water to air coolers

[Guest]

i feel like a dork now after saying hook it up to the engine cooling system lol i realised last night thats soooo stoopid lol.

Alot of good arguments for pros and cons of it still making my mind up on it

[Pappu1]

u can buy a full set complete for around less than 50.. i remember one of the members here bought his set for 40...

[nt_a_foz]

 pappu said:

just saying if i didnt want the bling of a fmic and had to redo my setup - i wud go water to air simply coz its got better street performance and cost.. hmm my car has seen only a few track days but all the rest of the km is clocked up driving everyday roads...

Says who?? lol...what proof do you have to say this..

Sorry not being a pain but really as Qwerty said the water will still get heat soak and take longer to cool than a TMIC...

[Pappu1]

i was thinking that same thing before and there was a big discussion abt it and then the member who had that 260 or whatever hi kw car showed his details and soem other details that was conclusive proof of the water to air setup.

also, the whole thing abt water taking longer to cool is not really a factor due to the volume of water in the system..there is enough for u not to reach into such issues..

this is comapared to the air to air setup

and there was also some temp data taken by very geeky guys that proved the point..will have to dig up the site etc and post when find ya

but yea man, i was not a believer of water to air and had gotten my fmic but that was after reading up on its advantages, i kicked myself for spending up on the fmic...

hmm but for the bling factor the fmic wins hahaha

[WRXER]

If I wanted 220-250kw atw the STI topmount has been proven to work with those level of powers, almost pointless and a step backwards IMO. Think about why Subaru invested so much going to top mounts instead of water to air coolers, it is a obvious step back. No offence mate, but there is little in way of data here and saying top level dragsters use them is a whole different story. Remember they are running for a just a few seconds...... Not street driving for hours on end.

And mate think about what ur saying, ur logic does not work in fact ur going against the simple laws of physics saying water doesn't take longer to cool........

Simply if you want better cooling, go with a FMIC. It's that simple.

[Pappu1]

lol... im not saying water does not take longer to cool.. what im saying is that due to the volume of water the heat soak does not become a problem in street driving.

220-250kw at wheels on stock sti intercooler gets an issue.. my v6 sti was begening to det around the 215 mark and a swap to v7 intercooler at the same power level stopped the det hence why i wont go gc8 tmic if ever agin pushing that much

obviously this means to only the gc8 models not the gdb ones that are better till way higher levels

im not aginst fmic as i have already been down the path of putting a fmic on my own car... what im saying is that on street cars that have bit more power the water to air is perfectly fine and way more cost effective than a fmic.. thats all..

obviously a fmic works well and im not saying they dont... oh and they have the better bling factor as well..

i will have to try and dig up the 260kw dyno graphs or whetever that guy was running in his type r sti that had the water to air setup and show that it works perfectly fine

[BC5RA]

Pappu now that you've got all that shit out out of your system, go weigh yourself.

Everybody else use the search, this has been covered way back.

Are you all referring to Gen 1 WAIC vs TMIC/FMIC? or aftermarket?

GEN 1 WAIC will never manage anywhere near those numbers without extensive modifications to flow and heat exchanger size.

It might net a decent peak figure on the fucking dyno, but subsequent runs will show a lesser number.

I had a friend who fitted a VF22 to a stock RS (WAIC) and pumped 20+psi through it, we tapped a temp sensor into the WAIC tank, a few pulls and temperatures soared.

The water would eventually boil.

[Koom]

 pappu said:

also, the whole thing about water taking longer to cool is not really a factor due to the volume of water in the system..there is enough for u not to reach into such issues..

Push 200kw worth of air through one and you will find that the volume of water isn't really that great

A FMIC with phenolic spacers under the manifold probably has less heat soak than the WAIC )aswell as much lower intake temps). Thats how it felt when I changed it on mine anyway.

[Pappu1]

of course this has been covered before and as i recall from the older posts the water to air ones seemed to have pushed higher figured based on the dyno plots...

anyway, i didnt say run it standard - the easiest way wud be to keep the pump running as i think thats what that water to air intercooler guy did..

anyway, ur missing the point, im not sayin fmic is bad, all im sayin is that for that power levels, the water one is better based on the cost vs performance... pretty much thats the point!

i think i have written that already so cant make that any clearer..

and doing multiple pulls will obviously heat things up.. hell even on the v7 tmic thats a noceable trend (on the last dyno on my v6) so of course most intercoolers will exhibit the same trend.. and no doubt the water one will too...a street car does not do multiple pulls on a dyno in an everyday situation so dont bring such examples..

this is getting tiring.. and bc5ra quit sayting things abt my weight.. everyone knows i have clocked the scales oh so long ago hahah ;D

anyhoo,in summary ... water to air is better on the street car compared to the gc8 tmic for pushing anything in the upper 220 -250 kw bracket...

on a budget that wud be a very workable solution with good performance.

next one wud be a GD type intercooler but its bit more involved to install but works well for a tmic (as tested on my previous v6)

and fmic is the best obviously (if u can afford to put it then why not - performance and bling together),,

[nt_a_foz]

 pappu said:

anyhoo,in summary ... water to air is better on the street car compared to the gc8 tmic for pushing anything in the upper 220 -250 kw bracket...

on a budget that wud be a very workable solution with good performance.

But its not??? lol

[Guest loren]

some people should come with a warning label. maybe it can be implemented here for the first time?

who's the tech guy here?

[nt_a_foz]

 loren said:

some people should come with a warning label. maybe it can be implemented here for the first time?

who's the tech guy here?

+1 just spreading vast misinformation to the world :

[Koom]

 pappu said:

this is getting tiring..

Yes it is.

SHOW US SOME PROOF!!

Unless you're talking about some flash aftermarket WAIC i.e. PWR, you are completely wrong. Its not like FMIC are even that expensive either where a decent, big power WAIC will cost you $$$

Driving through a twisty section of road will heat up a factory WAIC pretty easily if you're making even close to 200kw. A FMIC or even top mount will be cooled constantly in that situation. Phenolic spacers help alot towards lessening heat soak as well (although all Subaru's should have them fitted).

The Legacy rallycar at RDL makes just over 200kw with a factory WAIC. Just out driving it with a bit of boost here and there and some hills for a wee bit of load, you get ~55degree intake air temperature. On the last car we had, same engine setup but with a FMIC, that made over 220kw through the same restrictor. So that was at least 20 kw of free power just through having a decent flowing front mount that could cool properly.

[GC8E2DD]

Wow, 20kw for the price of a front mount has got to be right up there with a catless downpipe in terms of bang for buck.

[funkytown]

 GC8E2DD said:

Wow, 20kw for the price of a front mount has got to be right up there with a catless downpipe in terms of bang for buck.

for a WAIC to FMIC yer.. probably a bit less for TMIC to FMIC

also i would imagine that was on a td05, so take more off again for a wrx tdo4 TMIC to FMIC

[Pappu1]

when my v6 was starting to det and the factory tmic needed a replacement, we did a v7 tmic and that was good..

fmic was an option but worked out to be bit more expensive than a GD tmic..(which itself is a mission with all sorts of bits and bobs needed)

anyway, after getting the v7 tmic, things were ok but some later research pointed that a waic wud have been cheaper and as effective for the power levels..

im not tryna say waic is better than a fmic...geez all im saying it waic is better than the gc tmic thats all.. this is based on the research at the time (admitedly after shelling out for the v7 tmic) and then thinking doh should have looked into this more befpre spending...

anyway, the original poster seems like a person who can research his own answers as well.. so really up to him to investigate the waic if indeed he wants to perhaps put it.. the fmic is obviously the best and the easiest answer to most higher kw cars but up to a point the waic could be a better cost effective option..

really comes down to whoever wants to upgrade should research first before paying and depending on what the expected power levels are,

just giving an option to look at..waic is still good to a point

nothing for me to prove etc lol as its not like i run the waic factory or something and wana push for my products... if u want proof, go do the research like i did and make ur own minds.. from what i found, the waic is better than the gc8 tmic.. you can have your own conclusion, dosent bother me..

and for the last time, im not comparing waic to fmic ...just waic to gc tmic..

[nt_a_foz]

Tempted to delete this thread really the majority is a load of misinformation...

[Koom]

 pappu said:

when my v6 was starting to det and the factory tmic needed a replacement, we did a v7 tmic and that was good..

fmic was an option but worked out to be bit more expensive than a GD tmic..(which itself is a mission with all sorts of bits and bobs needed)

anyway, after getting the v7 tmic, things were ok but some later research pointed that a waic wud have been cheaper and as effective for the power levels..

See this is the bit that you need to provide prove of cause you keep talking about pushing high 250kw through these WAIC yet from my own car and the rallycar I work on, they both cook the WAIC setup once you try to push past 200kw. So about the same as a V3/4 Top mount. The GDB STI top mounts are better than both the early top mounts and WAIC's. Which doesn't really make the WAIC an upgrade over anything except a V1/2 top mount which is tiny.

[pl0x]

 pappu said:

all im saying it waic is better than the gc tmic

Not with you there tbh, after a blat a gc tmic will cool quicker than a waic

plus add water sprayers into the equation and tmic will be better again

[Pappu1]

koom.. read the whole thread - my v6 started det around the 215 mark as mentioned earlier

i only wish i was pushing 250 man..but dont think the car wud have liked it much .. or the gearbox lol

and unfortunately bro the v6 didnt come with waterspray sadly :

but yea that could have been an option at that time but i kinda jumped to a v7 unit and didnt do all the research till after..

anyway, each to their own i suppose.. if i ever went back in time to that point i wud do a waic based on what i found out of them compared to the gc tmic..

small things like perhaps running pump all the time and water wetter additive in the coolant etc

everyone can have their own setup eh.. .

[funkytown]

rig it up. dyno it. put up the results pappu.

people are just saying that generally the results dont stack up with your point on view on this one.

[WRXER]

I'd agree, ur argument still doesn't make sense.

[Pappu1]

 funkytown said:

rig it up. dyno it. put up the results pappu.

people are just saying that generally the results dont stack up with your point on view on this one.

fair enough bro..

will see if have any saved data i had used to come to this conclusion.. when i finds it i will post it up ya.. ;D

but if u dont agree then still all good by me.. everyone should do their research and come to own conclusions ..

[BC5RA]

Part one and two.

http://autospeed.com/cms/A_1618/article.html

http://autospeed.com/cms/A_1619/article.html

[Guest boostcut]

interesting reading.