water mist or intercooler

[6.5coalroller]

Will an intercooler cause a lot of lag? I have a hx-35 running 15 max sometimes spikes a lil higher. But i'd lyk to get somethin to cool the air down before next summer and i'm not sure which one to go with. I can def tell a difference between drivin to school in the morning when it's 40 and leavin to go home somedays when it's in the seventies. I don't have much lag now unless your at a complete stop and you put it to the floor lol you can punch it goin down the road and it spools real fast.

 

[mfgguru]

Why not both? The intercooler is low maintenance and constant, the mister will need attention, depending on how much you use it. There are those that run both. I have read that when employing an intercooler and mister, pre turbo nozzle placement is the most efficient. Turbine atomizes the water and increases charge air volume and decreases temps further. Just my thoughts. :smile5:

 

[buddy]

I think WMI is better than intercooler. Because the water serves additional purpose in retarding autoignition of the fuel, so compression heat is greater when combustion occurs and closer to top dead center. How you place the nozzles in a forced induction seems not so relevant to me, the atomization occurs at the nozzle and there is only so much exchange of heat that can occur and then its done. So pre turbo or post, I dont think there is much difference in performance of the water. The way to get better atomization is through smaller nozzles, foggers basically, thats why I run a 300cc and a 200cc vice a single 600cc or something like that. That is the benefit of the pre turbo systems advertised, they use foggers essentially, but 3 or 4 of them to get the same water volume. I just dont like the idea of water hitting my turbo blade, even though people have shown it no to cause them early failure.

Intercooler - simple, but lag off the line
Water - complicated, but more benefits, lower upfront cost

 

[Matt Bachand]

I've been thinking of this, So I'm gonna ask it.

What is the possibility of a WMI injector to fail, causing it to dump water in the intake vs spraying a mist?

 

[OregonHorseTug]

I've been thinking of this, So I'm gonna ask it.

What is the possibility of a WMI injector to fail, causing it to dump water in the intake vs spraying a mist?

The failure mode would most likely be that it plugs up and stops misting. If someone were to put in a nozzle that could actually open up that probably means it had a plug fall out into the intake system. Something like a carb jet screwed into the nozzle or some other horrible design. I don't have to tell you that the nozzle part that would be ingested would be worse than the water! Any nozzle for this purpose should screw into where ever it goes from the outside and be unable to deposit any parts into the intake manifold.

 

[buddy]

Well Im not sure if all nozzles come with their own check valves, but should. To essentially have pop pressures to ensure no dribbling into the intake overnight. Work like our injectors basically, but to pop at like 50 psi to ensure no water gets through that is not getting atomized.

So the nozzle is just a hole, and very small, its not like it can fail open and dump water, so as long as there is pressure behind it, it will be atomized. If it has an internal check valve failure you get some dribbling overnight until the water left in it is out and a puff of white smoke on startup .

May be failsafe then to have a system that bleeds the line when its not supposed to be operating, like reversing the pump for a second when it shuts down.

 

[Turbine Doc]

I've been thinking of this, So I'm gonna ask it.

What is the possibility of a WMI injector to fail, causing it to dump water in the intake vs spraying a mist?

Good system will ony spray above X psi boost, slugging with too much spray should not be an issue, if anything a nozzle would become plugged before failure would be an issue, only problem I see if home building your kit, you cheap out and buy some nozzles that aren't of good quality, or use pressure switches/spray control that is not up to the task then there could be some risk of spraying too much or when you don't have any boost going with the spray.

 

[6.5coalroller]

Where would be a good place to get nozzles and where can you get a pressure switch? I think most systems use 2 nozzles rite? How would you run it to kick on a second nozzle with one pump? Would you only want it kicking on on acceleration? so many questions lol.

 

[buddy]

You can find adjustable Hobbs pressure switches online or ebay. Dont put them on the aluminum intake though, plumb a line to them so that they are isolated from heat and vibration, learned my lesson.

Nozzles can be found all over too, make sure like stated they have a check valve/pop pressure. multiple small nozzles is ideal for atomization, even if only single split stage, 3 200cc nozzles will perform better than a single 600cc nozzle.

If you want 2 stages you need a electric solenoid valve in line with the secondary nozzle, and another pressure switch to activate the solenoid to open the flood gates per say.

Ulitmately, getting a whole kit is the way to go if you dont feel like hunting on ebay for a bunch of parts and hope it all works. Check out Heath, Devils Own, Cooling Mist.....

The latest MaxxTorque edition did have a nice pre-turbo setup with I think 4 foggers/misters located in the air stream. Its a nice setup, but I dont know how much it costs, and I wouldnt say it would outperform multiple small nozzles post turbo

 

[Edzzed]

don't put the nozzle PRE-TURBO, I have heard it sandblasts the turbine due to it's high rotational speeds. I can't see how a nozzle would fail as mine is screwed into the intake from the outside. As for drip after engine shutdown, it's only a problem if you turn on the spray after engine shutdown. 1 1/2 years and never had a problem in that way. hobbs switch, not a good idea. unless you are going to put a toggle switch to turn pump power off until you need it. you will go thru a lot of water otherwise. The setup I have is dual nozzle. it comes on at 7 lbs and ramps up power to the pump by pulsing the electricity till 100% power to the pump at which time I have hit max boost. As boost goes up so does spray. I also have a toggle switch between my unit and the map sensor. originally I had the toggle switch on the actual power wire for the unit but it kept setting off map boost codes on my puter but had to move it to stop coding. Ed

 

[buddy]

I think the use of pressure switches is to avoid the cost of a $220 controller. So if you have two stages, and set the pressure switches to where you want, it will work fine, and youre still only spraying when you wanted to, just varying flow by stages instead of a controller on the pump. I even had a third stage on mine using a relay and a third pressure switch that would either have the pump power straight or through a large resistor. It would vary pump pressure by 30 psi.

Ultimately the variable controller is easier

The one good thing about staging instad of progressive controller is that you get better atomization at higher pressure and smaller nozzles. So you can keep the pump pushing 100psi, and stage in another, and then another nozzle and still getting best atomization. Vice a contoller pushing 50psi and progressively gaining flow by increasing pressure.

 

[VW_Lupo_TD]

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[ryridesmotox]

don't put the nozzle PRE-TURBO, I have heard it sandblasts the turbine due to it's high rotational speeds.

Golly I sure hope you aren't using water from the beach batman. Water won't harm the metal unless its at a ridiculously high pressure. I think a water jet metal cutter runs at like 30-40,000 psi or something crazy like that. Planes run in rain storms and a turbo probably doesn't spool much faster than a metal turboprop plane propeller at full RPM. Plus in rain there are small particulates like sodium, carbon and acid crap. I'm pretty sure most WMI systems call for distilled or highly purified water. Like buddy said no one has shown any early failure... YET

just my 2 cents. I will be going with WMI pre-turbo 3 nozzle setup next spring.

 

[buddy]

Water can cause serious damage to the blades if large enough droplets are thrown at it. Preturbo its essential that you use real fine mist sprayers. Thats why youll have three, because they will be real fine mist.

 

[bison]

I have zero experience with water inj.
what are the pro's and con's of this hickymicky,and how does one use it in subzero weather.
Water has the nasty tendency to get solid in winter.

 

[6.5coalroller]

I think you can put some washer fluid in it but you have to delute it enough bc it has methanol in it. I think you can only run bout 10% methanol and idk how cold that would go to keep it from freezing. If it was me since I jus have a daily driver in the winter I would jus unplug it lol. It gets down in the teens in Indiana so I think the air would be cold enough.

 

[6.5coalroller]

It would be kinda neat if you could wire in 2 lights one for each stage that lights up when they kick in. 2 pressure gauges might be a lil over kill lol but if I had some money layin around whats 2 more gauges jus makes it look more serious than it is. I only have a boost gauge now and everyone that ever rides in my truck asks me what it is. I tell them and they still have no clue lol

 

[OregonHorseTug]

For the pre turbo crowd-

Let's see, just for the sake of argument -

1. Industrial steam turbine users will spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to make sure the condensate in the steam piping does not get to the turbine.
2. The prop blades on my (high rpm) sport plane spin up to 2800 rpm, turbo props run about 2000, the compressor in your turbo charger runs upwards of 100,000 rpm
3. Look at a prop on a seaplane some time to see what water does at blade tip speeds of only 1100 fps (90" prop at 2800 rpm)
4. water drops, even very fine ones, will erode a turbine compressor wheel.
5. If you consider your compressor wheel to be a replacement item then this design is okay.

The question remains, how long will it last? If you're building a quarter-mile rig it's irrelevant. For those of us looking for longevity and pulling heavy up long hills, my money is on post turbo injection.
Mike

 

[ryridesmotox]

Yea you can use the windshield washer stuff. Methanol is touchy stuff though. I think the % varies with the size of fogger nozzle you use, but i could be mistaken, I wouldn't use it though. Just some hi-quality H20.

I figured a fogger was the way to go before or after turbo buddy. Am I mistaken? A good mist cools better and doesn't cause droplets to form on the intake pleunum. At least that's where my thinking takes me.

Yea Oregon I don't know much about planes I jsut used it as a poor example. But I mean "sandblasting" an impeller? Thats a bit much. I would think that it would take a bad mister or some particulates in the water for any damage to be done.

There are pros and cons for each. But I do know that Pre Turbo alows for more cooling of the air, since the water is in there longer right. I would think the way to go would be to have 2 foggers pre turbo that kick in on a second stage, and one larger fogger post turbo that runs more often maybe. Just a thought if you are worried about the turbo, the 2 pre foggers wouldn't kick in til higher boost so you turbo wouldn't be exposed to it all the time.

 

[OregonHorseTug]

..I only have a boost gauge now...

One gauge??