Adding an intercooler to an old truck?

[Daniël Bos]

Hey experts!

 

I was tinkering with my truck yesterday and noticed just how much space I have around it...

It made me wonder whether there would be much benefit in adding a (suitably sized) intercooler to it?

 

Engine is an iveco, turbocharged (duh) 6l straight six, about 100k, but 22 years old. It's in good condition, little smoky at startup, uses no oil and has no known faults.

 

So is it as simple as just slapping one on, and have more power?

I presume there'd be a bit more turbo-lag though currently there is none noticeable?

Any drawbacks?

Would I have to increase fuel supply? (I presume this can be done by tweaking the high pressure pump..?)

 

Cheers, Daniel

[treequip]

A suitable intercooler wont add turbo lag.

 

Adding an intercooler will feed the engine with cooler (denser) air allowing it to get the best out of the fuel its currently getting.

 

It would make it cleaner but in itself its unlikely to make much power difference unless you tweak the pump to add more fuel.

 

That would be like giving your granny a pair of running shoes, she will do it but for how long??

[openspaceman]

Would I have to increase fuel supply?

 

I cannot answer question about practicalities but yes to get more power you would need more fuel to burn in the increased mass of air the intercooler would get into the engine.

 

Volumetric efficiency would still go up slightly with the same amount of diesel.

 

As mass of air consumption dictates power out of an engine and cooler air has more mass per volume colder air is better. This isn't the case with wood burning as fuel surface area and heat exchange tend to be limiting.

[MattyF]

Not really worth it unless you adjust the actuator or fit a bleed valve to wind up the boost, intercoolers just allow you to run more boost as they keep the temps Safer and potentially the engine from detonating.. usually with an old engine winding up the boost only ends one way!

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

Remember the Perkins Prima 2.0 fitted in Rover Montego, Maestro et al? If only they'd intercooled it... that would have removed that engines "issue's" perfectly.

[TIMON]

I stuck an Iveco intercooler onto the front of a Nissan Silvia turbo years ago and it gave a very noticeable increase in power.

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

Cooler will halve the charge temperature. It's not a "charge" but you know what I mean.

 

Idi or di engine?

 

Cross flow head?

 

Compression ratio?

 

Increased density reduces ignition lag so smoother and quieter.

[Daniël Bos]

So the general consensus is: it won't cause any problems, but won't add (much if any) power unless I add more fuel.

I think I may leave it for now then.

 

Thanks for the inputs.

 

Sent from my D5803 using Arbtalk mobile app

[MattyF]

You can add more fuel by playing around I have no idea how but with turbos the power is all in how much boost the engine can handle ,the intercooler just means you can run more psi =boost on your turbo keeping the charge temps low so the engine does not prematurely detonate.

More turbo boost = more power. Just fitting an intercooler won't give you more boost it just lowers the charge temps so you can.

Old cars like the Renault 5 gt turbo you fitted a bleed valve off the actuator pipe or fitted a 31 actuator so it could be adjusted , the actuator on all turbocharged engines controls how much turbo boost is produced.

So say you get to 0. 5 psi boost the actuator spring is set to open the turbo waste gate at that pressure , other wise the boost builds up and blows your engine, the turbo waste gate opens and dumps excess pressure in accordance to what the actuator is set at ...You can adjust the actuator to keep the waste gate to stay open longer adding more psi or another crude way of doing it is fitting a bleed valve for about £15 that bleeds off pressure to the actuator spring so it stays open longer and gives you more boost= more power.

[Ferguson system]

Adding an intercooler has the potential to increase power by up to 20%.