The Unfortunate Adventures in Stillen-land
 

Well, as you know, I've posted a thread on this, so here is the link (I saw no reason to continue on that thread, this is quicker):

https://my350z.com/forum/showthread....threadid=86587


The Update

I went to Tom at Light Speed performance for a second opinion. He was kind enough to take the car to a dyno during morning hours, when temps are better and air is calmer. I scored 260whp and 231wtq. For comparison, my baseline is 230whp/231wtq. So, there obviously was a problem somewhere.

We talked to Stillen and somebody suggested replacing the SC belt and tensioner, as it seems the belt might've been slipping. So we did. End result -- no improvement, belt is new, but is still slipping during engine load. Before engine is fully warmed up (first 10 minutes, or so, of driving), you can clearly hear the whistle of the slipping belt.

Boost

Upon original install, it was going up to 0.4kg/cm2 (5.7psi) at redline. However, and what I did not know was abnormal, it was making only 0.3kg/cm2 (4psi) at 3000rpm. From what I heard from Stillen techs, it is supposed to make full boost at 2700rpm. This was never the case for me, apparently, but I just did not know it was not the proper operation.

At this time, with replaced belt and tensioner, it is making maximum 4psi of boost at redline and about 3psi of boost at 3000rpm.

Just before replacement, it was making max boost of 3psi and less at 3000rpm.

My verification method? I recorded the boost gauge, then played frame by frame to compare with tach. Not the most sophisticated method, but efficient and precise.


Elimination Process

We eliminated temperature, slipping clutch, belt, tensioner, andf bad dyno (we went to completely different dyno this time). What's left:
* 7th injector not working -- if this is the case (my A/F was lean originally), this is compensated by APEXi SAFC2 and the other 6 injectors
* RT cats -- they should not progressively rob more and more HP. So, that's not it. Yes, I could be losing about 0.5psi of boost with them, but that's about it. I'd live with that, as they'd compensate by better airflow, giving me back those 5-10 lost HPs.
* bad, bad Stillen -- I could have a botched Eaton blower. I'd be the first that I know of. Read on...


Not Eliminated -- The Blower

Stillen says 'quiet operation and no whistling' of the supercharger. Ever since this was installed, the SC has been making SO MUCH noise, my wife once thought an ambulance was approaching :) -- but it was just me, catching up at WOT. You, other Stillen SC owners! Read this and please post comments.

The SC whine is so loud that it drowns any other noise of my car, including engine, exhaust, stereo, etc. My wife made fun of it early on, since it truly sounds like a siren. Very loud! Someone, please comment -- is it supposed to be THAT loud?


Bottom Line

All in all, I think I'm now probably the first person that is actually experiencing a problem with this particular application. I am extremely frustrated by this, since my reason for installing Stillen was just the opposite -- longevity, stability, ease of maintenance. As it is, I'm spending money to troubleshoot this problem and am not happy!

Most people, professional or not, are simply flabbergasted by the problem, since we've eliminated all the simple things. So, if anyone knows what else may be the problem, please post.

Addendum

Forgot to mention that, when we took out the original belt and tensioner, the original belt was worn and cracked in several places and would've broken in few weeks. The original tensioner seemed okay, same tension as new one.

I only put about 1000miles on the SC since the install and before the belt/tensioner replacement.

Stillen is horrible their customer support is bad also. I got ripped off on maxima headers 8 months ago when i had the car. All they did was transfer me all d#m day. Alot of their products are made from other companys, and they put their name on it. So when it comes down to problems they can't solve them primarily, because they didn't make the product to begin with. Their whole solution is guess and check along with dynoes they never show. I had problems with them, and i will never buy a thing from them ever again. I hope it gets fixed for you. If they were a normal company like most others they would give you a whole new supercharger after all you spent big money on their product. Stillens next hypothesis is your car having problem, and not their product. I know this because they claimed the same thing in my situation. Also their over priced to begin with!!!!!!!!!!

Best of luck :icon11:

I dont have the Stillen.....have a Vortech.. ..But had the RT cats...I was losing 1 full lb of boost with them . I got rid of them . And now have the Crawfords .Gained all the boost back and I hope alot more torque .[ redynoing Tuesday ] I do have the Stillen cat back and got the RT cats from them . They have never been helpful with any thing . Good luck with your problem...it does sound like that blower is bad.....Bill

I have crawford headers and rt cats and made up to 10 lbs on the dyno with a 9 lb pulley and see about 8 lbs on the street

Sounds like the blower is seizing up or binding for some reason..Don't know if those have oil in them, do they? but is shouldnt be THAT loud since a roots type blower comes on many stock applications , I would think they are pretty quiet..
Oh and one more thing....




STILLEN SUCKS BALLS:icon8:

roots blowers can be hella loud my friend had one on his 4 runner, was quiet as a mouse at ilde ONLY, at any sort of throttle input it was loud as piss.

Call Still$n up and tell them you want a new blower. Chances are they will try to give you the run around, cause they suck. By the time everthing is fixed; if fixed you will know all the people their by their extentions, because no one knows what the h#ll is going on to begin with. They are so head strong that their products are perfect that im sure its gonna take a while to fix the ordeal. I hope everything is going to work out for you.

Glen

The Stillen is pretty quiet on the Z There are a few running around up here and they're pretty quiet.

I've had a problem like this with a customer car back in the day. It was a Integra GSR with the Jackson racing kit on it. The blower wasn't completely TQ'ed down and sounded like a 200hp electric drill. It looked tight so just looking at it you'd never see the problem but once you started it you knew there was a problem!

We TQ'ed it down and it ran great. Sounds like this could have happened to you. Check all the mating bolts (supercharger to plenum, plenum lid, Plenum to engine).
Hopefully that's all it is.
Gary

no, i have heard stillens and they are not supposed to be that loud, call them back and tell them, plus with a stage two you should be making 320 hp to the wheels. Call them and make them either send womeone to fix it or send a new supercharger that works. you should have a hella fast car is you have the sitillen stage two , not 260 that's weak, NA numbers. Make sure they fix this problem for you.

Re: The Unfortunate Adventures in Stillen-land
 

Stan,

You can bring it to us and we will check that for you for free instead of paying Tom to do it. We did check it when we did the install and it worked fine. Just let me know and we will help you out anyway we can. :)

Kyle
SGP Racing

Thank God for Yahoo briefcase. Here's the link, listen to your heart's content. ID3 tag comments have a small description of the test.

http://briefcase.yahoo.com/~bashcelik/
* rev tests indicate whistling -- recorded AFTER warm-up, initially it is much louder. Also much louder under engine load (this was with no load).
* accelleration tests indicate SC whine, which seems a bit too loud (you be the judge) -- recorded from inside the cabin, outside is louder

I'm currently working out the problem with Stillen R&D, so we'll see how it goes.

Kyle, thank you for your offer, but injectors are out of the picture until we can work out why the belts are 'eaten by eaton' every 4-5 weeks or so. I'm asking Stillen for new blower at least. If you offer to take the old one out and put new one in for free, I might take you up on it, depending whether we find out it was a bad blower (or other part), or other.

To everyone, thanks for your comments. Listen to the sounds in the link provided, and post your responses. Thank you.

I can see why your wife was complaining . Listened to the 1st and 2nd gear run . If that was from inside the car....how the hell can you even drive it ? You could hardly hear the exhaust .

I'm babying the thing, I rarely run WOT. Especially now, since it is eating the belts.

Guessing by replies I'm getting on all the forums I posted this on, seems that it is not normal, which is what I expected (I drove Grand Prix GTP for 3 years with an eaton blower, and it was quiet like a mouse). How did I drive it so far? Well, first 500 miles I did not even run it on boost, to follow the break-in procedure. 2nd 500 miles I did, but I honestly did not WOT that many times. Nevertheless, the sound did make me suspicious, but none of the pros mentioned anything was out of order, so I assumed "Oh well, I'll live with it for now, as long as I'm making the numbers" -- well, no numbers, so now I question everything.

Update:

I spoke to R&D at Stillen. Currently, the sound is attributed to the AEM CAI I have (they have not listened to it yet, but will). At least 0.5psi of boost loss is attributed to the RT cats I have. The rest of the boost loss and belt slippage is under investigation.

As we make progress on this issue, I'll keep everyone informed. So far, I wanna make sure everyone knows I'm not blaming anything on anyone (yet). For all we know, this could be a bad manufactured component, and I was the unlucky recipient.

So far, Stillen R&D was receptive, even though we (wife and I) had to essentially call them, otherwise we would be waiting for the 'call-back' even now. I guess, with a little nudge and right people, they are not that bad. I had a good and informative chat with them, and they did offer a new blower, so that's a good thing. Also, no problems related to SGP's install were found at this time. Everything is tight and where it should be.

I'll keep you gyus updated as we further investigate...

And Still people will continue to buy STILLEN garbage...I just dont get it, how do they find victims, I mean customers to keep them in business?:rolleyes:

Glad you are getting somewhere with Stillen. Not every body does! There are several horror stories on the Maxima board.....

Anyway, that supercharger sounds like its making several different sounds. I'm willing to bet there may be a bad bearing in there thats causing all that infernal whistling. Some of the blades may actually be coming into contact with each other. This may be why you're not making full boost. Good luck...can't wait to hear how it turns out.

Jesse

Stillen is a rip off their sweet as pie when your gonna purchase something. Then once you do you can't get ahold of them. Not only did stillen rip me off on maxima headers their workers stated Iradium spark plugs give 8-10 hp at the wheels.

:icon13: yea right

I have the stage 3 Steal in SC and mine sounds very close to yours, although i did notice there was some hesitation in the second gear to redline runs.

What exhaust are you running?

I'm running Borla TD.

I'm still having a hard time with the whole "RT cats are causing a lack of boost", thing.

How would that be possible? Boost is simply possitive pressure applied to the intake track. That's all. For the cats to cause INTAKE pressure to drop there would have to major valve overlap. Your talking blowing a crap load of air through the jugs. Not to mention that all 24 valves would have to be open at the same time on a running engine, you would not be making any compression at all. I would be amazed if the engine would run.
Sounds more like the S/C is putting a ridiculous load on the motor and the loss of horepower is paracitic losses from a bad S/C.

Now the computer pulling timing....to the tune of 60hp possible I guess, but a stock computer? Does the stock computer have the ability to pull that much timimg? I know the GM ECU's don't that why us NO2 junkies custom burn/or edit our own ECU programs.

If an eaton S/C is making that much of a racket I would look there. Every eaton I've ever seen was pretty quiet.

Can someone explain to me how high flow cats are causing boost to drop, I'm a noob with these cars do maybe there something I'm missing. I hade a turbo 280z when I was in high school and my biggest dyno run was without most of the exhaust, it was turbo/downpipe....period.

1) your cats are 1005 NOT an issue...

2) if your shredding belts there is a reason for it..Trust me..

3) your SC sounds like its broken!!

4) No, the stock ECU would never pull THAT much timing.


Stillen + 350z + your $$$$$=:mad:
Steallin's products suck..Period..

Did you purchase this blower less than 6 months ago on a credit card?If so utilize your consumer protection and dispute the charges on the grounds of a defective item and you attempted to return it but they refused...Stop the troubleshooting and get that blower off the car.Period.

Well, my wife had the displeasure of speaking to Stillen service. I spoke too soon about getting somewhere. Here's the deal:

Their R&D guys are definitely interested in the problem and to resolve it. However, they DO NOT dictate company policy. Unfortunately, Stillen's policy in this case is as follows:

* I uninstall the blower at my cost
* I send them the blower at my cost
* They verify whether something is wrong withthe blower
* They send it to Magnuson for fixing, if 'repairable'
* Once fixed (or replaced, if not fixable), they send back the unit to me
* I re-install the blower at my cost

:mad: :banghead:

Notice I'm out a car and probably a $1000 for this. Also notice they have successfully swindled a no-cost resolution for them (due to blower's 1 year warranty) save for the shipping back cost (and I wonder about that too).

So, bottom line is that this company is out to save a penny everywhere they can, and customer satisfaction is the least of their priorities. I'm sorry to say but the 'expensive piece of equipment' (qouting service guy when he was referring to the blower) is more valuable than my good word, or my satisfaction, regardless of what I purchased.

They were so adamant on keeping that policy that, after pleading our case with vice president, they did not budge even a bit.

What we requested: that they send us a new blower, while they examine existing one. They can keep the old one and, if not broken, can sell it again, or do whatever they please wth it. If broken, they have coverage through Magnusson, so they'd be okay.

My wife got so upset on the phone with them, she was in tears, but it did no good.

So, my suggestion for those purchasing Stillen: know what you're getting. I guarantee you these guys are NOT going to be there when things go wrong. You'll pay for everything, warranty or not. How long, do you think, before something breaks in the application? If I knew what I know now, I'd have never made a purchase. Screw CARB, this ain't worth it.

More updates to follow, as we go through this case...

I'm 110% sure that,if I asked for a refund on the kit, Stillen would echo a resounding NO. If I then went on to dispute through my credit cards (I've made purchase using two cards), it'd be a long, drawn-out battle, lasting months, and I'd be without a car during that time. Not sure I can bargain with that. They sure got me hooked.

Omg stillen is pissing me off and its not even my car this time.

:icon10:

Dude.
Call both your credit cards and dispute the charge and say that the product was defective and that they (Stillen) Expected you to consume unreasonable and unnesisarry cost to get the item replaced..You wuill hit stillen where it hurts by taking their money back.What the credit card does is charge back the money from their bank pending an investigation, you supply them with your proof that the item was defective and the shipping costs,removal cost , re-install cost ect..You get the picture...dont mention anything about what Stillen wanted to do, just say they would NOT honor the warranty and refund or return the item that was defective.It cost you nothing,take the blower off and return the car to stock and get your moneyback from your CC companies, both of them..Trust me I did this to wheelmax on a set of rims that came chipped from them and I got 100% of my $$$ back AND kept the wheels..Just **** Stillen then I guarantee they will be more kind to help you once they are out the $5000 and you got their blower then the ball is in YOUR court my friend!!

I would seriously send an email to Steve Millen himself or call him. I know that he would not like whats happening here one bit.

He doesnt give a $hit!He's in it to make $$$...Period!
I dealt with Alex Cates when he was there and he was very condensending and threatening towards me..All he did was talk and when I complained he told me I was being rude!!WTF!!Like he was my Dad or something..Bottom line STILLEN sucks,their products suck,their customer service sucks,their reputation sucks!!Why do you think they are no longer sponsors on the LARGEST Nissan 350Z website with over 30,000 potential customers of their products..Cause they are cheap and they suck..

I dont disagree. I'm just saying that maybe it MIGHT be worth a shot. I have never and will never buy a Stillen product but I think just being mad is going to get his blower fixed. Maybe Steve Millen will do something. He doesn't know until he tries.

Disputing the charge is the way to go. Regardless if they dont give you your money back at least you get the SC warrantied. I have won every dipsute I have ever filed, I think you stand an excellent chance.

Sure..In a perfect world the CEO of a multimillion dollar company is going to answer his own E-mails and send the guy a new blower out of the kindness of his heart.:rolleyes:
Waste of time, and besides whats Steve Millens E-mail address?Stevemillen@stevemillen.com??
Not flaming you I just think his best course of action to get Stealins attention is to TAKE THE MONEY BACK!!!

Hi,

Sorry to hear about your troubles.

I would speak to the credit card companies, they are very good at getting your money back for purchases that do not match the description / warrenty offered to when you purchased it. i.e. the start of your contract with Stillen.

The CC Companies will credit you, normally within the first initial investigation (normally 1-2 weeks) . And then try and get the money back for themselves from Stillen. So you dont need to worry about it :D

I have done it many times without problem. I think the suppliers are s**t scared of VISA / AMEX etc and wont want to lose their ability to use their service. :icon6:

I have found that even mentioning that you are going to use your rights to a refund from your Credit Card, this normally causes a positive response from a supplier.

Good luck.

Andy

Actually there is webpage dedicated to hatred of Stillen and even on that webpage the author says that he contact Steve Millen personally and got an issue resolved. Here is the webpage http://www.stillensucks.com/stillensuckshomepage.htm
and here is the link to the article in which Steve Millen himself got pissed about an issue with one of their products. Sort of...

http://www.stillensucks.com/rear_stb.htm

This is the wifey here: Thank you all for your suggestions. They are excellent suggestions and I will be looking into all of the avenues mentioned. It's just such a pisser that we have to do this on our vacation. Of note, after my tears and minor hysteria, stillen CS offered to pay for the cost of us to overnight the blower to them. One minor battle won....on to the next one.
Also, one of the things I intend to do is to file a complaint with the BBB. They are a BBB member and I checked their record and they only had one complaint on record. Not to be a nag, but considering the number of disgruntled and extremely annoyed opinions, I do urge you all to at least file a complaint with BBB so that some sort of picture is apparent to the unsuspecting. :)

Yeah there aren't TOO many BBB businesses that have a website dedicated to their horrible service

I will never purchase anything from Stillen! I gaurantee you they get 100's of calls each year from "clients" who's parts do not perform at all, or up to advertised expectations. I bet they label these cases as "customer installation error" or some such write-off of a sorry a$$ excuse and roll their eyes while they're doing their very best to resolve the problem....yeah right!

On the Maxima forums, the most horsepower I ever saw produced by their headers was 4hp and they advertise almost 5 times that. On average the gain was zero!

my boss before I was in the navy was president and CEO of a multimillion dollar real estate training corporation, and if you called him, you got to talk to him, period. :)

Was he the president of Stillen?No?Ok then...He was one of the few people that actually cared and believed in the old motto "if you want something done right, do it yourself"..Stillen is a DOUCHEBAG..Period...I met him at a convention and he is a cocky prick who is worth Millions and knows it, and does not care about you,only your $$$$ you will give to him..
Their product claims are rediculous,their technical service is a laughing stock, and their products are cheap *** knock offs of REAL companies stuff. They will promise you the world when you are giving them your credit card info, but once they got your money it's a whole different ball game.
For a company that offers a 3year warranty on the ENGINE with their blower (cant wait to see the first person that has to try and take them up on that one:rolleyes: ) and claims to have "THE BEST" supercharger available for the 350Z, they sure seem to be more concearned about saving $$$ than saving face.
With claims like that they should send him a new blower no questions asked and pay for the install and removal of THEIR defective product that they claim to stand behind so well.
I have an ATI blower and can say that their customer service has been outstanding and the best I have ever seen in a company. Anything I break they fix either for free or cost, and they pay shipping FED-EX to me!!!Unheard of man..

PS read that Stillen sucks website its funny!!

Well said :icon18:

just pointing out that not everyone who owns a company is a douchebag :\

Another Update

We took the blower off and sent it back to Stillen, along with the belt they sent me a week ago (it was already worn after only 25 miles of driving).

Blower was faulty, a bearing was seizing up. They are sending new blower, gasket, belt and some locktite, overnight for Saturday.

Couple of good things to add:
* they offered to reimburse me for overnight shipping of the blower to them (I paid this to date)
* they offered to reimburse me for labour to take the blower off (I paid this to date)
* they offered to reimburse me for labour to put the blower back on (probably will be done early next week)
* I'll still have to pay for another dyno (at this point, it is a necessity)

So, if they live up to their offer, bottom line costs will be...

* Compression test and basic inspection @ $102.68 (me)
* Dyno @ $75 (me)
* Return belt and tensioner to Stillen (shipping) @ $10 (me)
* Ship new belt and tensioner overnight @ $?? (Stillen)
* SC tensioner and belt re-install @ $67.25 (me)
* Blower removal @ $271.95 (Stillen -- offered)
* Blower overnight shipping TO Stillen @ $138.44 (Stillen -- offered)
* Blower (new) overnight shipping FROM Stillen @ $??? (Stillen)
* Blower re-install @ $??? (Stillen -- offered)
* Another dyno @ $75 (me)

So, bottom line, if they live up to their offer, it may turn out okay for both parties.

Unfortunately, there is no way for them to compensate me for: a) not having a car for about two weeks, and b) ruining my 2-week vacation plans (yeah, I'm on vacation till after Labour Day).

Another unfortunate thing is that this whole thing feels like it had to pulled out of them, not unlike pulling teeth.

I'll keep you guys informed, as usual...

The new blower was installed with belt, gasket, etc. The belt was still quealing and (most likely) slipping. We applied belt dressing to it, per instructions from Marshall@Stillen and the squealing seems to be gone. However, most likely, belt is still slipping.

I measured 2.84psi immediate boost, and 4.26psi boost at redline. Again, too low.

They (Stillen) will send new drive pulley assembly (yup, the pulley attached to the drive belt) in a week or so, and then we'll replace that, as well as put back my stock cats (oh, well, was gonna do that anyway). I'm even considering putting back the stock airbox (still got the AEM) in hopes of reducing the whine noise.

Another thing we'll try is measuring boost with another gauge, just to remove the possibility of a faulty gauge/sensor (however, dyno number don't lie -- but I'll go with what Stillen says).

That'd be it for now... will be back in few weeks with another update.

**** i just bought stillen test pipes :(

I ordered a strut tower brace for my brothers christmas present last year, it still hasnt come from stillen yet. All they did when i called was tell me taht the machine shop was putting it off. I called back a month later and they transfered me to customer service. It was horrible, i still dont have the strut bar.

you cant just say that stillen is horrible based on one isolated incident, maybe the RT cats have failed?

Have you checked?

Maybe it is a bad blowaaahh

Hey Stillen sucks big time if you feel this is the only complaint they have had so far your wrong. Half of maxima.org got ripped off by them with headers for a 2002-2003 maxima including me. The customer support is good until you have a problem, and their so called techs cant tell a hole in the engine from a hole in their a$$. Thats why nothing gets fixed by them ever while they guess for a answer.

Thanks Glen:icon14:

Wow, I just read this thread for the first time am truly amused again. I am the owner and creator of the website - www.stillensucks.com

Bascelik - I think your wife contacted me about Steve Millen's email address. Unfotunately, I did not have it and was not able to help out. If I had that address, I sure would be using it a lot.

I hope that everything works out for you, but it sure looks like it is going to leave a bad taste in your mouth.

In regards to the BBB complaint; I cannot absolutely verify it at the moment, but one 300ZXTT member on www.twinturbo.net, did reach a settlement with Stillen. I am not sure whether the BBB was involved in that case, but they may have been. I've had a chance to meet this guy, Jo Wynn and he is my hero based on actually taking some serious action against Stillen and getting a settlement out of it. See the pasted post below from twinturbo.net.

Oh and btw, Jo was one of Stillen's better customers as I believe he spent over $100K with them. I think he bought a fully loaded SUV from them as well as a ton of mods for his 300ZXTT.





Subject REMEMBER ME?! .......Stillen's biggest sucker.

Posted by KingRameZX on March 17, 2003 at 7:30 PM
This message has been viewed 531 times.


Message

Actually, I think I fall into the legend catagory floating around in the Z community as being the guy that got hosed by Stillen the most.
Well it's been almost a year and a half now since my "ordeal" with my Nissan Nemesis (Stillen), and with a phone call to Consumer Affairs, a couple months of investigation, four citations on my case alone, a hefty check for my pain and suffering, and a healthy baby girl, I finally have the Z out of the shop of my choice shop...A different shop of course. As it turned out I had a bad valve in the #1 cylinder, and a scorned wall in the #5 cylinder. Apparently the scorned wall was there for a while, probably before I bought the car, but I never had any bad engine vibrations. Stillen never told me about it when they built it, nor did they tell me about the free-spinning Camgear they reinstalled that was attached by the bolt, and not catching the groove of the inset pin on the inside. Other than that, everything else seemed okay. There was also the BIG question of them installing everything I payed for, seeing that I caught TWO different parts not installed on different occasions. After my mechanic inspected the block, it looks like the JE Pistons were in place, along with the other things I payed for.

As for my transmission problem, it turned out that the spleen (inside the torque converter) was stripped to high heaven. Stillen didn't catch it, nor did Level 10, and they were the guys that built it for me. It's kind of funny though when it happened, because all my problems started when I was on my way to Stillen to have them install the tranny cooler they didn't install in the first place. Some time later, Gregg Dupree referred me to a transmission guy out in Simi Valley that did great work. He found the problem and fixed it in a week.

For the engine rebuild, I went with Japanese Engine Racing. Lihn imports all types of engines, and can import anything, including other high performance engine parts, much like speedlab did. Anyway, it took less than a week to get it back together, and I managed to install my additional injector kit. I also had the EVC IV installed, but there was a problem with the harness, so I need to get that fixed before I can install it.

Now I have to put some miles on it, bleed in the brakes, and get another color sanding done. Next'll be a redo on the interior and rims. After I get the EVC and additional injectors tuned, I'll take it to the track with you SoCal regulars.

Until then, see you at the Motorsport show in April.

I'm trying to post exactly what I see. I may have gotten emotional in few posts, but I think I'm keeping as objective as I can. The "bad blowaaahh" has been replaced and problem persists. Stock cats will be re-installed. I guess we'll see next week...

As Glenn says, no matter what, I'll have bad taste in my mouth after the ordeal. To those that are purchasing Stillen SC, my objective bottom line on it, is that it is not mod-friendly. Even if it works fine, you cannot replace headers, nor cats, for fear of losing boost. You cannot put CAI on, for fear of horrible sound on acceleration. I'm even wondering whether SAFC2 is causing problems with the piggy-back unit from Stillen's kit... Basically, I'm now afraid to add anything else but higher boost pulley. An aftermarket mod should not be like that.

Ask yourself these: What would it take for Stillen SC to make 400whp? How early on the tach would it achieve max torque/hp in such case? How much would the torque drop off by the time you are in 4K-6.5K RPM range (which is where you are when you're shifting gears)? How would it react to other mods? How would it react to an NO2 application? Where can one purchase higher boost pulleys -- well, say I want 9psi now, obviously I'm stuck with Stillen -- or, am I?

Now that you've pondered those, I think you'll come to the conclusion that Stillen is for those wishing simple, bolt-on, almost care-free application, which adds just enough power for a better power-cruiser. It will never stand up to turbo or centrifugal SCs, as their power is realized where it is needed (high RPM). But it's ideal for cruising -- kinda like Harley of the Z mods. Which is why this ordeal is bothering me -- I got something that's least intended to be a problem, actually become a problem.

Update - new lower pulley, stock cats back
 

Alright, here comes another update on this issue. Per talk with Stillen support (Marshal), I got new lower pulley from them, new belt, and was instructed to replace stock cats back on. I did all of that just yesterday.

The result is: back at square one. Yes, belt slippage is less, but still audible. Yes, redline boost is now at 5.4-5.8psi (0.38-0.41kg/cm3), but immediate boost is still at only 2.84psi (0.2kg/cm3). Car dynoed at 260rwhp/240rwtq after tuning with SAFC2. Probably worse (acc'ding to the shop, running VERY rich) on first pull (untuned).

Weird.

At this point, I only have: Stillen SC, AEM short-ram intake, Borla TD cat-back, SAFC2, and 2 gauges (A/F & boost). I also have larger radiator (Blitz), but cannot see how that relates.

On the SC, we replaced: blower, belt, tensioner, lower pulley.

Reimbursement: As you may recall, Stillen offered to reimburse me for this troubleshooting (I listed the items in previous post). So far, I was only reimbursed for original blower removal. Shipping orig. blower to them, new blower install, lower pulley install, any other items... I'm still waiting...

FYI, RT cats were fine when we took them off. See through and all...

I'll be talking to Stillen to find out what the next step is, since I exhausted all options. I'm thinking the engine was damaged at some point, that could be the only reason kit is not working at this point. However, since it was stock motor prior to the kit install, only the kit itself could have damaged the motor. Hence, it still remains problem with Stillen and their solution.

I'm not a greedy man. My vette was pushing a little over 300 at the wheels and I was plenty happy. My only change for the Z (besides the f'ing rattles) is more power. I would love to be back at 300 to 320 rwhp.

My understanding is that is what the Stillen is supposed to do. I am really interested to see how yours turns out. I would rather have a worry free set up with less power -300 to 320rwhp, than the costs and troubles of building a 375+rwhp monster.

I really hope your F/I situation works out. I would hate to have to fight the same battle. Keep us posted!

Good luck buddy!