Positive-displacement superchargers may absorb as much as a third of the total crankshaft power of the engine, and, in many applications, are less efficient than turbochargers. In applications for which engine response and
power are more important than any other consideration, such as
top-fuel dragsters and vehicles used in
tractor pulling competitions, positive-displacement superchargers are very common.
There are three main categories of superchargers for automotive use:
- Centrifugal turbochargers – driven from exhaust gases.
- Centrifugal superchargers – driven directly by the engine via a belt-drive.
- Positive displacement pumps – such as the Roots, Twin Screw(Lysholm), and TVS(Eaton) blowers.
The thermal efficiency, or fraction of the fuel/air energy that is converted to output power, is less with a mechanically driven supercharger than with a turbocharger, because turbochargers are using energy from the exhaust gases that would normally be wasted.
For this reason, both the economy and the power of a turbocharged engine are usually better than with superchargers. The main advantage of an engine with a mechanically driven supercharger is better
throttle response, as well as the ability to reach full-boost pressure instantaneously. With the latest turbocharging technology, throttle response on turbocharged cars is nearly as good as with mechanically powered superchargers, but the existing lag time is still considered a major drawback, especially considering that the vast majority of mechanically driven superchargers are now driven off clutched pulleys, much like an air compressor.
Turbochargers suffer (to a greater or lesser extent) from so-called
turbo-spool (turbo lag; more correctly, boost lag), in which initial acceleration from low RPM is limited by the lack of sufficient exhaust gas
mass flow (pressure). Once engine RPM is sufficient to start the turbine spinning, there is a rapid increase in power, as higher turbo boost causes more exhaust gas production, which spins the turbo yet faster, leading to a belated "surge" of acceleration. This makes the maintenance of smoothly increasing RPM far harder with turbochargers than with engine-driven superchargers, which apply boost in direct proportion to the engine RPM.
