cooling intercooling and ducting question/theory

[EazyBreazy]

i am well aware of the benifits of a v mounted intercooler/radiator, but i am also aware of its price and fabrication that is involved with it... my question is has anyone used custom ducting with the standard configuration(intercooler infront of radiator) to direct the air where they want it to go..i am aware that there is quite a bit of custom fab work involved hear and that it would not be worth it unless the design uses the venturi effect to speed the air up as opposed to slowing it down...

any input would be appreciated.

[j-z]

i dont understand the benefits of a v mount setup as opposed to a front mount setup. since you know them, can you elaborate?

[TurboKA37]

allows more airflow to the radiator as opposed to a standard front mount style where the intercooler will slow down and heat up the airflow to the radiator.what type of ducting were u thinking of? maybe some type of fins that extend forward from the sides of the radiator might help. moving air from the sides of the intercooler to the radiator? would take some work but id wait until i had cooling problems before i do something like that

[j-z]

so where does the radiator go then?

[TurboKA37]

the radiator is turned to the point where it is almost parallel with the ground and is accompanied with an upside-down scoope to force air up i believe. ive also only seen them on cars with a big cooling vent in the hood.

[TurboKA37]

like this:and

ive now noticed that the IC is on the top and the radiator on the bottom part.

[Nathan]

I tried to duct air to my radiator, it didn't work out so well Unless I cut holes in my bumper its kinda an exercise in futility. Instead, I'm doing the SCC water sprayer trick

[andrave]

I think what he is talking about is how you can use sheet metal to control how much air flows to either the radiator or the intercooler... if that makes sense.

[EazyBreazy]

more along the lines of completely incapsulating the radiator and intercooler with ducting kindof like ac ducting in a house and then slowly tapering down and exiting out a hole in the hood.

in theory it woud increase the speed of the air as it exited the hood and essentially create a vacume at the front where the intercooler and radiator are.

the vacume would be in addition to the air forced into the ducting by entering the front of the intercooler and radiator.. I am not sure what kindof effects it would have on engine bay temperatures since alot if the air that would be moved through the engine bay would be directed throught the i/c and radiator and then exit external of the bay..

with exeption of when the car is sitting still i also believe that it would increase i/c efficiency as well as the aero dynamics of the car because after cooling the charge and coolant the air is sent over the car as opposed to collecting in the engine bay until it haphazardly finds its way out.

im not an aerodynamics engineer nor thermodynamics but with my limited knowledge this seems like a good alternative to the v mount.

[EazyBreazy]

like this:and

ive now noticed that the IC is on the top and the radiator on the bottom part.

the way ive seen it is that a splitter is used in the open area of the bumper spliting the air so that the top half goes through the intercooler and exits the hood and the bottom half goes through the radiator downward but i dont know where it exits im pretty sure its either down or ducting is run so that it exits the wheel wells. if it is down i would think that it would create a bit of a lift in the front of the car at high speeds with the air being forced downward.

[andrave]

negligible.

[EazyBreazy]

just thoughts

[j-z]

ohhhhh ok, i gotcha now. ive seen pics of the v mount and never understood the point of it and where/how the hell the radiator was mounted. now it makes perfect sense on why you would do this and why they call it a v mount.

[C-Kwik]

In a v-mount set-up, separate ducting would be somewhat negligible. As long as the sides are blocked off to effectively make a single duct that feeds to both units, it should create enough of a high pressure area in front of both to make it reasonably effective. However, there can be a lot of factors depending on the set-up, the car, the amount of effectiveness you want out of both the radiator and the intercooler, etc.