OK, got the whole WI kit installed today, thanks to some advice on here and some fiddling around. Tank is in the boot (UK-spec rear washer bottle), along with the pump and the checkvale. This routes through the passenger side and through the footwell up to the clog detector, boost switch and obviously injector.
I\'ve proven that water comes out of the pipe at full boost, as desired (drove along with the pipe sticking out of the bonnet towards the windscreen). I\'ve also proven that water comes out of the injector when everything\'s wired up (using the NO to ground switching method for those with Cooling Mist). So, you would assume, when the injector is installed in the intake pipe, it will fire at full boost and the intake temp will come tumbling...
Nope. Not a sausage, just a bit more heat after several seconds of full boost! Now, either something very odd is happening to stop the injector firing when it\'s in the pipe (can\'t see why, checked it in situ before putting the pipe back in), or water is being sprayed and not having an effect, suggesting I have chosen a stupid place to put it. Based on the pic below, does anyone have any ideas!?
dont really know much about WI but i will be fitting it when i get my engine rebuilt and back in (need to get it out first lol) but may be the injector is too small??
Hmm, it seemed to shoot out a fair old spray of water when I tested it, but I don\'t know how much or how much is enough!
my two nozzles are by the throttle body in the elbow
mine comes in at .40 bar. many put .5 or more which doesnt take away much power or any and some put it in low for safety.
mine runs a .7mm jet and comes in a .40 bar and brings temps down from 60 degreez plus down to 25 in a few boosts. i think yours if at full boost is only going to make it heat up slower.
I have one nozzle where you have one and another in the intake elbow. Is the water definitely coming out ? How is it activated.....boost pressure etc ? Is it adjustable ? I have one nozzle set when the boost is just over 0 psi and it brings the temps down.
Can you hear the pump working when on boost ? How long are you keeping the car on boost for ? If you try getting the car up to temp, drive down a 40 mph road about 30mph and put it into 4th and put your foot down, it should pump the wi in.
Sorry for all the questions.
just a note may be wrong but the water pressure needs to be higher than boost any way of checking that out.
Cheers guys. I can\'t absolutely say for sure that the water is coming out, only that it comes out when on full boost (proven by driving with the pipe sticking out as described above) and that it comes out of the injector when using the "test wiring" method. Obviously it\'s impossible to know once it\'s all in place, unless the temps drop!
No chance of hearing the pump on full boost sadly, it\'s in the boot and pretty quiet. I almost couldn\'t hear it when testing and that was with the engine off!
I\'m keeping the car on full boost for a good few seconds - accelerating hard all the way from 0-80mph+, which even taking into account gear changes must mean 6 seconds of squirt and having read lots of descriptions about how quickly temps fall with WI, I would have thought that\'s enough to make a difference.
However, I take your points about the activation settings you have and I\'ll try winding it down to 0.4 or 0.5 (no idea how I\'ll manage to be accurate, as the setting is controlled by a screw in the boost switch with no markings!)
One other thing I wondered, how far into the pipe does the injector need to protrude? Mine is flush with the inside of the pipe, I thought this was sensible to keep airflow maximised and give the biggest space for the water to atomise, but maybe it needs to stick into the pipe a bit more?
Quote from: danny_m94;516881just a note may be wrong but the water pressure needs to be higher than boost any way of checking that out.
Hmm, not sure what pressure the pump is putting out, but it\'s called the 150psi kit, so I presume it\'s that - it made a pretty decent spray when I tested it! Could do with a pressure gauge fitted into the pipework - I thought it came with one, but it appears to be a temp gauge (which might come in handy if I think the PFC is giving wrong readings).
I also don\'t know what size the injector is, does anyone know what size comes as standard in the Cooling Mist 150psi kit?
wat cc nozzle do you have....i would have gone for a 600cc one...just buy a bigger one off ebay and try that....very easy to do and relatively cheap.
Really don\'t know the CC, will try and work it out from Cooling Mist\'s site, but no luck so far...
I would of taught havin the nozzle that far away from the inlet would let the air mix and heat up again?
Mines very close to the inlet and theres a big difference when i run out of water!!!! The knock shoots up and so does the temp!
Plus i dont think you had it on the right bend if you get me?
hmm the location seems ok, just seems your boost activation point maybe to high, experiant with the activation point
as Mark says, you want it on a lot less than your max boost, if you runs twins, your first turbo wont activate it.
I used to run 0.6 with no problems. Get a small lamp or led and connect it to the 2 power wires on the pump. Accelerate and as soon as the light comes on, stop, check the highest boost reading. Not perfect but accurate enough to know how much time it spends on.
I fitted the light in the dash so i could adjust for different events.
Cheers guys. I\'ve got the activation LED installed (just forgot to wire it up in my haste to test the system!), so I should be able to tell when it fires.
You\'re making me feel better about it anyway - looks like I haven\'t created a big hole in my HKS pipe for nothing, just gotta work on the boost level. I know it\'s a fair way from the throttle body, but my understanding was that you have to give time for it to atomise properly and as I\'m only doing it for extra cooling, it doesn\'t matter too much.
Presumably if I want an extra injector in the elbow, I can just tap into the existing pipework? Or will that lower the pressure to each injector too much for a decent spray?
that pump will have no problem running a second injector
Yeah mines a coolingmist setup and the pump is fine running 2 injectors.
To adjust it to come on sooner you just have to turn it counterclockwise. Keep doing it a quarter of a turn at a time and see what happens. Suprised you cant hear the pump though....you can hear the water slurping through it lol.
Well, tried it with the boost switch screw loosened plenty (two or three full turns counter-clockwise) and still nowt - no LED lighting up, no drop in temps.
Gonna have to take the hose/injector off and do the "fire at windscreen" test again to check the boost switch is working (and at what boost level). If that works, I\'ll then do the "wiring" test with the injector in the intake pipe but the pipe off the car, so I can see what\'s happening inside when (presumably) it is firing water in.
If that all looks like it\'s working, I have no idea what\'s going on!
if you have no light it must be either the boost switch or the wiring, you\'ll get it sorted. Best mod you can do for the money so worth getting it working. you should see the intake temps drop 1 degree every few seconds when its hot and you inject water
Cheers mate. The guide on temp drop/time injecting water is very useful - I will do my testing as above tonight to try and prove which bit is letting me down.
What I\'ll do if it all looks like it\'s working I don\'t know... I\'m on track Friday, so lots more boost and heat, we\'ll really see if it makes any difference then! If not, I\'ll be doing alternate hot lap/cooling lap!
OK, popped the pipe off the injector and tested to see if I got any water out - I didn\'t. Odd, as it was working yesterday, so... tried all the coupling points in the pipework, got a little "spit" as I took it out of the pump side of the checkvalve, after which water flowed happily all through the system. I can only assume there was an airlock of some description, either caused by low water (it wasn\'t that low though) or the slight leak (and I do mean slight) in the coupling to the tank.
Whatever, I took it out for a drive and the LED came on and I could hear the pump operating! (I left the boot trim off). So I have to assume it was spraying, but before I got chance to boost too much, it stopped again! I was worried, as the pump made a sound similar to an electrical short/spark, so did the pipe off test again and water still flowed out. Then checked the boost pipe - the coupling I used (aquarium piping T-piece) was obviously not up to the job, as when the silicon pipe got hot it went floppy and expanded.
Drove away again, got a flicker then nowt - looked at the boost gauge and realised that wasn\'t reading properly either, so that\'s why the WI wasn\'t firing. Hopefully when that\'s sorted and I\'ve silicon-sealed the tank coupling, all will be well! :)
have you got a true boost source for your boost switch?
Not sure what you mean by "true boost source"? I\'ve got it running off the plenum, as per the boost gauge, which seemed to give an accurate reading.
there are a couple of take off points on the plenum that dont give an accurate boost reading, but if its from the same point as your boost gauge and your happy with that reading it should be ok.
Ah right, didn\'t know that - the one it came attached to is kind of in the middle of the plenum on the driver\'s side (not sure how many nipples there are actually, so can\'t say how many along it is!)
Any reference/pics around to show the best options? Ta! :)
Oh, and I take it that it\'s fine to use the same nipple for two applications (i.e. I\'ve got a T-piece off the plenum to connect both the WI boost switch and boost gauge)?
OK, on track yesterday the water injection worked... for about a minute or so per session! When it was working, it was definitely doing its job, but it seems to be getting an airlock on the pump (input) side of the checkvale. When I pulled the tube out of the connector, it spat at me due, I presume, to air pressure. This only happened on that connector, none of the others.
There is a very small leak on the connection to the water tank, but I\'m not sure if that would be enough to cause an airlock in such a short space of time? Moreover, I did the "wire" test (i.e. pull the tube out of the injector, ground the live pin of the boost switch and watch water come out) and pulled a litre of water through the system with no apparent loss of flow/pressure.
So, what could be causing the checkvale to keep locking up on the pump side when in use, but not when tested (unconnected to the injector)? I\'m not sure how the checkvale works, so that isn\'t helping!
I also noticed something else - after I had managed to get a decent bit of water through before it locked up, I had an oily water coming out of the elbow/plenum face, which had clearly sprayed a bit under the bonnet. There was a bit of oil in the intake pipe when I took it off, so I can see that the water has flushed it out, but surely the seal on the elbow join should be water-tight!? Should there be a gasket in there?
By the way, when it was working, Tony\'s suggestion of a degree every few seconds of water was about right (in the mid- to high 40s).
Aside from your troubles, be aware that operating WI won\'t necessarily low you inlet charge temp, perse\'. My meaning is that the only true way to see how effective your WI is, is through a wideband lambda. Knowing that your engine is running x under certain perameters without WI, compared to y with WI. There should be a marked increase in richness of the AF ratios.
J
OK, I kind of understand you, but surely if the PFC reads a lower air intake temp, the engine is getting cooler air, which is good?
Effectively, with cooler air the sensor is telling the ecu to put in more fuel....assuming your air temp map is balanced to do this. The water injection is creating a condition that slows the burnrate of the fuel mixture. This is the same effect Race fuel has, allowing the engine to run more aggressive timing and/or leaner AF ratios.
J
just out of interest, what w/i tank are you using?, and does it have a small hole in the lid or the top somewhere to let air back into the tank to replace the water that is injected.
Water tank is a UK-spec rear washer bottle, so yeah, small hole in the cap that I\'ve checked is allowing air through. Good thinking though!
is the pump at a place where it can get enough water to pump through? I understand that either having a lift pump, or ensuring the high pressure pump is at the right height (whatever that may be) is crucial to ensure the water is being fed through...
Yeah, I know what you mean, I wanted the pump below the tank but actually it is kind of parallel, i.e. the intake of the pump is slightly higher than the bottom of the tank where the pipe is.
However, I have seen other people with this install working fine and the instructions say that whilst it is preferable, it is not vital and the pump should still work.
The thing that\'s really throwing me is that it seems to work fine when you\'re running water through the system in "test" mode (i.e. pipe off the injector, engine not running), but when you\'re asking it to squirt into the intake pipe, it stops working after a short while with air in the checkvale. :confused:
is the pipe higher than the injector? If it\'s under pressure, it shouldn\'t be an issue, but I suppose if the injector was open longer than the water was under pressure, then that could have an issue... How does this system work - is it a closed loop with a regulator at the end and a T off to the injector, or a single pipe from the pump to the injector?
Hmm, I think the injector is slightly higher than the pipe run, there\'s not much in it though. The system is a simple straight line really:
Tank > Pump > Checkvalve > Clog detector (microswitch over a pressure valve or similar device I think) > Injector
You then have a relay wired into the pump power, clog detector switch (which also powers the LED in the dash to show it\'s working) and of course a boost switch, which is adjustable and causes the whole thing to fire up when the desired boost is reached.
The tank, pump and checkvale are in the back, with a run of pipe down through the passenger footwell and up into the engine bay, where it runs through the clog detector and into the injector in the intake pipe.
Have you tried running without the check valve? I have run mine without for over a year without any problems, even with pump above tank.
(http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b51/kevnokia/004.jpg)
(http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b51/kevnokia/003.jpg)
Hmm, I think that\'s my next attempt, I would have done that the other day but I need to get something to replace it as a connector! Something with (I think) 1/8NPT threads either side should do the trick.
I\'m not sure how the checkvalve works - I\'d assumed it\'s there to maintain water pressure on the injector side of the system, so that as soon as the pump operates it\'s injecting water (i.e. the water in the system doesn\'t run "back").
Is it worth ringing the company who supplied/made it? Sounds like they ought to be doing a bit of product support here and offering a bit of advice. For all you know it\'s a really common problem with the injectors or whatever, and they replace a hundred of them a week for this fault. You may be looking for a problem with your set-up that simply isn\'t there
Yeah, an email to Cooling Mist is on its way! :)
Just had a look at Coolingmist website. At first I thought check valve was between tank and pump, but I see it is used to keep line pressure between pump and injector. You will need to keep that in place, it maybe faulty or wrong way round!!
Definitely the right way round (according to the arrows on it anyway!)
Well, the official Cooling Mist line is that the pump is gravity fed and needs to be below the tank so that the checkvalve can prime.
I\'m a bit confused by this as the checkvalve is AFTER the pump, but maybe that doesn\'t matter. I\'m more confused by the people who have mounted their pump above the tank with no apparent problems (I appreciate not all of these are the same kit, but I\'m sure I\'ve seen a Cooling Mist one recently with the exact same setup I have!)
Sounds a bit like it may be their stock/hopeful answer then. A bit like ringing for computer support and the always say to just restart the computer! Is their pump so rubbish that it can\'t lift water out of the tank without being gravity assisted, then? Be better off going to a fishpond pump specialist if that\'s the case! Or use a windscreen washer pump for five quid from a breakers, I\'m assuming we\'re not talking about fire hose amounts of water being moved around here?
Yeah, seems strange to me - I don\'t know much about hydraulics, but surely once water has been pumped through and is sitting in the pipes, it doesn\'t matter where everything sits as unless you run out of water, there\'s no air in the system and the gravity of water in the tank will keep the pipe full as the pump draws it through?
It\'s a pretty beefy pump, presumably at 150psi as that\'s the name of the kit, so you\'d have thought it would work OK.
Try fitting a one way valve (windscreen washer type from halfrauds will do) between the tank and the pump. This will keep water in the line between oneway valve through pump to check valve, thus keeping pump primed.
Ah ha, sounds like a plan. So the checkvalve isn\'t the same thing as a one-way valve? I really don\'t know the difference! :o
Sort of the same, but work in different ways. According to the Coolingmist blurb checkvalve they\'re using has a crack pressure of 22 psi, so needs that amount of pressure minimum to allow water through. The one way valve does not work by pressure but will only let water flow one way.
Cool, I\'ll pop down to the \'frauds and see if they have one. If not, there\'s a Cromwell\'s Tools nearby where I got the 1/8NPT tap and 11/32 drill required to fit the injector, they\'re bound to have something suitable!
Fit the valve close to the tank, so that you have gravity flow to the oneway valve.
And therein lies one of the issues - the washer tank sits very close to the floor of the boot, the pipe is very nearly kinked just coming out of the tank. There\'s no room at all to fit anything else directly below the the connector into the tank, it will have to be to the side (albeit still slightly below the outlet).
Actually, I want to find a 90-degree angled connector to avoid the kink, but that doesn\'t really help with getting the valve below it...
Just fit in the low run before pipe rises to the pump.