a pleasure to work with! They were so nice I (Almost) didn't mind the $680 bucks! Seriously, they do great work with a super fast turnaround.

91TPU

so what ended up being wrong with the S/C???

midiwall

Price sounds like a rebuild. Given the original symptoms, I bet he torched a bearing which may have ended up in a broken impeller.

heyben

Midiwall nailed it. Total rebuild after only 20K miles, which surprised me since I hear of them running upwards of 100K. Also rebuilt the nose cone bearings as there was some metal and a loose bearing up front as well. I was just glad that the bearing that was rattling around in the body didn't end up in the engine block, and that I could put it back together myself.

vonnieglen

Most of the time supercharger noise at idle is caused by the coupler, a plasic disc with holes drilled in it that couples the shaft in the nose cone to the gears in the supercharger. The noise sounds very bad, like the thing is faling to pieces or a bunch of loose marbles rattling around. A decent quality coupler runs around thirty dollars and takes around an hour to replace. The nose cone can usually be removed without taking the supercharger off of the engine. It is an easy and quick fix.

The sad thing is that if you take a vehicle into the dealer with a bad coupler most will generally tell you that the supercharger has gone bad and try to sell you a completely new unit and installation. This can run thousands of dollars, when almost any grease monkey with a wrench could fix their own for around $30.