Having come from owning sports cars my whole life, when I entered the off-roading world, I missed the SPEED and immediately started researching a Supercharger for my 4Runner. After a few years of begging, my wife gave in and let me upgrade.
Was it worth it to supercharge my 4Runner? For a guy whose obsession with fast cars didn’t end when I purchased a 4Runner, the answer is 100% yes. I’m not out there racing my 4Runner, but it does satisfy my need for speed and make for a really fun ride.
Below I’ll dive into all the things I considered before making the plunge. I researched cost, some ways to save money, horsepower comparisons and a few drawbacks.
According to Magnuson website: The supercharger system is a positive displacement, roots style kit, utilizing Eaton’s lightweight TVS rotors. Cast and assembled as a single, OEM-style-manifold and rotating group housing, the unit is quiet, compact, attractive, easy to install, and requires little to no extra maintenance. This in my case is all true. It makes just enough of the supercharger whine to satisfy, but can easily be drowned out by the radio. (or 2 small children in the back seat) If you really take the time to keep track of everything you would be able to take this off and put the 4Runner back to stock aside from 2 hoses you need to cut. I have no plans on doing that so I just tossed everything in a box.
Table of Contents
Horsepower with a Supercharger
To give you some background, I have a 2016 Trail Runner which would now be considered the TRD Off Road Edition. I’ve done a number of modifications on it but this one was by far the biggest and most expensive.
After install, my 4Runner is by no means a racecar, but it gives you the extra power that the 4Runner should have come with from the factory (in my opinion). This modification really made up for the lost power resulting from other add ons I have. These include bigger tires, a full roof rack, rock sliders, a low pro bumper, and the seasonal rooftop tent.
According to Magnuson you will get a 30% increase on stock power and 28% increase in torque. I would say this is 100% accurate with the seat of the pants dyno. The higher the RPMs the more power you really feel. The 4Runner has no problems climbing hills and passing slow pokes on the freeway now. I have done minimal towing with the supercharger, but it does help move the extra weight.
There are a couple other things to consider for my install that have to do with power. I also have installed a TRD cold air intake, a URD Y-pipe in the exhaust, and a Sprint Booster. While the sprint booster made a noticeable difference in throttle feel, it didn’t scratch that itch for more powah baby!
Cost
The going rate is $5995 although keep an eye out around the holidays for deals. After a Black Friday deal, my final cost was $5500, before installation. You can expect installation to cost you in the neighborhood of $1200.
Installing Your Supercharger to Save Money
**The next few paragraphs are reserved for the gear heads. I get into a lot of technical terms that may freak out the average 4Runner owner. Skim by if you know you would never attempt to install this yourself.**
The only way to convince my wife that I could buy my supercharger was by promising to save a little bit of money by installing it myself. This was a little intimidating as there are roughly 300 steps in the instructions. After looking through the instructions I realized most of the steps are simple things like taking a bolt out or removing a bracket.
Magnuson says on their website that install can be completed in one day, and I am a little hesitant to agree with that. I would consider myself above average when it comes to installing mods and this install took me about 14 hours. Granted, I have two preschoolers so I wouldn’t say the entire 14 hours was focused work. The most difficult part of the install process was making sure the 2 hoses for the coolant on the back of the blower itself were on tight enough.
Potential Install Complications
Some other complications you may run into depend on things like having a winch or any power distribution system under the hood. I had a winch sitting in the garage waiting for the bumper to show up. The coolant pump will sit right where the winch bolts on. I have chosen to put off installing a winch for now, but will need to figure out where to relocate the pump. when it comes time to install the winch. The other thing I ran into is that I have an SPOD BantamX on a power tray mount. This sits right where Magnuson has you install the Coolant reservoir. This was solved fairly easily, but definitely not as pretty looking as others have done online. I just used some spare metal to bolt it to the power tray. I have seen guys that have fabricated really nice looking aluminum brackets. This is on my list of things to do in the future, but just don’t have right now.
The other important note if you are installing yourself, is their software for calibration is NOT Mac compatible. We had to dust off an ancient Chromebook and deal with slow loading speeds and other computer headaches. After about 4 hours of loading the updates I could finally get everything uploaded to Magnuson. I had the reworked tune back first thing Monday morning. I would think if you did this in the middle of the work week you would have the reflash back in 24 hours.
If you still have warranty left on your 4Runner I highly recommend having this done by a shop as you will get to retain your warranty. My warranty was over and I felt confident enough in my abilities to get this done.
Drawbacks
Other than the steep price of entry, I’d say the biggest drawback to this modification is the need for premium fuel all the time now. You will see a hit to your fuel milage as well, although all of that is definitely more dependent on your driving style. Living in Colorado altitude, milage already takes a decent hit. I usually fill up my tank when it hits 1/4 and I’m usually about 215 miles on the trip meter. This modification won’t hit your milage as badly as bigger tires did, but you will notice a little hit.
Some may be concerned with reliability issue with this kit. Having had it for about 10k miles now, I have not seen any reliability issues. With the kit only putting out about 6psi of boost I would not hesitate to add this kit on again. After all Magnuson used to make the old TRD superchargers for Toyota so clearly they are a trusted brand.
Final Thoughts
This mod has been my favorite to date. Yes it was an expensive one, but given that I was starting to look at new cars or trucks that had more power, this was cheaper than a new purchase. It drives like a factory supercharged vehicle now. It will get you up to the mountains no problem, and will get you around the old ladies camping in the left lane with ease. And after all the supercharger whine never gets old.