What are your opinions of running a water intercooler before the air intercooler? The water intercooler would use the stock coolant system so the best the air boost temperature could be is 170-180.

Would the potentially slower boost response be worth very likely having ambient IAT?

 

The issue I see with that when the air coming out of the turbo is cooler than the coolant itll just raise the iats going to the motor...

If you were willing to do this it might be worth running a setup like the supercharger guys with a pump and a heat exchanger

 

So I did a little math...

With a 70% efficient compressor and 10psi of boost with a 90F inlet temp, the output temp will be about 215F. So anything more than ~10psi of boost and the temperature is going to be greater than the engine coolant, which is to say below 10psi of boost this is a terrible idea.

At 15psi of boost and 72% discharge temp is 260F, 25psi at 75% is 330F.

Lets say you have an A2W intercooler with the engine coolant system that is 70% efficient and you are shooting for 20psi of boost. Compressor out would be 302F and A2W out would be 230F with 200F coolant. Lets say you then have a A2A intercooler that is 65% efficient and its a 90F day. A2A outlet would be 139F.

Just for fun if you used a water source that was 90F (ambient), A2A outlet would be 112F.

I attached the spreadsheet to this post if you want to play with it. Only change the values in the GREEN cells, it does the rest. Keep in mind with more coolers you will have more pressure loss so you have to run the turbo slightly harder, which makes it make slightly more heat (so if you want 20psi, you may have to run 25psi at the turbo).


My opinion is you would be better off with either a dedicated A2W or a simple A2A, but that really depends on your goals and how much money you want to spend.

 

Either/Or is more than sufficient. Both is just extra cost and headache.

 

Thanks for the spreadsheet Atomic. That will be one for keep folder.

 

There is one practical application for that I've seen. The air-to-air is first after the compressor and then it goes through the air-to-water, but the water circuit is closed with an electric recirculation pump that goes to an ice box. That setup used in conjunction with a controllable waste-gate would net a few extra psi for racing.

 

Air/air with meth your looking at 30* intake temps. Simple

 

Not practical.
Like others have said. Psi drop across the cores.
More expensive
Either one properly sized will get the job done.

The addition of methanol injection will help.

 

Thanks for all the input. It was more of a discussion topic than a project. I was really just curious what everyone thought of the idea and it was very clear. Thanks again. Is Atomic an engineer?

 

what gave it away?