What are the pros and cons of charge cooling over running an intercooler? On the subaru running a charge cooler, the main advantage is shortened pipework runs, reducing lag (over FMIC). However what would the disadvantages be?

The useage, is fast road track days and no 1/4's

 

not really an answer to ur question,but im waiting to fit a charge cooler from a legacy,just need the rad and thats it,interesting to see/find result,im hoping it will cool city driving as my inlet temps reach 50 round town

 

It might be worth a call to Paul blamire, he has done a lot of development with the PWR charge cooler system in his Zen Performance time attack car, and can probably answer your questions better than most.

 

harge cooling is less dependant on ambient temps, obviously if its hot outside a FMIC can be less effective until running at a speed high enough to remove the charge temp through the cooler, a charge cooler will give a more constant cooling operation but are usually smaller than a FMIC so are less effective on BIG BOOST motors

 

Thanks for the answers guys.

Will a charge coolers, coolant heat up over a period of time though. Would running a methanol mix help.

 

its the same with anything tho, if stood for long long periods of time, the fluid will heat up,but then your not moving are you so the inlet temp isnt as important,but once on the move, it will cool, and STAY cooler longer than air will.

 

Thats spot on really, if the water is cold in the system then it will continue to cool the incoming air regardless of how much air is flowing through the rad and at what heat. But once that water heats up it becomes a problem as water is pretty hard to cool down quickly. Essentially what you do is store a capacity to remove heat as your going along by making the water cold. The opposite is true when stationary as the water will heat up untill enough cold air flows through the rad to remove the excess heat.

 

Ohh yes, the main advantage would be that the lengthy pipes are all water pipes, you can make the turbo to intake pipe relatively small as you just have to pass it through the heat exchanger (ie no bigger than standard top mount) = minimal lag. Chargecoolers are a great idea, as long as your not stationary for ages and ages (but then top and front mounts are bad here as well but tend to cool quicker once moving again) the only other downside is the weight they can add to the car.

 

Thanks for that borat.

Has anyone had any experience/knowledge on the PWR range? Doesn't the ZEN impreza use one?

 

Having used a chargecooler system on my old turbocharged Clio, I'd say the advantage lies mainly in the 'packaging'. I.e. you can have a very effective cooler, whilst at the same time keeping the boost circuit as short as possible, and also don't need to find room for bulky FMIC pipework. Lots of advantages really. The additional weight of the system and the water it contains is not really a major problem, if you look at the size and weight of a decent sized FMIC it's quite heavy too.

I tend to think of chargecoolers as slower in their responses than intercoolers i.e. it takes a lot of punishment to heat up the water in a CC system, but once it's there, it takes a lot of gentle cruising to get the water temp back down again. An air-air IC on the other hand is 'fast' i.e. it has less heat sink capacity so will heat up quickly but can also dump the heat more quickly if it's given the chance.

 

Thanks Mr.Running

I'm going to be using the car on trackdays (nurburgring) mostly so will have extended periods on boost, will this heat the water more than the cooling effect of the air passing through the rad? Or is a carefull choice of coolant rad that is required?

 

LOL @ 'Mr Running' - I like it! I'm talking of course from a general standpoint about chargecoolers applied to all turbocharged cars. It seems that at present Scoobies are well catered for with front mount intercooler kits, and I in fact have an 'Autobahn 88' front mount on mine which works perfectly well. For the £200 or so that it cost me, I wouldn't bother trying to fit a chargecooler instead.

Put it this way: I was going to have taken my WRX over to the 'Ring this year (in the end I went in a mate's 205 GTi instead) but I would have total confidence in my front mount intercooler to do the job properly. In fact I'd rather have an FMIC than a chargecooler for any track work. Less to go wrong. I'd probably favour a chargecooler for everyday driving and quarter miling, which is exactly what I used to use my turbocharged Clio 16v for.