The age old conception is that with an intercooler that is more efficient than stock, you get more horsepower. How true is that? do you automatically get more horses, or does it just allow you to run higher levels of boost more densely and i.e safer? so not really a power gain more a safety gain? just wondering what the facts are, and in reality all the people you see running feck off fmic's are more show than go on a car on stock tubs etc. Obviously I understand, that at a certain point with bigger tubs etc , a larger intercooler is required to process an increased level of hotter air and lower that temperature to a safe level. However what I'm asking about here is stock or near stock cars.

the hole point of a inter cooler is to keep the Air Temp Charge as cool as ...

the Problem with a turbo is the more Boost the hotter the air charge gets

hot air mixed with fuel in the engine will give you less power

 

so yes if you change the intercooler on a stock car there will be an improvement to what point no one can say as each car would be different

but more boost = more heat .. Big no no

 

oh and bigger iC is really needed if the turbo is Flowing More air than stock tub .. this will help too

you don`t get more horsepower automatically that`s for sure :)

As well as making the intake temps cooler a larger cooler will also suck in alot more air this is obviously better

 

Pipe work is just as important aswell ideally you want the intercooler piping as short as possible kinda hard on a zed though and also larger diameter pipe work

Edited February 15, 201312 yr by 111mattin111

and dont do this ...

 

As well as making the intake temps cooler a larger cooler will also suck in alot more air this is obviously better

 

Pipe work is just as important aswell ideally you want the intercooler piping as short as possible kinda hard on a zed though and also larger diameter pipe work

 

The car can only suck in as much air as the air filter will allow and the diameter of the pipeing

too big of a cooler (volume inside) and it can actually cause a pressure drop on the initial spool up so can have negative effects on power.

too big of a cooler (volume inside) and it can actually cause a pressure drop on the initial spool up so can have negative effects on power.

 

Yea technically but would you actually feel the difference I've always fitted a front mount to all my cars the biggest I can and have never once made things worse always had better throttle response ect

The car can only suck in as much air as the air filter will allow and the diameter of the pipeing

 

That's why I said piping is just as important the larger the pipe work the more air it takes to fill them the more air will be forced into the engine from the turbo

 

Don't forget it's not like an NA where everything is coming through the filter the turbo is forcing air through the engine so the more that can be sucked in the better

 

That's also a thing alot of people seem to do they fit a small universal air filter the same that the guy down the road has fitted to his saxo alot of filters arnt upto the job of allowing enough air in really you should look for the flow capability of the filter you have fitted or are going to fit

Edited February 15, 201312 yr by 111mattin111

That's why I said piping is just as important the larger the pipe work the more air it takes to fill them the more air will be forced into the engine from the turbo

 

Don't forget it's not like an NA where everything is coming through the filter the turbo is forcing air through the engine so the more that can be sucked in the better

 

 

Isn't the air still going through the filter though?

 

ie. Air sucked through filter/filters by turbo/turbos which is then cooled by air passing through the I/C before cooled air entering throttle bodies?

 

or have I got that wrong?

Yup sucked through the air filter just edited my last post,

Filter > Turbo > Intercooler > Throttle bodies > Cylinders

 

the hole point with Intercoolers is to remove some of the restrictions of the standard setup when wanting more power

 

if your car is Running completely stock there would be very little gains in changing the IC to a bigger one

 

but when wanting more power ...

 

Filter is one of the first mods to be done

but bigger flowing filter with little more boost will make more heat .. put a bigger IC on then air charge temp comes down ... more power ...

to get even more power ... bigger pipes and so on

Ive always been worried that my intercooler is to big for my turbos due to pressure drop. But how can you tell or workout what the best size is for your set up? Ive got the 2.5" pipes using gt28rs turbos and a large fmic thats 4.5" wide. Bigger area of the intercooler should allow for a lot cooler temps but will my turbos create enough volume of air to fill my fmic to stop the pressure drop?

There seems to be so many pros and cons it just depends how you look at it.

that setup will be fine m8 ...

4.5" ic's on stock tubs+ 9psi boost will give u boost pressure loss and more Lag

The thing I'd ask is can you notice the drop in pressure ie does it feel more laggier, it's alright going by what it says in the theory side of things but its all down to how the car feels once you've fitted certain parts,

 

If you fit a larger intercooler or what ever and you feel it's sooo much more laggier then yea it's probably a little big but more times than not you will feel the gains, better throttle response, turbos spooling a little quicker ect,

 

Like I said I've always fitted large intercoolers and never had a problem,

 

Last weekend I fitted a large front mount to my bro's car it felt so much betters afterwards, it's set at 14.5 psi and before fitting it the boost would drop off towards the redline now it holds full boost all the way to the redline, it picks up alot better

 

This is just my opinion on things