Where is the best place to cool the intake charge?

[m1tch]

Hey guys im working on something my end for my FC Turbo II but just wanted to ask everyone opinion on this. I know that the intercooler cools the intake charge, but if I were to cool the intake charge again where would be the best place?

[LIST=1]

• Cool the intake charge at the intake as it enters the system
• Cool the intake charge just before the intercooler
• Cool the intake charge just after the intercooler

If I were to do secondary cooling to the intake charge where would be the best place to do so? Im thinking perhaps cool the intake charge just before the intercooler and insulate the intercooler to turbo pipework. The FC is a top mount so there might be an issue with heat soak etc etc

What do you guys think?

[Ricco_04]

Well if you where using an air to air cooler then its going to have to be somewhere you can duct the air in and out.

By having 2 suggests that the current one is not suitable for your needs?

Or you could ad WI?

[BlitzBoy]

WI with a jet before and after the intercooler would be ideal

[Prof]

I\'d say use a temperature isolating gasket for the throttle body inlet, maybe make the throttle inlet out of a non heat conductive material or at least lag it and the pipework from it to the intercooler - as you\'ve already spent time and energy cooling that air down and don\'t want to let engine heat rob you of that gain.
 
You also need some way of helping the intercooler out - maybe a heat reflecting pan under the intercooler to prevent engine heat from the underside, but you need to vent off that engine heat as well (although oil and water cooling of the engine should be doing that job anyways), plus you don\'t want to stop the air from being able to flow through the intercooler from above.

[m1tch]

Would it be ok to cool the pipework down before the intercooler, or would that mess up the sensors at the air metering system that have already taken the temperature of the incomming air?

[logicalChimp]

If you aren\'t using a divider or something to prevent the intake from breathing the pre-heated engine air, i\'d think that ensuring the intake is cold would easiest?

If it\'s not pre-heated, you won\'t need to cool it :Hammer

[BlitzBoy]

The turbocharger heats up the air by way of compressing anyway, cooling the intake area will help a though.
Telling ya a cheap WI system will help no end

[Prof]

^ what he said ^
 
WI will give the best cooling gains and isn\'t affected by heatsoak like an intercooler, chargecooler or rad would be.
 
The temp sensor in the AFM works together with the AFM flow meter to work out what mass of air has gone into the engine.  So it doesn\'t matter if you cool the air before or after this device - as long as both sensor devices are working on the same flowing air at the same point they will correctly calculate the air mass.
 
As BlitzBoy says, the turbo is going to be your biggest source of heat through compression, the heat from heatsoak is much reduced by flowing air, so it\'s only an issue when your in traffic and not much air is passing through the pipes - that\'s when the heat gain starts to happen.
 
The pipes you really want to lag are those after the intercooler - as you\'ve cooled that air and don\'t want it heating up again.