turbo upgrade advice

[Bigred*]

I know i know, another one of these threads, ive been reading so many of these..im just looking for a little advice from the experts..so my turbos are shot, tons of smoke out the exhaust once it warms up and ive got alot of shaft play, so its time to upgrade! My goal is to have it still be very streetable, but im hoping to put down 450-500hp at the rear wheels..so for the turbos, ive narrowed it down to 2, either the gt28rs(disco potato) or the gt2860r, which is very similar..i still have alot of research to do about the small stuff, but first question is, would you recomend one over the other cuz im finding it hard to compare the 2, or another turbo, ive mostly been looking at garret products..next since im not made of money, what i wanna do is do the turbos seals ect all that good stuff while the engine is out, get a boost controller, run the boost lower and and leave the stock tune/injectors and such till i can save up and do the rest of it..is this doable, or smart? Im probably going to take the head off and do the valves..but then im right there thinking i should do the rings..haha conflict..anything else i should do while its all out, aside from replace hoses and seals and such..

Oh last question..i was going to look into buying the turbos straight from garret which will probably run me around $1500 for the set..is it worth it to get the kit for $2300 from someone else, or will it be pretty easy to source all those parts out seperate
Thanks and sorry for the noobieness

[DCaff300ZX]

When I was in the same boat and looked into things, I was looking similarly to you but found a great used set of JWT 530bb turbos with DP's for $1,200.
They are good into the 500HP range you mentioned, and in my opinion are awesome for the money. They have nearly no lag and boost hard from the bottom, giving more torque than some turbos double their cost. With the DP's I got with them they bolted to stock exhaust, and the difference is more than noticeable and with dual intake, upgraded smics and a tune, plenty enough power for the street to be sure.

[NolimitZ32]

- The 2860Rs or 2860RSs are very similar turbos and are capable of producing well over your desired HP. with your goals and inelastic bank account I would recommend you look at something smaller such as the 530bb (again as dcaff mentioned) these are awesome street turbos with a lot of oomph and generally are cheaper than their bigger brothers, however if you are set on the bigger units there is no contest, the 2860RS is a better turbo.
- Thought its possible to make the off the shelf Garrets work, you will usually spend a good bit of change on adapting them to fit the VG. Having said that, if you have access to a welder and some fab skills this can be much cheaper. The decision of whether to buy from garret or go with an adapted kit from one of the vendors is going to largely depend on this.
- I'm not sure why you mention replacing turbo seals if you are going with new turbos. If you are thinking of rebuilding yours I would recommend you just buy a new CHRA and swap your compressor and turbine housings on, you don't have the ability to balance the turbos after pulling them apart so they wont last past a few months.

[DCaff300ZX]

As NoLimit says, if HP is the game then the 2860's or GTX700's are where it's at...but require customizing and other install issues depending upon your final size selected. The 530's bolt on OEM with a simple downpipe swapout included which helps spool of course, and you need a oil feed kit with the gasket kit at a complete price less than just the other turbos.
Also to consider is how much space you have available to wind up your turbos to get to that much power, so if this is for the street/pleasure I still think the 530's will make you happy. They are good to just over 500 HP with the same mods you would HAVE to have with the other turbos and with superior spoolup speed, so really you can get what you want for less with the 530's.

[Bigred*]

Thanks so much guys, ill definatly start reasearching the 530's more.. I dont remember saying i wanted to rebuild the stockers? Magbe in another post, i did think about it, till i researched it, and realized how pointless it is.. I guess the reason why i was looking at those larger turbos, and this is where my inexperience comes in, is because i thought it would be safer to get a turbo rated at more then my desired hp goal so that i wasnt always pushing the limits of the turbo, but for the street i would definatly like a quicker spool up..k and this might sound really stupid and immature, but are some of these turbos going to have a louder spool up whine then others? because i absolutely love that noise!
Ps my budget to do all this about $3000, if it goes a little over thats fine

[DCaff300ZX]

Honestly, your thinking of not overworking components is sound except in this case, where a motor that does not use a larger turbo setup will suffer from lag and general notchy operation while a setup that fits the engine setup will work best. If as you just mentioned you want quicker spool the 530's can't be beat, the turbine/housing combo is made for response versus capacity.
As for noise I really haven't noticed any difference in sound between OEM and the 530 turbos but then again, my foot and the motor has a say in what I hear!
Seriously the only time you really hear the turbos is when you shut off, you can hear them spinning down after everything else has stopped moving, that's about it that I can recall. You may be thinking of rear-mount noise from the trucks, or roots-type superchargers that are on many vehicles these days.

[Bigred*]

as far as noise i was just thinking like my buddies gti that he built, it only puts down like 300hp with the turbo but man can you hear that thing spool, the only other thing i can think to compare it to is like a ford power stroke, you have the diesel rumble but then you can hear that turbo whine too.. anyways bahbam just posted in the classifieds he has a set of jwt sport 500's that have zero miles on the rebuild and feel like new, he wants $975 for them so i think i might just get those and i could get them tomorrow, that will probably be plenty for me, get those, bigger injectors and a good tune and ill be very happy with that, and with the sport 500's they use the stock 4 bolt pattern so theyll bolt right up to my hks stainless exhaust already on the car.. then in the future once the car is paid off and i have a little more money maybe i could look into going bigger, but i really dont want to loose reliabilty, plan on having this car for a long time.. or should i really wait and get the 530's? i didnt wanna go with journal bearings but thats a great price, z1 says theyre good up to 500hp, which i think is pushing it being that its just a bored out stock turbo