here are a few pics of the intercooler installed, and a few extras of the car, for the moey i was very happy with the intercooler, i figured i would go with an oem placment intercooler, clean and simple, i modified the plastic "air duct" panel to fit for that extra clean look :-)

 

did that ic come with piping?

 

yes couplers, t bolt clamp`s everything!, i own/ run a shop here in Olympia Wa, and i have actually been using alot of the XS intercooler kits, and they keep getting BETTER and BETTER!.. this kit came with everything, i removed the factory airbox, un bolted the over flow tank, the XS intercooler droped right into place, after removal of air box, and the stock IC, nice and snug fit, no custom mods as far as install unless you want to ad the plastic ducting like i did, the overflow res even bolts onto the Xs intercooler, it`s GREAT!!. i`d hafto say a 9 out of ten for the installation e-z ness

 

how much $?

 

i belive 285$ shipped to my door, and about an hour to install!!

 

wonder how it performs

 

$285 shipped for the intercooler new, or used? and it came with the intercooler piping also? whoa......

link me to the website were you bought this please, also what did you have to modify on the stock plastic piece? PM Me if you wish if it would make it easier, I'd appreciate it, thanks!

 

What intake are you going to run? I don't see any filters on there now.

And you will need a good duct to force air through the IC. The small stock duct won't cut it for this application. Sorry if you already have one in there, can't tell.

They are on ebay

 

hks filters they hadent been installed yet, there sitting in the trunk in the boxes, and i was looking at the ducting from the bumper area, and wanted to upgrade it when i get some time :-p

 

is it the rs or the greenies..?

 

greenies,, i wanted to do the blitz sus but the filters are Huge,, i took the pair off my 240 and tried to fit them on the rx, but not enought room, sus fit with the oem IC,

 

love it, the low key look is appreciated.

 

If you've got adequate ducting, that looks pretty clean with that front piece on there.

 

does the stock peice cover the ugly TurboXS badge on the top of the ic? looks awesome and cheap. i want one

 

Ditto, can you show pictures of your air duct?

 

Sounds like he's using the stock ducting which means it'll cool about as well as stock lol.

If you've ever cut the end tanks off one of those intercoolers and checked out the internal fin design you probably wouldnt have bought it. The one I've seen didnt have any fins inside at all. It was nothing more than straight flat rectangle tubing. Anyone that knows anything about IC's knows that doesnt work....if you want to cool the air, you have to have internal turbulators.

Maybe yours is different. Its not uncommon for the Ebay stuff to swing wildly in quality from ok to beyond poor even under the same name and price because they get different various manufacturers to make the same item depending on who can spit them out the fastest and cheapest.

You need to replace that stock duct man!!! Thats actually the hard part, everyone could just make thier own kit if it wasnt for the duct.

Stephen

 

On my xs power intercooler you can see fins through the inlet opening, there are also pics of it in a different thread where Kevin Wyum pointed out that it was old ic technology. Better than stock, but worse than asp/m2/pettit/etc...

 

I remember that thread. It left me thinking, how much better is the new technology? If you gain 10%-20% efficiency (I don't know, just throwing out a number)...does that justify the $1,400 price tag? People that have purchased this IC do report a lower intake temp. For $300~ investment, not too bad.

 

My thinking exactly. Especially because its not like I'm building a 600hp monster, I just want to run 12psi more safely than stock with less boost loss across the ic.

I will say that $1400 also buys you better piping and a duct that fits. My ic has never really fit quite right because the airpump is in the way of the crossover pipe, and the small s-pipe is just a little bit off. Plus the crossover pipe keeps popping off the y-pipe and has torn through at least one coupler. I ended up having to brace it against my strut brace to keep it from moving.

 

still no link to where this was bought at?

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Mazda...temZ8039737335


specifications taken from that link to the intercooler for those who don't want to click it:

specs:

460mm X 310mm X 85mm

85mm THICK

( 3.25" THICK )

( 18" LONG )

( 12" HIGH )

SUPER BAR AND PLATE

2.75" inlet, 2.75" outlet

Brand New...100% Aluminum, hand welded, constructed with a bar & plate design.

 

and it was actually 245 shipped to my door, and il do some ducting this weekend, and take some pictures for you guys also,

 

That is the problem with these ICs. People just throw out numbers because there is not a single piece of data on the performance of these ICs despite the number of installs. No pressure drop data and only vague statements from people claiming their intake temperatures are cooler than before during highway driving (which is a pretty useless indication of IC efficiency).

The comparison the $1500 ASP/M2 large IC is irrelevant without such data. And perfectly good proven used ICs (SRM, Greddy, Blitz) can be had for $400-$500 in the classifieds so it is also a misleading comparison.

As mentioned above, the few reports I have seen are all by people talking about highway cruise tests. Where are the real tests: pressure drop tests during high RPM, high boost conditions, and temperature drops during same?

A $300 'investment' (odd word for something that probably loses half of its value the minute you buy it) for a completely unproven piece of hardware seems quite bad to me.

 

I don't have definitive numbers, but I have used this IC on track days accelerating from 80 to 145mph (full throttle, full boost down the front straight at summit point) and my temps stayed fairly consistent at around 145 from what I can recall, definetly lower than what I was seeing with the stock ic which was up around 170.

In any case you're right that there is no actual factual evidence to support the IC, but personally I believe it works better than the stock IC (it almost has to) and thats all the proof I really need for my application.

 

At the end of a session on a 95 degree day after the cool down/heat soak lap and talking to my instructor my temps were around 165 which is definetly an improvement over my old stock readings. This was also without proper ducting so once I get everything installed properly I expect better numbers.