There's no ride sweeter than one with power. When you can back up your appearance with performance, everyone will respect you on the street. And power makes your ride a ton more fun to drive. That's where a supercharger comes into play. The OEs have been offering them for years, but we can never seem to find one for the lowriders that we want to drive.
 Magnuson's new Radix supercharger...  Magnuson's new Radix supercharger is an inter-cooled Roots-style blower for EFI. |  It utilizes a rear inlet to...  It utilizes a rear inlet to fit under low hood lines. |  The intercooler sits in the...  The intercooler sits in the center of the sealed box-style intake manifold. The Radix blower sits on top of it and blows the air through the intercooler, adding horsepower and reliability. |
So, for our latest creation we went to the aftermarket specialists to find a blower for our 2003 Chevy Avalanche. We knew that we wanted a blower because the Avalanche's small 5.3L V-8 was struggling to move our crew from show to show. It needed a boost, so to speak. The crew at Magnuson Products (in Ventura, California), who make the "Magna Charger" line of Roots-style blowers, had what just we were looking for. Their Radix supercharger lineup is a bolt-on kit to fit under our hood and boost power up to 50-percent more than we had before!
What is a blower?
The term "blower" is confusing when spoken in "lowriderese." Although the big, polished aluminum superchargers, (known as "Roots-style" blowers) which you've traditionally seen poking through the hoods of hot-rods at the fairgrounds were once used to actually "blow" air in the literal sense, when they're bolted onto an engine their purpose changes entirely.
 Magnuson tests every blower...  Magnuson tests every blower that they build on one of their in-house test fixtures like this one. That way you can be sure that what you're getting won't leak and will perform as expected. |  The installation took an experienced...  The installation took an experienced crew the whole day to complete. If you're a first timer, plan on it taking a whole weekend. There's a lot to unplug/remove even before you can bolt on the blower, so be sure to label all of your wires and hoses to keep track of them. |  The factory fuel lines are...  The factory fuel lines are reused with the blower. Magnuson includes special clips to disconnect them from the stock fuel pressure regulator. |
The history of the Roots blower can be traced back more than 125 years when it was first patented by the Roots brothers back in 1860. Their original bi-rotor blower was not very successful in its intended purpose of driving a water wheel at their woolen mill. But they later found it to be very good at pumping large volumes of air into a local foundry's blast furnace. Since then, the Roots air blower has been used in many industrial applications, as well as being fitted to internal combustion engines since the early 20th century. The first recorded example of supercharging an automobile in the United States and the first supercharged car to win a race both date back to around 1907 at a blistering top speed of more than 100 mph!
 The factory intake manifold,...  The factory intake manifold, throttle body and injectors are all removed as a single unit. They're mostly made of plastic; so one guy can handle it easily. |  Here's the only spot where...  Here's the only spot where you may need to grind some extra clearance for the blower manifold to fit. It's on the back of the factory alternator bracket on some engines. Unfortunately, there's no way to know in advance if you'll need to grind without fit-checking the new system. |  Make sure that the intake...  Make sure that the intake ports are clean by vacuuming them out before dropping the new supercharger in place. |