How-To add the SVT supercharger to a 5.4 N/A Engine
A few people have asked what to do to add the Lightning supercharger to their non aspirated 5.4, so mods please make this a sticky for the non-supercharged guys. Here is what you will need with approximate pricing with ranges based upon whether you find parts new or used.
1. Buy a Supercharger Assembly ($900-$1400)
You will need a supercharger assembly like those found on ebay. They typically come with the following parts:
- Intake (Plenum)
- Intercooler
- Fuel Rails
- Green Injectors
- Throttle body
- Coil Packs
- Wiring Harness
- sensors
2. Additional Parts ($1000-$2000)
*SV (Madferraristi) is a good source to get these parts from
- Heat Exchanger w/ all mounting hardware
- Accelerator/Cruise Cables
- Idler Pulleys (3)
- Idler Pulley bracket
- Water Pump and Fan Shroud or E-fan (recommend LFP)
- Lower Pulley w/ Harmonic Balancer or Aftermarket lower pulley kit
- Blower Belt
- Blower Tensioner Pulley
- EGR Tube
- Intercooler plumbing (4 tubes)
- L/HD Radiator Hose
- Rear heater hose
- Intercooler Resevoir (tank for coolant that mounts to fan shroud)
- Intercooler Electric Pump (pumps fluid from tank to heat exchanger)
- L or HD Alternator
- 90mm MAF Sensor
- Complete air intake kit (filter/airbox, fender boot, Intake boot).
- Tubes that go to air intake boot
- NGK TR6 Spark Plugs
- Minimum of 255 lph fuel pump
3. Tuning (~$300)
You have two choices on how to tune your truck. The easiest option is to order a custom tuned chip for your existing PCM. Chip + Tuning is usually about $300.
Your second option and the option I elected is to change out your PCM with a Lightning or Supercharged Harley PCM. This requires more work than is obvious to the naked eye, but gives you a cleaner install.
To make this install go by smoothly with no problems, you will need a few parts. First, you obviously need the PCM ($100-$300). Take your truck to a mod friendly dealership to install the PCM as they will have to setup your PATS (~$50). You can drive with your old PCM to the dealer as long as you are very careful with your driving habits.
You will also need two separate harnesses. The first harness you will need is the underhood harness ($100 used - $700 new). It can be a bear to swap out as I have done this. It runs completely around the engine bay.
The second harness runs from the underhood harness mentioned above and runs to the gas tank and tail lights (~$100). If you have an extended cab, you must purchase the harness from the Supercharged Harley as the Lightning harness will not reach to the tail lights.
4. Additional Notes
It may be a good idea to verify what type of tranny you have. I already had a 4r100 Heavy Duty tranny that came with my '01. If you do not have this tranny you may want to think about upgrading. Also, I would make sure to have at least 3.73 gears. You will want to open up your exhaust some. '01s have SI/DO (Single-In/Dual-Out) exhaust and I highly recommend having DI/DO exhaust.
If you are not in a crunch for money, you may want to purchase your performance upgrades in place of stock parts (Heat Exchanger, Larger lower pulley, E-Fan, etc.).
I did about 95% of this by myself, but it took me about 4 weeks as I had to track down parts, Information, etc. Don't expect to do this in a weekend. If you have not done this before, I would expect to run into some problems that may cause you some delay and headaches. If time down is an issue, you may want to consider a complete supercharger package such as an ATI. Also, most of the part #s can be found in the Part # list thread. If there are any you need help finding, let me know and I may have a record of it stored on my PC somewhere.
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