Curious on one point you make as well... You comment that you plan to put the water heat exchanger ("slim radiator") in front of the stock radiator, but you also claim the w2a system won't dump as much heat in to the car as an air-to-air FMIC will (at least I think you do). I don't follow that arguement. The heat has to go SOMEWHERE, and if you are putting the water heat exchanger in front of the radiator (same as an FMIC), then it will flow seceondarily to the OEM radiator... Now the w2a system should handle quick "spikes of boost" better, as the water in the system should absorb the shot of heat very well, but it will dump it back to the radiator through the front mount heat exchanger - what am I missing?

 

The core will only be 1" thick and will have a fan attached to it also. This wont restict flow in 1/2 the rad like a 20x8x3" core will (or some 12" tall cores), plus it will have more airflow going through it due to the fan pushing while the rear pulls. Im not saying its not like it wont restrict some flow, but the fan will more than make up for what it restricts.

 

The fan addition is what I was missing. With the fan, you will have active cooling at low/no speed where an FMIC is restricted to radiation cooling only at that point... I hope you instrument the system well to counter arguements (temp sensors pre- and post-intercooler with ambient temps noted, at a minimum, but water in/out as well as pressure drop across the system would be useful as well). I think the idea has merit, and wish you luck!

 

I will be doing as much testing as i can. Im sure it will be on par with a2a in cooling but in a more compact package. Plus since i had a 6whp and 35wtq loss with the stock ic between dynos, im sure i wont be able to miss that or a much larger gain. Also thanks for the luck, i hope people will come around to this idea do to its many positives. Also i plan on making this a painless as possible. Should actually be an easier install than getting all new pipes to fit perfect and tight.

 

Just finished ordering the parts for the first setup, should be on and running this weekend if everything gets here on or before friday. If i like it, ill start doing more the following week with a special for the first handful

 

If I may input just a little. A few years ago, I was working at an Import Performance shop in Knoxville, TN and we fabricated a similar set-up on a Civic SI that had a Jackson Racing supercharger. I can't remember the name of the solution but I think it was something like water wetter (mixed in with the water to help carry maximum amount of heat??).

I've since lost the data that we recorded but I can tell you that we aggresively drove Deals Gap with extremely & efficiently cooled air supplied throughout. It was an impressive concept and had many benefits with it.

As for my car, I guess I could be interested in it but I don't want to retain the stock intercooler pipes. I guess I could get some and fab them up because if I am understanding this correctly, you are going to be removing stock IC and replacing with A2W IC?

 

It will just replace the stock core. I will plan on changing the ic to tb hose at some point because it goes from 2.25->2->2.5 and change it to a full 2.5" (same size as the stock TB)

 

interesting cinc... i wanna see some IAT data logs! stock vs. w2a...

 

cincy you can put me down for one, i more than need somethin to help cool my car down.

 

I have one question about this set up, i know its a set up usually used for racing, so how will it work as a set up for a daily driver? wont it get to hot for that unless you constantly refill with ice?