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Johannesburg - SA vehicle specialists, RGMotorsport claims it's built a bakkie for the fast lane. The auto tuning company says it has signed-off what could be the fastest double cab bakkie in SA - a 327kW/545Nm super-truck capable of sprinting to 100km/h in 7.1 seconds en route to a top speed of 227km/h.
It could also be the first eighth-generation Hilux 4.0-litre V6 to be supercharged on the continent but it certainly isn’t the first 'Big Six Toyota' to benefit from RGMotorsport’s tuning and modifying acumen.
The Strydom Park-based business has installed a similar forced induction package on well over 100 of these engines; and V6 FJ Cruisers, Prados, Fortuners, Land Cruisers and Hiluxes have all been through the workshop.
Performance gains
A supercharged conversion starts at R105 000 to a Hilux – or Fortuner - and like all RGM conversions come with a minimum six month/20 000 km warranty.
While the acceleration figures are impressive, the stand-out number is its flexibility. Making full use of the kick-down characteristics of the six-speed auto, RGM says it thunders from 80 to 160km/h in just 12.2sec – a full 10sec faster than the standard double cab 4x2 ‘Lux. Overtaking is effortless and at lower speeds the story is the same; 60 to 120km/h takes just six seconds, compared to 9.6sec for the showroom version.
All figures were recorded at Gerotek by track coaching and data analysis experts, Stigworx, using VBOX data-logging equipment.
READ: What a bakkie! We drive the fastest Hilux in SA
Rob Green, founder and managing partner of the business, says: "Many of our supercharged customers use their vehicles for towing. When you overtake with a 1400kg caravan behind you, you end up spending plenty of time and distance on the wrong side of the road and that’s when you’re in the most danger. With a supercharged conversion that period is massively reduced and safety dramatically improved.
“With the huge torque reserves, the engine now copes easily with the gaps between the gear ratios and acceleration is unrelenting, without the drop-off in momentum between third and fourth which is apparent in the standard set-up.”
While they’ve supercharged many V6 units (including one which has covered more than half-a-million trouble-free kilometres), this particular recipe has a slightly different mix of ingredients compared to the outgoing, ‘Vigo’ generation Hilux, says the tuner. For example, the cold air intake system is substantially different from before and other components such as the power steering and air conditioning plumbing were repackaged.
152kW more!
The Hilux is fitted with the single VVTi version of the V6 but in supercharged guise produces 152kW more than the standard unit, with torque boosted to 545Nm (up from 376). As in the past, intake temperatures are kept low (the key to both reliability and power) with a standalone radiator system which provides coolant for the liquid chargecooler.
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Green says this reduces the temperature of the compressed air from the Vortech centrifugal supercharged by up to 60 degrees Celcius before it enters the intake manifold and is the reason why, along with modest 0.5 Bar boost, the compression ratio of the engine can be left unchanged. The V2 blower also has an integrated lubrication system, which reduces maintenance and simplifies the installation.
Each conversion is optimised on RGMotorsport’s four-wheel-drive dynamometer to get the Unichip piggyback ECU perfectly mapped for the engine it is partnered with, before being unleashed from the Hammer Road speed centre.
