Intercooler Fan?..Water Spray? Yay or Nay...

[HotFourOk]

Hey guys and gals..

I was thinking about improving the intercooling system on my 1993 Daihatsu Rocky 2.8TD. Its a front mount type.
When normal driving the intercooler performs quite effectively, but when stopped or going slow (like when 4wding) it seems to be effected by heat soak a fair bit.
It was soo hot yesterday and in the aid of cooling the charged air, I came up with 2 options:

*Install a Thermo Fan on the back of the intercooler to draw air through it, and either have it on all the time or just on a switch.
I've heard this can hamper airflow when at higher speeds.

*Make up a intercooler water spray system which sprays a mist of water onto the front of the cooler to help dissipate heat.
But I would need to top up the water tank often.

I dont know if there are benefits or disadvantages of either way... Or I can do both and use whateva suits at the time.

Has anyone done sumthing like this??

Thanks for your comments in advance...
Cheers, Nick.

[Bad JuJu]

I thought heat soak primarily affected top mounted intercoolers as they sat on top of the engine ??

[dromana7411]

a mate was going to do it on his mini, but he never got around to doing it all... he was going to use metho sprayers because its cooler than water...
not sure if it would work or not, but look ino it...

[rlaxton]

Hi All,

You should check out the articles on Autospeed (www.autospeed.com) about this sort of thing. They have covered both fans and sprays in great detail. Just do a search for "water spray". They have a current article on a super high pressure pump that will blow your mind.

Regarding the metho spray, that is a serious recipe for a fire so don't do that. I hope that your mate was considering water *injection* which is often done with a mixture of water and metho.

Richard.

[HotFourOk]

I had a bit of a browse on Autospeed, but you can only read the first portion of each article without registering...

I was thinking of a Davies Craig 10" thermo fan on the back of the IC, and see if a difference is made.. easier to try than the water spray method..

Well when you're on boost and not going fast.. such as when 4wding.. the intercooler soaks up all the excess heat from the intake air and there is not really any air going through the intercooler.
Also, when you're stopped or going slow, the heat from the radiator and engine bay does soak into the intercooler because it is radiated out and there is no airflow in the opposite direction to stop it affecting the IC.

[+dj_hansen+]

Hey guys and gals..

I was thinking about improving the intercooling system on my 1993 Daihatsu Rocky 2.8TD. Its a front mount type.
When normal driving the intercooler performs quite effectively, but when stopped or going slow (like when 4wding) it seems to be effected by heat soak a fair bit.
It was soo hot yesterday and in the aid of cooling the charged air, I came up with 2 options:

*Install a Thermo Fan on the back of the intercooler to draw air through it, and either have it on all the time or just on a switch.
I've heard this can hamper airflow when at higher speeds.

*Make up a intercooler water spray system which sprays a mist of water onto the front of the cooler to help dissipate heat.
But I would need to top up the water tank often.

I dont know if there are benefits or disadvantages of either way... Or I can do both and use whateva suits at the time.

Has anyone done sumthing like this??

Thanks for your comments in advance...
Cheers, Nick.

Cut your losses and go a water to air intercooler

Mate of mine ran a spray bottle on his hot 91 GTIR Pulsar but got sick of it running out of water all the time (read 10 seconds) and could not really see much improvement when he was running it..

You would need to run a big water res to warrant using it for hours on end when out 4WDn... water to air is probably a better/more economical option...

Denco should have a complete bolt on kit for around $1300 IIRC, or make up your own from a wrecker using a WRX cooler, shurflo pump etc...

[chris davey]

Water spray is different to water injection. Water spray sprays over the intercooler in an attempt to cool it down. Water injection injects a fine mist of water into the intercooler piping which cools down the intake charge and also helps prevent detonation. I would think that the water injection would use a lot less water and last longer.

Also you can get methanol and water injection to further decrease the risk of detonation. You have to adjust air fuels then though.

If you want the coolest intake charge, just get some N2O

[HotFourOk]

Yeah im not going into water injection.. too much hassle... and i dont like the idea of water spraying into my DIESEL engine... if it malfunctions or what not.. ur stuffed

I might just get a thermo fan to pull more air through when driving slow..

[Syzygy]

I had a bit of a browse on Autospeed, but you can only read the first portion of each article without registering...

Theres a way around this...

do a search in autospeed, find the article you want, then do a search in google. Should be able to view the full article when you open it from google. If you can't, clear your interenet history.

worked for me

[vn15]

Yeah im not going into water injection.. too much hassle... and i dont like the idea of water spraying into my DIESEL engine... if it malfunctions or what not.. ur stuffed

I might just get a thermo fan to pull more air through when driving slow..

It is better to fit a fan in front of the core.

[HotFourOk]

Can you elaborate on this vn15??

I thought mounting it on the back side would not hamper air flow as much when driving at speed when the fan is not really useful. Due to the centre of the fan blocking some area of the intercooler.

[bogged]

I thought heat soak primarily affected top mounted intercoolers as they sat on top of the engine ??

Correct.