Hi,
I dicided to make my own fin and tube intercooler, with a very high efficiency intercooler core wich is special made. But now I want to show you some pics of the result:



Here you can see the fine gills (inside and outside)




And the selfmade end tanks









Hope you like it

Best regards,

Martin

 

Interesting to say the least

 

The finished product looks very nice, but i'm just thinking of the core efficiency. Would you care to elaborate as to why you chose that route vs a standard tube-fin or bar-plate?

 

Hi,

the tube&fin version has several advantages, one big advantage is the weight, it is much lighter than a bar and plate intercooler is. And the tube&fin version is better from the airstream conditions, the bar and plate intercoolers are sharp-edged on the surface and the tubes of a tube&fin intercooler are rounded.
The only disadvantage of the tube&fin design is the price

I also think that you will not find a bar&plate intercooler with such fine gills inside the tubes!

Greetings,

Martin

 

Air velocity is good because it 'tears' through the boundry layer - the thinner, the better the heat transfer. Due to the raw mass of air pushing though a bar&plate FMIC, the flat edges actually help since it induces turbulence, which is even better at stripping that boundry layer. Unless you're pushing the snot out of the turbo, it won't be that much of a difference. Fin density also helps a lot, although internal density can create a noticable pressure drop.

The only problem I see with your core is the leading edge of the cores. Tube&fin are usually made with 2-3x the thickness in at the front due to road debris, and the pictures provided show them fairly thin. Cheers on having a custom fmic made, not many people are willing to go that far.

 

Thanks, you are almost right but not only the fin density will rise the efficiency, also how much gills and what kind of gills the fmic has is important.
The thin tubes are a disadvantage that is right, so caused by that it is absolutely necessary to use a grid infront of the FMIC which avoids a damage!