Jezebel's AWIC - Now With Pics!

[vanbcguy]

After sitting forever with my thumb up my a I finally decided to get around to sorting out an intercooler for Jezzie.  I've been giving her some pretty decently hard work to do - I've been driving Vancouver - Kelowna via Highway 3 fairly regularly, with some pretty decent excursions through the side roads, lots of sustained climbing for a few minutes at a time.  

I did my hitch last year too, and I've made plenty of use of that now!!  Both Portland and Seattle with a 600 lb open trailer, then the return trip with trailer plus a bunch of bikes, something like:



...which is some pretty decent work for her through the Cascades!

Around town there's been some harder work:



The box trailer once fully loaded is really the limit - I got myself stuck on a hill once, traded in about a year's worth of clutch life to get her moving but pretty much had no choice!! Fair bunch of cars behind me, no backing up so do or die!!  I hate doing that kind of thing to her but every once in a while it just happens!!

Anyhow, I figured she deserved an intercooler.  I've been running her at about 15 PSI for quite some time now with no problems.

 I have no EGT, I am terrible, Etc. etc. etc.

I'm taking her nice and easy, pretty much the sustained hard work I've figured she could use a little extra cooldown.  I haven't yet seen anyone who's managed to do a FMIC on a Mk III without cutting away part of the bumper support, and that was one of my major criterium. The Mk III only has a 3-star headon crash rating, if you've watched much Top Gear they've got a great spot where they show the difference between a 5-star car, a 4-star car and a 3-star car.  Let's just say the bare minimum you want is 3-star.  Anything less than that and you probably have messed up knees, broken pelvis, all kinds of badness.  Whatever VW decided they wanted to put up front is staying!!

Jezzie has no AC being a Canadian car, so there's a great 1" space in front of the rad just ITCHING for something to fill it up.  I've ordered an aluminum rad pretty much exactly the same size, so I'm pretty confident it's going to fit.  Here's hoping!!  Seems there's lots of room if I need to drop the engine radiator back a tad, gobs of room under the hood.

I haven't sorted out 100% yet what I'm doing for a reservoir - once I have the rest of the bits I'll start worrying about that, but I think I've got it pretty sorted overall.  Promise to post pics as I get her done!!

[vdubspeed]

damn...no EGT. I would have LOVED to known how hot you were getting when floored goin up those hills!

[macka]

I'm moving the rad back a bit and my fmic will just fit in the gap made. That is also without modding my airbox which I know I will have to do to make it work. I'm moving the battery to the passenger side of the trunk, so I should be able to figure something out.

[vanbcguy]

damn...no EGT. I would have LOVED to known how hot you were getting when floored goin up those hills!

Yeah, I don't blow smoke and I keep the revs high.  My fueling is still pretty much stock - I still have the collar on my max fuel screw and it isn't bottomed out.  No modified LDA or anything like that.  K24 at 15 PSI is still a happy turbo, and I have 2.5" exhaust from the downpipe back.  Stock Mk III downpipe isn't as bad as the earlier ones by any means but still could use some improvement.

I feel I'm still within the "factory" parameters for performance.  EGT will come one day but the hassle of pulling the turbo / intake / exhaust manifold is what is keeping me from it.

[vanbcguy]

My order is showing "OUT FOR DELIVERY" - pics will come soon!!

[vanbcguy]

It's heeeeeeere.....


Pretty much the complete package (there's some assorted fittings plus the water hoses too, not pictured)




Now the fun part comes!!  Here's hoping I sized everything right.  It has of course, started raining right this minute so no poking at the car just yet.

[vanbcguy]

Test Fit:





Naturally some of the tubes will need to be cut a bit, but I'm pretty pleased with the fit, honestly I don't think i could have asked for much better.  I can still get at everything except the cap on the brake master cylinder without much work.  Still can see the timing plug on the transmission no problem, etc.  Pretty perfect!!

I'm satisfied with the quality of everything.  Here's a closeup of the workmanship, it isn't the most beautiful thing I've ever seen but it will certainly do the job:





Fitting the heat exchanger will have to wait a little bit as I need the car tomorrow so I don't want to pull the rad just yet.  I also still need to get some of the other bits and pieces (relays/switches, something to make a mounting bracket, some sort of reservoir). 

The reservoir location will be a "fun" one as everything I've read has said it should be at the highest point in the system to ensure all the air gets out.  That might be a bit tough, will be looking for ideas there!  I'm thinking of something small between the shock tower and the washer fluid tank, all I need is something big enough to be used as a 'burp' tank and a fill location really.  I don't intend to run this pressurized.

Pump I think I'll mount below the battery tray.  That will have it well out of the way of any road debris or whatever and should have it low enough in the system to make it prime easily.

[rallydiesel]

That looks pretty good. Where did you get the kit from?

[vanbcguy]

Kit is from frozenboost.com. 

I read a LOT off stuff about them online before buying and couldn't really find anything negative other than some comments about their silicon hoses being only 'so' good.  The IC core is definitely meant for AWIC use (it has significantly different sized water passages than air). 

Most of the negative AWIC stuff I saw out there was the same copy-and-paste about how they are more complicated blah blah blah.  I did definitely see quite a bit of negative about the cylindrical 'barrel' style coolers though - they appear to have a much different internal construction to the one I got and I can see how they would be much much less efficient.

[vanbcguy]

I found a small paint mixing can at Princess Auto that I'm going to use for my reservoir.  It's only about 1L but I'm really just looking for something to use as a fill point / expansion tank / burp tank.  I'd rather most of the water volume was in the heat exchanger!!

Figuring out fittings for it was kind of challenging.  The tank itself is made out of HDPE (same hard plastic as the stock expansion tank) so it's fairly easy to put a hole in.  What I settled on for fittings is some NPT - barbed elbow fittings with NPT "reducers" to mechanically hold them against the tank.  I'm epoxying everything to the tank too, but that's more for leak sealing than actually physically supporting weight or whatever.  I still think though that this is going to be my trouble spot if any.  But I'm in it about $15 including the epoxy so I can always try again if necessary!!

Bought myself some relays for the pump / fan as well (PA had some Bosch-style ones complete with harness for $4.99 ea!!), got my wire and switches and things now.  I'm HOPING to get this installed on Saturday as I'm going up to Kelowna again the following weekend - I want to have it in, then have a week of driving to ensure there's no "surprises".

I have all the water flow and stuff planned out now too.  The Bosch pump I'm using is designed for automotive cooling system applications (it's basically the same as the auxiliary pump on the VR6's) so I'm not concerned about feeding it warm water.  Flow will go Reservoir -> Pump -> Rad -> IC -> Reservoir.  Since the reservoir is under the hood I don't want to feed the IC from it, rather I want the water coming directly from the heat exchanger to the IC as that is when it will be the coldest.  I think this will be the easiest for purging air and things too.  Hopefully I'm right!!

I also am figuring I'm going to flow water through the IC in the opposite direction of airflow, that way the air exiting the IC will be hitting the coldest water coming in, which should yield the best overall temperature drop.  Funny how many little details there are to think of...

No distinct plans for mounting the IC yet.  I might try bolting a piece of steel to the battery tray and then bolting that to the IC, not really quite sure how that will all go.  Ideally I'd like to mount it to the engine or transmission so as to minimize movement and reduce the chances of a bucking engine pulling off couplings and things but I'm not really sure where I can bolt to around there.  We'll see...

[TurboJ]

A bigger reservoir would still mean better heat absorption capacity.. More water being cooled down by the rad -> more heat taken out of the boost charge..

Good that you have a big radiator too, that's much bigger than most racing cars I have seen

Nice work BTW!

[vanbcguy]

Yeah it's more of an underhood space issue than anything.  I'm not really wanting to relocate my battery - if I did that then there'd be lots of options for reservoirs that'd be quite a bit bigger.  Totally agree more water = more heat absorption capacity.

The price was right on the radiator - it's probably big enough for a truck but that should mean it will be super hard to heat soak on Jezzie.  The 1" thick factored in to my decision big time.  Goal is to cut/drill as little as possible in the car and this seems like it will fit - I think I'll be finding out this weekend:



Oh and I got the fittings epoxied on to my "reservoir" yesterday.  Everything SEEMS pretty rigid and happy, but I did discover (after I started) that basically nothing will actually bond to HDPE.  Makes sense, that's probably why they use it for so many different tank applications.  In my case though I'm relying on the fitting's mechanical threads for structure and then the epoxy is just filling space rather than having to "stick" something to something else.  We will see.  I've been looking for catch cans or whatever that are small enough and have 1/2" NPT fittings but there hasn't been a lot to choose from.

Thanks!!

[Vangruver]

Yeah it's more of an underhood space issue than anything.  I'm not really wanting to relocate my battery - if I did that then there'd be lots of options for reservoirs that'd be quite a bit bigger.  Totally agree more water = more heat absorption capacity.

The price was right on the radiator - it's probably big enough for a truck but that should mean it will be super hard to heat soak on Jezzie.  The 1" thick factored in to my decision big time.  Goal is to cut/drill as little as possible in the car and this seems like it will fit - I think I'll be finding out this weekend:



Oh and I got the fittings epoxied on to my "reservoir" yesterday.  Everything SEEMS pretty rigid and happy, but I did discover (after I started) that basically nothing will actually bond to HDPE.  Makes sense, that's probably why they use it for so many different tank applications.  In my case though I'm relying on the fitting's mechanical threads for structure and then the epoxy is just filling space rather than having to "stick" something to something else.  We will see.  I've been looking for catch cans or whatever that are small enough and have 1/2" NPT fittings but there hasn't been a lot to choose from.

Thanks!!

How much was that kit in total?

I've been seriously tempted to order/find an intercooler kit for my td as well. however for simplicity purposes i might just opt for a front mount air/air and possibly do a water/meth injection

[vanbcguy]

Agree 100%.  I really am just saying I'm lazy.  I've just never had any time that I've tried messing with exhaust related bolts without it turning in to a nightmare.  If I could figure out a way to do it without pulling everything I'd order everything up tomorrow, heck I'd even pay someone to install the probe and take it from there!!  Post-turbine would be ooohhh soooo easy but I understand the risks/problems there.  Anyhow it will get done, I understand the risks, I do not recommend anyone else do what I am doing.  For the time being I do not anticipate making any fueling changes post-IC install but chances are my fiddly nature will get the best of me eventually.

While I could have used a 'same side' inlet/outlet cooler I wasn't really happy with how they would fit in my engine bay.  I could probably shorten the piping by a foot or two with that kind of setup, but compared to the FMIC guys my piping is at least a few feet shorter.  From what I read too the straight-through style cooler is supposed to be more effective too as the air spends a lot more time in the core.

For data points I do have an IR thermometer, so I'll be able to take intake temps before / after / pump on / pump off / fan on / fan off and things.  Gauges in general are something I need to work on next, my boost gauge is just loose in the compartment behind my cupholders right now.  Ditching the radio and mounting gauges there would be a nice solution but I do like my music a bit too much for that!!  Seems like the A2's have a lot more options for gauge locations than the A3's do.  I might go the dash pillar route, but I've only found dual gauge pods so far and that's not going to be enough.  I need EGT / Boost / Oil Pressure at a minimum, and would like to have IAT too.

Thanks for the comments!

[theman53]

If you are too worried about intake volume you could use smaller diameter tubing. That is what I did on my FMIC...2" piping.