Upgrade 850 Turbo to 18t Turbocharger?

Thinking about the 18t Turbocharger?

Can I get a 18t turbo with a speed tuning chip and maybe some bigger injectors and be ok?

Sure. Don’t do the 18t until you get a tune and do some exhaust upgrades, though. The tune is the important part – too much boost too low in the rev range, and you get bent rods.

Again, keep in mind that with going to a bigger turbo, you’re going to lose some of that get-up-and go off the line. The S70’s acceleration/tall first gear make it useless for trying to dart out in traffic quickly, but great for passing power from 30 mph on up.

Upgrade 850 Turbo to 18T? Turbo Talk!
18t Turbocharger

jblackburn » That graph really does tell a lot of the story. I think they also realized after 1998 “holy crap, this thing needs more low-end power from the 16t!”

The IPD turbo control valve and a turn and a half on the wastegate helped me a bit with that – it’s got a decent amount of power from about 2000 RPM on up now, but it’s still nothing like a V6 or LPT engine, and you’re not going to win any races from a stoplight.

1999 saw a change to a different turbo exhaust outlet (an angle flange opposed to the straight one on the 1996-1998 cars) that helps it spool a bit faster, and the electronic throttle body and variable valve timing on the exhaust cam helps it get off the line a bit faster by optimizing the amount of air metered into the engine. If I floor mine from a dead stop, it’s definitely slower than if I give it about 75% throttle til the turbo comes up.

The reality of it is, when you’re dealing with an engine still only 2.3 liters, you’re just not going to have a lot of torque down-low, and the things are actually quite fast once you get going!