What to do air/air of air/water intercooler?

Status
Not open for further replies.

rzimmerl

Registered User
Its finally time to upgrade from the double to something a little larger. I just can't decide which way to go. They both can be built for around the same cost so thats not a factor. Give me some opinions and data if you got it...
 
well from what i have read. The air to water is better , but their is more maintenance on the water to air cooler. I plan on doing one myself here soon, after i get all my hear to find parts. another good thing about water to air is you get a small rad with most kits, so you can use a bigger rad on the SC for more cooling + its cheaper.
 
A street driven car is always going to benefit the most from a high quality air to air intercooler. This because there is less complexity, and about the best performance you can get all the time. The only time a liquid/air intercooler can give you more bang is if you load it full of ice. That will allow the intercooler core to be below ambient air temp, giving a greater exchange of heat than what an air to air system can ever do.

About the only time that's useful is at a drag strip, or maybe a shorter auto cross course.

down side to the air/air intercooler? Interferes with standard cooling system as it sits in front of the radiator and condenser.

down side to liquid/air intercooler? some interference with standard cooling system (still have to put the heat exchanger somewhere) and more complexity. (all the same of the air/to air plus plumbing and wiring for the pump and switch)

With the cost the same, I'd go air to air. I'm building a liquid system because I had an opportunity to get a intercooler core and the associated parts for much less than what a front mount would have cost at the time.
 
here is a link that might sell you on the water to air. http://www.frozenboost.com/stpg.php?page_id=water_to_air

i disagree with you on the water to air, yes you will have to put the heat exchanger rad on the car with the pump, and pluming. water to air with out a ice box is still better because of stop, n go traffic the Inter cooler Core will not get heat soaked like air to air sitting in traffic. even with out the ice box your air temp will be lower than air to air. on the sc. i have planed to use the Water to Air Intercooler DIY Kit 600 HP and put the heat rad in front of my condenser with the ten inch fan always running. now the real + in my opinion is that i will remove the stock rad, and ic. put the battery in the trunk of the car. the intercooler will mount where the battery was . that means shorter tubs also a + ..05 PSI drop is WOW lol. now with the stock rad, and ic gone i will be able to fit a full size rad which ever one knows better cooling is always a +.

just think about a pc processor and over clocking it. it will get hotter the higher you go up now air cooling is good, but when you want it to stay cool as possible you use water cooling.


the only bad thing about water to air is more maintenance, and the pumps suck, so go to summit racing and buy a electric water pump with the an fittings, and you will be good to go.

dude just check out the Bugatti Veyron it has a water to air inter cooler for a reason its better just my opinion though.
 
even with the air to air ic with a fan is not better, than water to air i use to be leave that air to air was the way to go, but not no more . i for got what web sit it was that did a test with air to air vs water to air. The test was done on the same car with a super charger, and temp moniting system was watching the air temps. it ended up being that the water to air was 15% better than a air to air with a fan on the ic. if i find it i will post it.
 
even with out the ice box your air temp will be lower than air to air.

That isn't physically possible since the medium being used to cool the liquid is the ambient air. Without some other source of cooling, you can't drop the temp of the liquid in a Air/Liquid system below the ambient air temperature of the surrounding air.

The coolest an air to air can get is ambient air temp. The coolest an liquid/air can get (without ice or other cooling method) is ambient air temp. The benefit of the liquid system is that water transfers heat better than air does. The total surface area required for similar temperature drop is less with a liquid cooler vs air.
 
For what it's worth, my air to air cools the air to approx. 15deg above ambient temps at 16psi boost at the end of the 1/4mile. I too thought about doing an air to water system, but the only benefit is being able to add ice to the system. Since I drive mine on the street, and didn't want to worry about adding water, adding ice, plumbing the water, and worrying about the water freezing and damaging the core at colder temperatures, I chose air to air. If it were a race-only set-up, I would do air to water.
 
Mike's right. The lowest air temperature an air-to-liquid (without the use of ice) or air-to-air can get is ambient. Nothing is 100%, but ambient is the best that you will run into.

The heat exchanger for the water intercooler still requires air to cool the liquid; therefore, the liquid is subject to heat soak the same as the air-to-air intercoolers (to an extent.) The larger your heat exchanger or air-to-air intercooler is, the less prone it is to heat soak.

The advantage of a liquid-to-air intercooler is you can potentially have intake temperatures below ambient temperatures. Other than that, and given that you have a sufficient sized heat exchanger/air-to-air core, you will result in a similar intake temperature.
 
Last edited:
your right in that case, but having the heat exchanger on the front of the car with a fan that runs all the time will run cooler than air to air. if its 80 degrees out with the front mount heat exchanger , and a fan running on the heat ex you can cool it a few degrees lower than air temp , if it will work on a air to air why would it not work on the water to air. physics,,,,, water always cools better than air. its all about where that heat exchanger is located . I live where it gets cold out, so i would use a 50/50 mix with antifreeze , and in summer use water wetter with this system. now checking the fluid of a water to air system not very often, unless you have a water to air system that's sprays a mist on to the exchanger lol. water also transfers heat faster than air , and can cool faster , stay cool longer than air with the right set up. Now i may be wrong about a few things but it is physics, water cools better than air.
 
Last edited:
your right in that case, but having the heat exchanger on the front of the car with a fan that runs all the time will run cooler than cooler than air to air. if its 80 degrees out with the front mount heat exchanger , and a fan running on the heat ex you can cool it a few degrees lower than air temp.

I don't see how that is possible....lol
 
Last edited:
That isn't physically possible since the medium being used to cool the liquid is the ambient air. Without some other source of cooling, you can't drop the temp of the liquid in a Air/Liquid system below the ambient air temperature of the surrounding air.

The coolest an air to air can get is ambient air temp. The coolest an liquid/air can get (without ice or other cooling method) is ambient air temp. The benefit of the liquid system is that water transfers heat better than air does. The total surface area required for similar temperature drop is less with a liquid cooler vs air.



its done all the time . say its 90 degrees out side why do people use fans lol it cools the air be low ambient air temp i'm not blowing 90 d air on myself. as far as this application go's water cools better than air . its more efficient.
 
its done all the time . say its 90 degrees out side why do people use fans lol it cools the air be low ambient air temp i'm not blowing 90 d air on myself. as far as this application go's water cools better than air . its more efficient.

If it is 90 degrees outside and you have a fan blowing at you, you are blowing 90 degree air into your face. Where your face differs from a piece of steel is that your body uses a system of perspiration to promote evaporation. The increase of airflow over your body increases the rate of evaporation on your skin which leads to lowering skin temperatures. That's trait of humans, not heat exchangers on cars. I.e., -20 degree (F) day in the winter with a -60 (f) wind chill feels like -60 to our skin, but it's only -20 as far as the radiator on your car is concerned.

and a fan running on the heat ex you can cool it a few degrees lower than air temp

That will never happen. The heat from the fluid is transferred to the heat exchanger which transfers the heat to the ambient air as it is flowing through the heat exchanger (either with the help of a fan or not). Once the fluid inside the heat exchanger reaches the same temperature of the ambient air, no more heat transfer will take place.

heat transfer occurs between two regions of differing temperature. Once both regions are at the same temperature there is no excess heat to transfer. Thus you can't get below ambient air temp. If you think you are, then your temp gauge is wrong.

Most Air To air intercoolers also have a fan, either the one on the radiator, or their own fan, which helps to cut down on stop and go driving heat soak, or recovery after a race.

water always cools better than air.
Water has greater heat capacity than air, but it can't get rid of any more heat than the exchange medium will take. As long as you are counting for ambient air to take the heat from the water, you'll never get the water temp below ambient air temp. Water weter works to reduce the surface tension of water so that more water is in contact with the surface of the heat exchanger, allowing it to pickup more heat from the intercooler and make more heat available at the heat exchanger.

Bell intercoolers has a good faq page:
http://www.bellintercoolers.com/pages/techFAQ.html

This wiki article may help you put into context the physics behind moving heat around.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convection
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conduction_(heat)
 
Last edited:
its done all the time . say its 90 degrees out side why do people use fans lol it cools the air be low ambient air temp i'm not blowing 90 d air on myself. as far as this application go's water cools better than air . its more efficient.

I actually laughed at that statement.

Mike beat me to the post, but he's 100% correct.

If you have a container of water in your fridge at 33degrees, does placing a fan and blowing air on that water make it freeze? I think not.
 
I actually laughed at that statement.

Mike beat me to the post, but he's 100% correct.

If you have a container of water in your fridge at 33degrees, does placing a fan and blowing air on that water make it freeze? I think not.

XXXXXXXX , and laughed maybe at your self. 33 degrees is already freezing the water if you where to actual put a little fan on a bowl of water it would freeze faster . why,, lets see your moving the colder air faster on too the water if you don't know now you do. lmao
 
Last edited by a moderator:
your crazy , and laughed maybe at your self. 33 degrees is already freezing the water if you where to actual put a little fan on a bowl of water it would freeze faster . why,, lets see your moving the colder air faster on too the water if you don't know now you do. lmao

You're not serious are you? I think (I know) you should rethink all of your statements in this thread. There are many people on this message board with impressive engineering backgrounds and degrees, some of which have already replied in this thread. I think you should trust their statements and leave your skewed idea of heat transfer fundamentals behind.....
 
lmao, ok then get a t -stat put it in front of a fan . if its 80 degrees out it should stay their right . that is if the movement of air from the fan is not cooler .
 
by moving air you cool it . that's physics . so i don,t really care about engines in here with a different opinion . PROVE IT. moving air at 45 M.P.H. airflow that lowers temperatures 10-30 degrees F
 
Last edited:
lmao, ok then get a t -stat put it in front of a fan . if its 80 degrees out it should stay their right . that is if the movement of air from the fan is not cooler .

Please stop with the examples....it's not helping your argument. Neither the air to air or the air to liquid intercooling system can cool the intake charge to less than ambient...unless using another means of removing heat, like ice or spraying Co2 on the core.

I do think a properly sized air to liquid intercooler system is superior to the air to air system. I remember when Chris Wise and I used to dyno our cars on a regular basis. With the liquid intercooler his motor made the same power (SAE corrected) all year round, where mine with the air to air intercooler would lose 25-35 rwhp (SAE corrected) in the summer.

His system was rated for something like 1200 HP and that is probably why it did such a good job. The cost to build his system was also a big factor because it was about double what a MP FMIC kit was selling for and required considerably more fabrication work to install.

I'm using air to air on both my cars, because it's much less complicated and it works good enough for how I use the cars.

David
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top