Intercooler on NA L28

[.]

Anyone got any opinions?


Of course you do. I mean anyone got any opinions whether adding an intercooler to an NA engine increases power? I guess the question is whether the drop in air temperature fully makes up for the added restriction to air flow. I guess thats why it works ok on turbos because the air is forced through?

[Zeddophile]

No point.  The intercooler works on a turbo because the turbo itself induces heat into the intake air as a byproduct of increasing its pressure, as well as from the housings themselves.

On a naturally aspirated car, all you'll do is give yourself a stupidly long intake tract, the bends in which will restrict flow.  I'll have to dig up the site I was on the other week, as it had some staggering figures on how much straight pipe one mandrel bend was equivalent to.  The intercooler will also pose a restriction due to its internal design.  Even on turbo cars, adding an intercooler where one wasn't before tends to give a pressure drop.

The equivalent of intercooling on an NA car is to feed in an efficient cold air duct which rams in air from the front of the car to the air filter.

[nizm0zed]

yea, just like that.....

[Zedman240]

Then just add one of those fake blow off valve speakers and the set will be complete! I think that will equal minus 10 Hp at least.

[Add]

So in other words its just a large cold air intake. IMO I think just a pod filter cold air intake would be better as it would force cold air in quicker. You could try it and provide feedback, results speak louder than misinformed opinions.

[mtopxsecret6]

ADD, how would a pod filter force air in over a flat panel filter? In an atmo engine, the intake will always be negative atmospheric pressure, the most it would be able to do would equal atmospheric pressure at full noise, the pod filter would create an equal amount of restriction as a flat panel, there's no gain to be had from flat to pod the two would have the same surface area as each other. In theory the front mount air filter would suck more cold air with a surface area of 16inch by 8.5inch, as opposed to a 2.5inch pipe as a feeder to a filter sitting in a hot engine bay in the first place. In theory it seems like it would work better.

Ive seen many track car with there pod filters hanging just below the front headlights in full flow of the air, for this same reason, full cooler air compared to the engine bay heat. They use a pod filter not because if flows better, but because it can suck air in a 360 degree direction, which a flat panel can't do, and would also be to big to setup as such as this.

If you were to go this far, you would cool your fuel with a little front mount cooler, to make the fuel more dense along with the air going into the combustion chamber. I have this setup on my 32.

You can buy spacer kits for inlet manifolds that cool the intake charge air that's supposed to work pretty well i here.

[RB30X]

With the holdens and LS1's, OTR's or over the radiator intakes were proven to increase quarter mile times due to the air being able to 'force' into the throttle body once the car was at speed. The actual surface area of the long skinny panel filter was approx half of the original panels surface area, so I could never understand how they improved performance so much......but still bought two.





By the way those pretend intercooler air filters are for transgender's with Excel's, to go with their electronic BOV's. Get a turbo so you can have an intercooler or stay away.

[Scando]

yea, just like that.....

bahahaha.  That's gotta be up there in the greatest rice mods of all time 

What about a pod filter at the front with the pipe back to the plenum going through a dry ice box?  It's highly dangerous and expensive for the results but would work 

[RB30X]

It would be easy and make more power to just use nitrous to cool intake air. Either that or get one of those car fridges and plum your intake air through that.

[Zedman240]

Nitrous is injetced into the cylinder because when it's burned, it creates oxygen which lets the petrol burn more efficientlyl; I've heard it called "chemical supercharging". I'm not sure if a very fine mist of water is sparyed near/on the intake air would cool it enough to make a difference..

Eh, just make sure your filter isn't around hot air and that should be enough!

[Add]

mtopxsecret6 read my last sentence that is my disclaimer.   

Was just thinking of alot of air being forced down a pipe into whatever setup is (efi/carb) being used. My Bad!

[nizm0zed]

Nitrous is injetced into the cylinder because when it's burned, it creates oxygen which lets the petrol burn more efficientlyl; I've heard it called "chemical supercharging". I'm not sure if a very fine mist of water is sparyed near/on the intake air would cool it enough to make a difference..

Eh, just make sure your filter isn't around hot air and that should be enough!

partially correct.
Oxygen is an oxidizer (who would have thought ) so you are right in saying that it allows the fuel to burn more efficiently.
However in an engine it also cools the air quite a lot, allowing it to be denser, and utilise more fuel with that denser air.
When you inject Nos, you also need to inject more fuel, to keep the proper ratio with the now denser air, but also because the extra oxygen released as the nos seperates will burn with the extra fuel.
end result, power.
And according to one movie, blue/green flames and self ejecting floor panels.

[RBZ 260]

And according to one movie, blue/green flames and self ejecting floor panels.

LOL i remember when that came out and one of the doosh bags i know started telling people that what happens when nos gets used blue flames at the back and ulike in some warp speed everythign goes blue infront of you.

i slaped him and told him to jump of a building for saying that as  he will do rest of us justice him not being around.

Galderdi what u been takin or talking to someone that has been taking some good stuff to come up with these wierd ideas lately   
LOL 4stroke to 2 stroke and this 

anyway not going to go into detials what happens its been said above

but to add to RB30X comment about raming air into LS1 for better pperformance is quite true and been around for last 35+ years.

Camaros, firebirds, mustangs corvettes etc.... all had this in the hot days of muscle car wars back in the mid 60s and early 70s. u win a race on sunday people buy it on monday.

they refered to as RAM Air and it proven to give approx 5mph and reduce the time by 0.25s on the 400m not bad for putting a hole in the bonnet and adding a scoop for fresh colder and somewhat forced air.Thats in a very "aerodynamic"  (NOT) 69 Mustang.

though that NA "intercooler" on civic (had to be civic) sure looks from a distance as an intercooler. that perpex cover with small holes kinda defeats the purpose of it... Im sure that cost a fair bit but u get lot better performance with a decent pod placed in the right location and lot of leftover dosh to spend on tune and better jungle juice to increase power.

none mentions fuel in increasing power... put some avgas or c16 and see how it goes than 

[Zedman240]

From memory you can buy some of the exotic fuels like methanol, C16 etc from large fuel distributors. Theres one in Dandenong but haven't been there in years. I'm sure they are all over the country.

[waxhead]

C16 at about 4-5 dollars a litre would send you broke fast
Running avgas in your car is not a good idea
Its all about heavy tops so it doesnt flash off in plane wings
That means its hard to light it may be high octane but thats about it
You will not be making much more power out of it