Combining the power conservation principle as applied to the compressor, the turbine, the bearing housing and to the overall turbocharger, it has been shown that the thermal power transferred to the lubricating oil as well as to the environment has a relevant impact on the performance of the test article. In particular, it has been found that the algebraic sum of the aforementioned two thermal powers is roughly speaking 20–30% of the compressor total enthalpy change per unit of time m_ cDh0 c . This also means that the evaluation of both work transfer and efficiency under the assumption of adiabatic flow is largely affected by errors. Specifically, it has been shown that a 5–10% relative error can be easily made evaluating the compressor efficiency through classical expression based on the adiabatic assumption. Finally, the rig also allows the acquisition of the high frequency pressure and flow rate fluctuations typically occurring in unsteady phenomena like those characterising compressor surge. It has been documented that going from mild to deep surge regimes, the mass flow rate fluctuations increase more compared to the pressure ones.