Thread: Vertical vs. Horizontal Intercoolers

Your thoughts? Anyone run one on their SE-R?

Found these thoughts on other forums:

Element Racing used one on their G20. Worked well for them. But they never pushed more than 16psi.

links dont work bro.

stratton.

Vertical flow intercoolers work great out of the box with traditional cast/sheetmetal tapered endtanks. You can also improve their performance when a well designed divider/splitter is used within the endtank to optimize airflow.

I have been trying to get people to understand this for years LOL.

Javier said it for the cores that have endtanks on the same side. You could skip the divider if you had the endtanks enter and exit like an "S".

I have had a crappy ebay one for a few years now, same side end tanks on the NX.

Assuming the intercooler is longer than it is tall, the vertical flow intercooler is preferable. I'm sure if I searched I could find a good couple of posts I made on the subject years ago.

Eh,

Its not going to make that much of a difference given the intercoolers have the same type of core and the same surface area and thickness. It wont be enough to really tell.

Optimal in the basics of looking at things would be a horizontal with the inlet and outlet in the center of the end tank with a taper to the top and bottom meaning the inlet and outlet sit further back from the core and the endtanks taper to get a nice even flow across the intercooler.

Most verticals have the inlet/oulet on the same side of the intercooler and would cause drastic changes in direction of airflow and I would think I mean logicly that would not be as efficient to have to do two 90* turns basicly.

inter-coolers are radiators. The more metal to absorb heat from the air flowing through, the better thermal efficiency.

its basic shape wont do anything to the heat soaking ability, that's whats key. As far as shape, channel size, end tanks shape, inlet/out let angles/shapes, fin size; pressure distributes its self evenly through the path of lowest resistance. wait im tripping im talking about electrolysis haha, anyways pressure distributes its self anywhere the air molecules can travel basically.

that's where flow rate and bottle necking of a ic design comes into play. the bigger the channels and less directions/distance for the pressure to cover, the faster it builds from the compressor outlet to the tb. pressure wont get lost in the system like some believe. that's absurd, unless a leak is about.

there is such a thing as to much volume for any given application ic. think of a coke bottle. from a crushed 1 liter to a 2 liter bottle, how many more breaths will it take to fill up the 2 liter than the 1 liter? more. Now give 2 mouths to blow up the 2 liter and the flow rate is matching 1 mouth to 1 liter crushed bottle to fill up. same thing as using a too big of a ic or too little of a ic. there are ic dimension calculators out there to tell you what you need. im sure you know all this. Im just saying think about the shape, size, ic piping accommodation and if it logically it will do anything better for you. Use your tuner brain

You have any pictures?

Don't listen to Ashton and Dema. Listen to the guy who made well over twice factory power at a mere 10.8 psi on a tiny turbo because he sweated the details.