I saw that watercooled intercooler thread earlier...

Do people ever use phase-change intercoolers?

You know, use the A/C system to cool the intercooler...

Is there an intercooler you can buy that would replace your A/C system's evaporator? I'm sure that would drop intake temps dramatically.

Just wondering because I used to make cooling systems for computers:
air cooling - decent
water cooling - slightly better
phase-change cooling - DOMINATION!!! SUB-ZERO TEMPS!

haha, what do you guys think? seen any before? pics maybe? would this work well?

 

Not exactly an answer, but I know there are CO2 injection kits to ICs, sprayed when you're on the dyno, or during spirited driving/racing etc.

Now if there's a reasonable (read: not dangerous, and not horribly expensive) way to do this, I'd be ALL over it

EDIT: Ahhh...the power of 2:30 am brainstorming Seriously man, great idea!

 

this reminds me of a movie where these 2 white chicks and an asian chick ran a shop. they dragged raced at night and had lots of soft **** sex. for some reason i just cant remember the name of it. but on to another note, does the power fc act like the stock ecu and switch the a/c off when your at wot?

 

i made my own CO2 IC sprayer out of home depot parts & a paintabll CO2 tank before they were on the market. i had a thread about it about a year ago.

 

just found an old pic of it...



anyways, back to the point of this thread....

screw co2....

im talking about a way to use the A/C system to cool the intercooler...

i don't want to do it. i just want to know if it's ever done. :\

 

Are you sure it was an actual movie.... or **** movie you were watching.....

 

i remember



her thing was messing with the a/c pushing colder air, but her system kept blowing up like a rotary.

 

Yea I remember that thread and that pic. Good stuff.

Why do you want to just know if it's been done? I say DO IT. You've obviously got the know-how, since you've made some for computer systems. I say make a larger system for an FD IC, and you'll make BANK

 

I remember reading an article somewhere where they routed the air con cooling lines through the intercooler somehow. It has definately been done, and is meant to work pretty well. (Which it would have to to negate the power drag of the air con compressor)

totally lost as to where I read it though...sorry

 

PM SPOautos. He was telling me about it a few months ago...

 

I dont think the benifit would outway the power it used up by the AC unit.

The only problem with the CO2 sprayer kits is, you have to make sure you dont get the CO2 in your intake, Not really to good for your car.

 

i knew one of the OE's was messing with this on one of thier concept vehicles, all i had to do was find the article. Ford did something like this with their F150 Lightning Concept vehicle. they used the AC system to cool a small volume of coolent in a separarate tank, and when it was cold enough a green light came on in the gauge cluster. the next time you went WOT, this supercooled coolant would circulate through the IC, netting roughlyf 50hp. here is a short article, i can't find any more.

http://www.ultimatecarpage.com/frame...hp&carnum=1629

 

i think it would be interesting to try this - but i don't have the $ to blow on experiments :\

i think it would be fun to make an intercooler that functioned as an evaporator for the a/c system :P just to see what sort of results came up. who wants to fund the project? haha

actually, if you modified the lines on that PWR Charge cooler, im sure it would function nicely as an evaporator....instead of pumpin water through it, just put it inloop with the A/C system...

read here if you wanna know about the basics - http://home.howstuffworks.com/ac2.htm
or
http://home.howstuffworks.com/refrigerator4.htm

or you could take a standard evaporator, then weld inlet & outlet shrouds on it...so air goes from the turbos - in one side, passes through the evaporators fins (getting cold) then goes out the other side - & into the throttle...

 

I know there was somebody on the Yahoo datalogit forum with an A/C intercooler setup. I dont know much about it, just remember reading a few of his notes on it.

 

The best way to run a setup like this is to not have AC hooked up blowing into the car. The reason is a setup like this is going to have to run in the winter and your not going to want to blow cold AC in the winter.

Also, I've talked to a guy that had his setup like this and if I'm not misstaken he ended up having to upgrade his compressor and condensor. This would make sense as our stock setup is barely sufficient just to cool off the car, much less 300degree charge temps. This setup is VERY complex, expensive, and experimental....just like anything else custom that you want done right. Personally if wouldnt mess with it, I'd just go with a V mount and be done with it. I'd do a liquid air before the ac, BUT the problem with a liquid air is that it takes a lot of space to do it RIGHT where it will cool for a high hp car thats driven hard on the street or wants to hit a road course. The heat exchanger technically needs to be bigger than the radiator but even if you just make it the size of the radiator to get the benifit it needs to go in front. If your going to do that you might as well run a fmic cause your still blocking the radiator.

Also keep in mind that the ac IC's build up condensation and drip, I dont know if any of your run at a drag strip but at my strip (which doesnt even do tech) they wont let you run on the track if your a/c is going because it drips condensation on the track.

Anyway, just thought I'd chime in and make a couple points.
Stephen

 

What about chilling the metal itself? I imagine (as mentioned above) something like a peltier on a processor. There are two things that would cause issues, the first being powering the peltier, and the second being the heat generated by the peltier (lord knows we need more heat under the hood). The upside is that you could just stick it to the top/sides/bottom of the IC and it would chill the aluminum. You should also be able to control the temps to keep condensation away.

Does anyone run a fan on an IC sucking air through? If so, does it make a significant impact on cooling the air going through?

 

Crazy idea...dunno if it would work...but could you run some type of closed-loop circulation of CO2 or NO2 through the core edges maybe, continually cooling it?

 

that may work, but it'd be better if you could have it expand as it goes through the IC. anyone that has ever played paintball or used a large tank of air and rapidly depressurized it knows that the expanding air is considerably colder than the surrounding environment. so to get a really good cool out of it, you'd have to figure out a way to expand the gas and then re-pressurize it to keep the loop going.

someone said something about computer cooling systems...why not use a compressed alcohol system, just on a larger scale? those things can get the processor down to sub-zero temperatures without slowing it down like with liquid nitrogen cooling.

 

I'm not sure I understand what liquid nitrogen does to slow anything down

While we're at it why not just encase the IC in a liquid-tight container and pour fluorinert in there?

 

Sorry, I don't have the equations but in very rough numbers you'd have to be able to cool over 300CFM from 200 degrees to 100 degrees.

That's a helluva lot of BTUs. An AC system that could handle that many BTUs would probably not fit under the hood and would probably drain more power running the pump than it makes by way of cooler air. And it would probably be heavy.

The main benefit of an air/water intercooler is usually in storing up cool water for use during the relatively short blasts of a street car (very rarely more than 30 seconds). You can go one better by refrigerating the water. It won't be able to keep up with continuous boost like in road racing but it's probably perfect for the street.

You can check out how this guy did it here:
http://www.mr2beast.com/RAWIC.htm

ed

 

Exactly edmcguirk...I figured it up at one point a long time ago but its been a couple years and I dont remember how many BTU's it is but I'm sure someone around here has the time. If you want to design a system good up to 400rwhp then your going to have around 750-800CFM going thru there. Depending on the boost level you should figure about 250-300 degree temps coming out of the turbo. Then you want to cool that down to at least ambient or else you might as well go with air to air. Your talking about dropping the temp of 800cfm by about 200degrees or more as it passes the IC. The BTU level that the intercooler has to absorb and transfer into another media is HUGE. If you go air to liquid you better have 4-5 gallons of water with a BIG heat exchanger because under long hard driving conditions it will heat up fast...thing road course or dyno session, ect.

The cooler for a computer probably doesnt even reject 100th of the amout of btu's that this will need to regect. This is why if you go with a AC system your more than likely gonig to need to upgrade the compressor and condensor, they just arent made for that kind of btu load. You need to get a system from a big van or something.

The thing is this...all the other systems like a/c, l/a, all have to eventually release the BTU's back into the air or else it wil just build up heat and be worthless...you might as well just run a air to air.

Stephen

 

The other systems will not just keep getting hotter. They will eventually reach equilibrium. An air/water IC will eventually reach an equilibrium that would be equivalent to an air/air IC the size of the water radiator minus efficiency.

The benefit is that the air/water IC will bank some cool water. As long as your boost periods are shorter than your recharge periods, air/water will be better than air/air.

Refrigerated systems have a better starting point but a longer recycle time.

The longer you boost, the more you want air/air. On the street or even a 15 second drag race, the refrigerated system is probably best but it is complicated to stop it from fighting itself when the water gets cooler than ambient temperature.

ed

 

Water injection, anyone?

-s-

 

A lot of people think that the main function of water injection is cooling the intake charge but the real benefits happen inside the combustion chamber.

The phase change to steam cools the charge further and the steam creates additional pressure inside the combustion chamber.

The water molecules do make some small catalytic contribution to the combustion process.

The water molecules interfere with detonation because they are mostly inert.

The water reduces the peak pressure (not ideal) but it extends the length of the pressure pulse (you need to adjust ignition timing to take full advantage).

All in all, water injection is a good addition to intercooling not a replacement.

ed

 

They only maintain a equilibrium when you have a constant temperature difference. In this case the temperatures are swinging wildly from ambient up to 300 degrees back and forth all the time. My point was if you didnt have a heat exchanger large enough to remove the heat then then the heat is going to keep building higher everytime you get into the boost. Sure if you have a tiney HE you might be ok if you only get into the boost for a few seconds every 20-30 minutes. But what about the situations I mentioned such as taking the car on a road course or tuning session? In those type situations if you want to beat out a air/air then your going to need a LARGE heat exchanger placed in front of the radiator that can remove all the heat. The only advantage a l/a has over air/air is the amout of btu's it can absorb before the water changes temperature above ambient. Once the temperature of the water increases above ambient you wont be able to run ambient charge temps. The water still has to be cooled by the air so either way your removing the heat with air, the liquid just delays that process for a short period of time untill the water heat up.

The only way a liquid air will have temps below ambient is if you get the water below ambient and the only way to do that is by adding ice. By using a heat exchanger and no ice your best temps are going to be ambient temps and to maintain those temps in a situation where your driving the car hard for an extended period of time will require a giant heat exchanger....even then I dont think you could keep ambient.