[HardtailHack]

Hopefully there are some guys and girls knowledgable about modifying cars on here.

I am tempted to go to from my normal air to air intercooler to a water to air sorta setup. My car currently has the intercooler wedged between the Condensor and the radiator instead of being out front as usual.

What I want to do is use the stock intercooler as the fluid filled heat exchanger, I can put a reducer on the intercooler in/outlets to allow fitment of smaller coolant lines and I already have a Davies Craig electric water pump doing nothing so I can use that.

Does anyone think it will work or will using the standard cooler full of water cause dramas?

 

[ridiculous]

A cooler full of pure water will turn to steam and steam will be bad for that cooler.

 

[Westy]

Just dump some nitrous into the air vents.

 

[BadDNA]

Hopefully there are some guys and girls knowledgable about modifying cars on here.

I am tempted to go to from my normal air to air intercooler to a water to air sorta setup. My car currently has the intercooler wedged between the Condensor and the radiator instead of being out front as usual.

What I want to do is use the stock intercooler as the fluid filled heat exchanger, I can put a reducer on the intercooler in/outlets to allow fitment of smaller coolant lines and I already have a Davies Craig electric water pump doing nothing so I can use that.

Does anyone think it will work or will using the standard cooler full of water cause dramas?

If you fill your intercooler with water where do you think your charge air is going to flow? What you would need to do, for what you are thinking about is encase your intercooler in a box and fill the box with water. What you really want to do is build a small mister that sprays the outside of the intercooler with just a little water or a water alcohol mix. That will draw more heat out of the charge air as it evaporates than just a passive air/air intercooler. Of course you need a reservoir for the mister, a pump, plumbing and a nozzle and this isn't something you'd use all the time, probably only at the race track for example.

 

[Sandwich]

better idea, find a way to plumb your intercooler to the front of your engine instead of sandwiched between other coolers. If you have a remotely performance minded car, the cheapest and best upgrade will be a pre-fabbed FMIC....otherwise you're just adding weight to your car, and there's no way an air-air (intecooler) chiller will be as efficient as an air-water (radiator) cooler.

I've never understood some people's desire to switch to air-water intercooling. it adds weight and lowers efficiency. Is this some recent v-tec inspired nonsense? All the big turbo cars have air-air coolers...

 

[DirtyMike]

I gotta ask..... whaqt kind of car is setup like that?

Sounds like nothing but bad idea all around. No it wont work, your inner cooler wasnt designed to hold water inside of it....

It was said here already.... replumb the innercooler<sounds like someone did it wrong to begin with or its a really ****ty small one> Or go with a nice aftermarket that is bigger and better.... the water mist idea is a good one, but like already said no difference unless your really really pushing the car....

 

[C.P.]

your engine will run much cooler, now that you have two radiators

 

[jimmydean]

Try it now!

 

[kazlx]

Like stated above. Bad idea all around and you are wasting your time. You would be better off with a custom front mount air to air. It will be simple and quite a bit more efficient in the long run. It would be quite a bit cheaper to just run an air to air cooler and a methanol injection kit if you really want to push your setup.

 

[MTB_Rob_NC]

I've never understood some people's desire to switch to air-water intercooling. it adds weight and lowers efficiency. Is this some recent v-tec inspired nonsense? All the big turbo cars have air-air coolers...

It works very well in short racing situations (IE... mainly drag racing, but I have seen the application on short rally stages and hill climbs).

If you have a street car the water/alcohol spritzer works well, or even better a NO2 kit. For the purposes of a IC sprayer I bet you could find a cheap NO2 kit for under $100

 

[ALEXIS_DH]

naws it!

 

[Sandwich]

It works very well in short racing situations (IE... mainly drag racing, but I have seen the application on short rally stages and hill climbs).

If you have a street car the water/alcohol spritzer works well, or even better a NO2 kit. For the purposes of a IC sprayer I bet you could find a cheap NO2 kit for under $100

Huh, i thought it was mainly used in applications where good airflow or packaging was not possible...like on a ultra-tight midengined car or on some trucks.

 

[stoney]

This just sounds like a bad idea. I'm with DirtyMike on this, what kind of car are you looking to 'mod'?

 

[Arkayne]

Use your AC system! Super Koald!!

 

[MTB_Rob_NC]

Huh, i thought it was mainly used in applications where good airflow or packaging was not possible...like on a ultra-tight midengined car or on some trucks.

Maybe but I was thinking of the "effective uses." The easiest example is drag racing. So you have the air to water intercooler. After each run you dump the water and refill it with ice & water which chills the intercooler core.

 

[dante]

Moar fins!!!!

 

[IH8Rice]

What you really want to do is build a small mister that sprays the outside of the intercooler with just a little water or a water alcohol mix.
Of course you need a reservoir for the mister, a pump, plumbing and a nozzle and this isn't something you'd use all the time, probably only at the race track for example.

NOS or C02 works better

 

[HardtailHack]

Use your AC system! Super Koald!!

Yeah thats what Ford use on the lightning, they cool the water to airs resevoir by circulating refiridgerant.

I didn't want to list the make of car, it's a Volvo S60 T5, so it's a 1500kg FWD open diff waste of space but I own it and it needs to be a bit faster.

To the people that said the intercooler isn't supposed to hold water, all I would have to do is put some Redline Water Wetter in it and plumb in a radiator cap to stop the cooler going pop. I understand it wouldnt be as good as a pupose designed unit but it still used to radiate heat so in theory it should work with water.

This is a normal kit and all I want to replace is the radiator looking thing, so for the people that don't know the barrel looking thing becomes your intercooler. If you use a barrel cooler you can get your post turbo intake pipe much shorter which helps boost response and they supposedly cool as well as a normal air to air intercooler.

Later on I will add a water meth injection system I just have to work out how to steal an injector signal without damaging wiring.

 

[kazlx]

Where are you going to plumb the intake charge through the cooler? Are you going to modify the cooler? If you can TIG it yourself, you might save money if it works. If not and you have to pay for fabrication, you might as well just buy what you need and save yourself the headache. All but a a select few factory cars use air to air coolers for a reason.

Also, for a meth injection setup you don't need to steal an injector signal. You inject into the manifold just like a nitrous system and use a boost switch (manifold vacuum) to tell it when to come on.

http://www.snowperformance.net/product.php?pk=9

 

[bean]

Yeah thats what Ford use on the lightning, they cool the water to airs resevoir by circulating refiridgerant.

I didn't want to list the make of car, it's a Volvo S60 T5, so it's a 1500kg FWD open diff waste of space but I own it and it needs to be a bit faster.

To the people that said the intercooler isn't supposed to hold water, all I would have to do is put some Redline Water Wetter in it and plumb in a radiator cap to stop the cooler going pop. I understand it wouldnt be as good as a pupose designed unit but it still used to radiate heat so in theory it should work with water.

This is a normal kit and all I want to replace is the radiator looking thing, so for the people that don't know the barrel looking thing becomes your intercooler. If you use a barrel cooler you can get your post turbo intake pipe much shorter which helps boost response and they supposedly cool as well as a normal air to air intercooler.

Later on I will add a water meth injection system I just have to work out how to steal an injector signal without damaging wiring.

Ignoring the fact that none of the above makes any sense, you realize that simply increasing the cooling capacity of your intercooler isn't going to make the car any faster unless your intake temps are already too high, right?

If you want to make it faster, tune the ECU for more boost. If you're running out of cooling capacity from your intercooler at that point, get a bigger FMIC. You can pick up a cheap one on ebay. If you're tuning the ECU and installing the FMIC you may as well do exhaust and perhaps an intake.

 

[kazlx]

Ignoring the fact that none of the above makes any sense, you realize that simply increasing the cooling capacity of your intercooler isn't going to make the car any faster unless your intake temps are already too high, right?

If you want to make it faster, tune the ECU for more boost. If you're running out of cooling capacity from your intercooler at that point, get a bigger FMIC. You can pick up a cheap one on ebay. If you're tuning the ECU and installing the FMIC you may as well do exhaust and perhaps an intake.

True dat.

Do you see where your issue lies from the illustrations above? You are trying to re-invent the wheel, but your wheel is a square. On your car, you are wasting your time. Try tuning for more boost, different turbo, aftermarket exhaust, aftermarket intake. There are a million things that will get you more power for less money and not have you end up with a non running turd that takes up your parents driveway.

 

[HardtailHack]

you realize that simply increasing the cooling capacity of your intercooler isn't going to make the car any faster unless your intake temps are already too high, right?

Yeah I do realise that, I live in Australia it is pretty warm over here, if what I want to do fails I just buy the proper heat exchanger and be done with it.

For the water meth I do need an injector signal as I will be using a single fuel injector slightly smaller than than the stock injectors. Running 2% macininsts oil in the mix will stop the injector from siezing and engines have no trouble burning the tiny bit of oil.

I was going to make a MAF based water/meth injection system but it meant I needed a freq to freq convertor to give me the correct input for the injector driver.
Doing it how I plan to all I need is an injector signal and a boost swith and the water meth injection will follow the fuel mapping perfectly.


To kazlx, the bottom pic is pretty much what I post(forgot to add link, oops) but a different shape, my car is know to heat the intake charge by a number of degrees at full bost in stock trim and putting a decent cooler on a stock car does bring decent power gains.

Later on I will make a dump pipe and exhaust but that won't be until a decent tune is released for my car, as the standard computer has trouble coping when a free flowing dump pipe is added.

 

[splat]

why not just put 1.21 Gigawatts through a Flux capacitor! that will give you better performance

 

[DirtyMike]

Yeah I do realise that, I live in Australia it is pretty warm over here, if what I want to do fails I just buy the proper heat exchanger and be done with it.

For the water meth I do need an injector signal as I will be using a single fuel injector slightly smaller than than the stock injectors. Running 2% macininsts oil in the mix will stop the injector from siezing and engines have no trouble burning the tiny bit of oil.

I was going to make a MAF based water/meth injection system but it meant I needed a freq to freq convertor to give me the correct input for the injector driver.
Doing it how I plan to all I need is an injector signal and a boost swith and the water meth injection will follow the fuel mapping perfectly.


To kazlx, the bottom pic is pretty much what I post(forgot to add link, oops) but a different shape, my car is know to heat the intake charge by a number of degrees at full bost in stock trim and putting a decent cooler on a stock car does bring decent power gains.

Later on I will make a dump pipe and exhaust but that won't be until a decent tune is released for my car, as the standard computer has trouble coping when a free flowing dump pipe is added.

I get what your trying to do now..... but you are mistaken. Just swapping the innercooler isnt going to give you any more power.



You want more power, better pick, more speed, more top end etc etc....

I will tell you exactly were to start..... tune the PCM. three hundred well spent. You can increase the boost, lower the running temp<via fan control and a thermostat> change the fuel strategy, change the inginiton strategy, change teh shift strategy.........

Seriously... on that vehicle raising boost should be as simple as changing the strategy on the electronic waste gate, drop a 10 Tsat in it, tell the fans to come on sooner...... You will gain a very noticable amount of power, commanding the fans on sooner< or with any boost> will decrease your intake air charge temp....... All without any modifications to the car at all.


In a responce to your Meth injection idea........... Just go with a regular kit, I see exactly how your wanting to set it up, I just know from trying crazy ass ideas like that, you are better off to use a standard kit instead of trying to build and program one all together.

 

[jimmydean]

Did you try it now?

 

[IH8Rice]

I didn't want to list the make of car, it's a Volvo S60 T5, so it's a 1500kg FWD open diff waste of space but I own it and it needs to be a bit faster.

they are fun cars but the turbo lag on them can be very annoying. my mother had a C70 with the T5 and it was fun. unfortunately there are only a few tuners working on volvo ecu's, particularly for non R models IIRC.
i wish my V70 was the 2.5T and not the 2.4slow.

 

[HardtailHack]

Cheers DirtyMike and IH8Rice for the constructive replies, I always struggle getting ideas into text, it works in my head so it should work on the net, LOL.

DirtyMike, my idea for the water meth may sound difficult but it is really easy, I already have an injector driver built that runs in a piggback(?) sorta setup but as I said I need to steal the signal and I would Ideally like to do it at a plug and make a flying loom sorta thing so I dont cut wires.
Also you can't mess with the boost solenoid on a Volvo as it some how works out it is running excessive boost and cuts power. I'm not sure if there are two pressure sensors or it has a max airflow cutoff limit but adding an E-Boost2 or similar only works for a couple of full throttle runs then it cuts power.

IH8Rice, the lag on the Vovos is all down to the tune, from what I read as soon as you give them a decent flash tune they have solid bottom end, fly by throttle wire is good for emissions and power specs but they are never fun to drive from the factory. Also with 98 octane fuel in OZ you can get a lot more midrange power without pinging when compared to the rubbish US fuel.

After inspecting my Intercooler I'm not sure it could cope with the weight of the water as it is only mounted using the end tanks which are the evil plastic crimped variety. I really don't want to put a front mount in it but I may have to, damn.

 

[IH8Rice]

IH8Rice, the lag on the Vovos is all down to the tune, from what I read as soon as you give them a decent flash tune they have solid bottom end, fly by throttle wire is good for emissions and power specs but they are never fun to drive from the factory. Also with 98 octane fuel in OZ you can get a lot more midrange power without pinging when compared to the rubbish US fuel.

absolutely. ive seen what it can do with a R model, so im sure if you can find one for you T5, itll make the biggest difference you can do to your car. turbo cars always have a ton of potential with a new flash, but with the Volvo's, its actually pretty massive.
yeah, that 98 octane is pretty sweet for making moar power. there are a handful of gas stations that sell 98 around here but they are becoming more and more scarce. 93/94 is the typical that we can find stateside....

 

[DirtyMike]

..........
Also you can't mess with the boost solenoid on a Volvo as it some how works out it is running excessive boost and cuts power. I'm not sure if there are two pressure sensors or it has a max airflow cutoff limit but adding an E-Boost2 or similar only works for a couple of full throttle runs then it cuts power.

.

You dont touch the boost solenoid....... You tell the PCM to make more. The turbo on there works, the pcm controls the boost via electronic waste gate. its all in the programming.

 

[c85r86]

Wow! Reading some of the other comments throughout this thread and I am amazed. I would not trust much of it, you all don't even understand what was originally being asked! I digress! I don't know if your old intercooler will work well or not for cooling the coolant that will be running through your air-water cooler. The fluid dynamics of air vs. water will be quite a bit different. Your coolant will not turn to steam in your old intercooler unless you are running insane temps. for long periods of time. You will want to make sure that you leave room in the coolant resvoir bottle so that the coolant has room to thermally expand, i.e. same principle as a radiator overflow bottle. Typically an air-to-water intercooler will flow better than a comparable air-to-air (very much so depending on size). Wate-to-air intercooler systems can get "heat soaked" after long periods of hard driving; just means that your heat exchanger can't keep up and in this case the air-to-air wins the arguement. If you can get away with an air-to-water setup, it offers you advanges that can't be matched by the air-to-air such as dumping in ice water (or antifreeze cooled to below freezing) just before a race event. One other thing to keep in mind is if you do have success using you old intercooler as a coolant heat exchanger, they are typically made from aluminum, so you'll want to run some type of additive in your water to eliminate any corrosive reaction. There are advantages and disadantages for both type of systems. Just depends on how creative and how much money you want to spend. I run 35-40 pounds of boost (Garrett VGT turbo) and when the funds are there will definately be switching to a air-to-water system. Try It! Worst thing that will happen is that you'll have to buy a specific heat exchanger for your system and ditch your old intercooler.

 

[Mr Jones]

Wow! Reading some of the other comments throughout this thread and I am amazed. I would not trust much of it, you all don't even understand what was originally being asked! I digress! I don't know if your old intercooler will work well or not for cooling the coolant that will be running through your air-water cooler. The fluid dynamics of air vs. water will be quite a bit different. Your coolant will not turn to steam in your old intercooler unless you are running insane temps. for long periods of time. You will want to make sure that you leave room in the coolant resvoir bottle so that the coolant has room to thermally expand, i.e. same principle as a radiator overflow bottle. Typically an air-to-water intercooler will flow better than a comparable air-to-air (very much so depending on size). Wate-to-air intercooler systems can get "heat soaked" after long periods of hard driving; just means that your heat exchanger can't keep up and in this case the air-to-air wins the arguement. If you can get away with an air-to-water setup, it offers you advanges that can't be matched by the air-to-air such as dumping in ice water (or antifreeze cooled to below freezing) just before a race event. One other thing to keep in mind is if you do have success using you old intercooler as a coolant heat exchanger, they are typically made from aluminum, so you'll want to run some type of additive in your water to eliminate any corrosive reaction. There are advantages and disadantages for both type of systems. Just depends on how creative and how much money you want to spend. I run 35-40 pounds of boost (Garrett VGT turbo) and when the funds are there will definately be switching to a air-to-water system. Try It! Worst thing that will happen is that you'll have to buy a specific heat exchanger for your system and ditch your old intercooler.

wow, hell of a first post. Welcome to Ridemonkey

 

[DirtyMike]

Wow! Reading some of the other comments throughout this thread and I am amazed. I would not trust much of it, you all don't even understand what was originally being asked! I digress! I don't know if your old intercooler will work well or not for cooling the coolant that will be running through your air-water cooler. The fluid dynamics of air vs. water will be quite a bit different. Your coolant will not turn to steam in your old intercooler unless you are running insane temps. for long periods of time. You will want to make sure that you leave room in the coolant resvoir bottle so that the coolant has room to thermally expand, i.e. same principle as a radiator overflow bottle. Typically an air-to-water intercooler will flow better than a comparable air-to-air (very much so depending on size). Wate-to-air intercooler systems can get "heat soaked" after long periods of hard driving; just means that your heat exchanger can't keep up and in this case the air-to-air wins the arguement. If you can get away with an air-to-water setup, it offers you advanges that can't be matched by the air-to-air such as dumping in ice water (or antifreeze cooled to below freezing) just before a race event. One other thing to keep in mind is if you do have success using you old intercooler as a coolant heat exchanger, they are typically made from aluminum, so you'll want to run some type of additive in your water to eliminate any corrosive reaction. There are advantages and disadantages for both type of systems. Just depends on how creative and how much money you want to spend. I run 35-40 pounds of boost (Garrett VGT turbo) and when the funds are there will definately be switching to a air-to-water system. Try It! Worst thing that will happen is that you'll have to buy a specific heat exchanger for your system and ditch your old intercooler.

TLDR.....

I saw most of us dont have a clue...... thats all I read, most of us knew exactly what he was talking about, we just digressed there was a better way to do what he was wanting for a final outcome.

I know exactly what is going on in this particular vehicle, I know exactly how to fix the turbo lag, I know exactly how to make it faster, quicker, more take off power, more top end Etc Etc.

I still after seeing this thread pop back up, go to the first step before spending a ****load of money to try and reinvent the wheel, just start off with getting the PCM reprogramed and be very happy with the outcome without crazy modifications, or strange wiring setups, or anything like that.