Everyone,

About to embark on building a Vmount for my FD and wanted to know some good places to consider for sourcing an IC core. For those who've already built their own kits, who did you use? I've noticed these inexpensive 3.5 inch cores on Ebay. Performancewise, they claim 0.2 to 0.5 psi loss at 15 psi of boost and sell for under $200.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/CXRac...spagenameZWDVW

Are they even worth considering? Please share your knowledge!

Thanks in advance everyone!

 

Generally, the cheaper ebay intercoolers have a very low inner fin density with no turbulators which leads to a very low pressure drop (good). However, this also means that there isn't much heat transfer between the fins and the ambient air so the efficiency will suffer (bad). To be honest, they are probably fine for a front mounted intercooler because you can make the thing so damn big that the relatively low efficiency doesn't matter as much.

For something mounted inside the engine bay I would opt for a higher quality core. Of course this means spending a little more money... Spearco and Bell Intercoolers are two great options, but a bit pricey. I just bought a custom intercooler by ETS (Extreme Turbo Systems) and I am very impressed with the quality of the core and welds. It has good fin density (about equal to my PFS w/ spearco core) and the fins have nice turbulators. It was also priced very reasonably, but still a good amount more than anything you will see on ebay for cheap.

You can go ahead and try the ebay IC. If you can make it big enough and flow enough cool air through it, it might just work out fine, I would be sure to moniter intake temps. Worst case scenario you are out 200 bucks and have to buy another core.

Oh, I can't see the ebay link right now at work, but I would make sure the IC you choose has at least 2.75" inlet/outlets. I know a lot of the ebay IC's are only 2.5".

 

Thanks Afterburn. Yes, the Ebay cores do specify 2.5 inch inlet and outlet, so if I decided to go this route they'd need to be modified.

Thanks again!

 

Rccaz, I would think about using a core from garrett we can get a pretty good price on serveral sizes.....Just a thought

G

 

The RX7 store has one that uses the greddy front mount and you can buy peices if you have a FMIC already.

 

Agreed Glenn. I'll give you a call and we can check on pricing. Do you know who Garrett gets their cores from? Also everyone, for those of you running AC, I'd really like to see some pics of your solutions for the dryer location and AC lines.

Thx

 

A friend and I built a vmount kit using the XS Power cheapo ebay IC. Its working great on his car.

We used my M2 Large SMIC that I had laying around on my car with our vmount and mounting setup.


Bell intercoolers is also a great source for quality ICs.