only thing with front mount turbos is they make your underhood temps HOT

 

i ran 1.2 seconds faster and 10mph with a 75shot last year and i was letting off the juice around the 1000' mark, buddy did the same thing except only gained 8mph with a 75 shot

 

IMO the best way to get 12s and have room for improvement later on, cuz you will want to, its inevitable is...

6.0L LQ9 swap
FLT Level 5 4L65e - to handle all this power, if you go the the third stage I mention, you should probably get a 4L80e conversion
lt headers
off road y-pipe no cats
3 in pipe to magnaflow muffler dumped
cold air intake
descreened MAF sensor
MSD spark plugs
NGK plugs
MSD blaster coil-packs
4.10 LSD rear gears
good hooking tires
dyno tune
TR220/220 cam or bigger

then later you can put on a bigger cam and some performance heads

then after that you can do a forged 408 stroker for the 25+ psi of boost that the huge turbo that you put on it can put out

 

I've got a simillar truck, and have a Magnaflow Cat-back, AEM intake, and TT3000 converter. I ran 14.57 with the Hyperterch programmer, which is a far cry off what you're looking for. I also ran the same mods with a 100 Dry shot and it went a best of 13.43. I haven't ran it yet with the 6.0L. I would think about the Radix. I know that the Breeze ran in the 12's with his longbed and 5.3 with a few other boltons and stock 5.3 motor, ie. NO CAM or HEADS with the RADIX. I would expect simillar times from an ECSB.

 

So, if I had $5,000 to play with, should I go with a turbo or supercharger, or internal engine mods for the most power? I was thinking cam, exhaust, cold air, tune and turbo or S/C. I know I can't do all that for 5k but I might start with the turbo. I have a spare 5.3 I could build while I play with the turbo on my other engine. What are some realistic 1/4 and 1/8 mile times with turbo only.

 

for $5k on a 5.3 i would do:
pacesetterLTs and ORY and magnaflow catback 1k
cai 300-400 disregard if going with turbo
nelson mail order (unless you are close enough to him to get dyno tune) 400-500
4.10 lsd gears 700k installed
thats about 2.5k right there and save your money if you want forced induction cuz you will need a different cam for fi than n/a

i would go turbo if going fi but n/a has better bragging rights i think
sts is only 3k for base system so i would probably do that plus they have financing

a supercharger needs full exhaust system first for full production of power..

read the sticky in the forced induction section on types of forced induction
it will help you make your choice

 

adn if you do a turbo or supercharger you will need to upgrade your tranny

 

A member here named TxSilverado has a 01' or 02' ECSB 5.3L running a 13.8 in the 1/4 with stock heads, stock cam, and no power adder. All natural aspirated. The heads are O.E. never taken off the engine.
His mods: custom tune, TB stall, CAI kit, LT's, and accessory pullies.
A ECSB 5.3L can be easily pushed into the 12's with NO2. Though not my choice of a power adder.
It just depends on your choice of the right combination of simple bolt-on parts and a good well known custom tuner.
A custom Nelson Tune wins my vote!

Jim

 

Has anyone got or know of anyone that's running an ATI Procharger? I was considering buying one until I joined this forum and no one really mentions them. Am I better off going with a turbo? 04 ecsb 5.3

 

It all depends really. How much power are you looking to make?