Intercooler help

[FLIP]

Hey guys I need help deciding what intercooler kit would be best for my R34 GTT. I have been quoted:

Trust-2,188

Envy imports costom intercooler kit- 2,000

Greddy-1,634

HKS-1,825

Apexi-2,257

If anyone knows of anymore brands or better deals, I could really use the help. Thanks a lot

Cheers,

Flip

[Doctor]

value for money would point to the HKS core. I havent had personal experience with this thogh.

[Sydneykid]

Hi Flip, how many horsepower you after? What are you using the car for (road only or road/drag or road/circuit or circuit only)? The answers to those two questions will then lead to right decision on intercoolers.

[Blitz]

FLIP: UAS has Micks Metalcraft made kits for $1695 complete with silicon pipes and clamps etc. They also use all alloy polished piping.

I think the ENVY kits are from dash sport, the piping is mild steel, bends are very poor and the core is pretty ordinary.

[rev210]

Flip,

Keeping the stock turbo?

I'd try to get the right flow rated cooler for the turbo, rather than pick off undisclosed sizes of various branded ones.

[ed]

FLIP, which trust cooler kit is this? I can get them for around $1200 (V-SPL)

[FLIP]

Syneykid-I generally want it to be more for road/circuit than drag racing. I want to try and reach above 200rwks on the stock turbo. Is that possible?

rev210-Ya i am going to keep the stock turbo but i do want to atleast have it high flowed in the future. How do i pick the right intercooler for the turbo?

[Guest Brisbane_Skyline]

--->FLIP, which trust cooler kit is this? I can get them for around $1200 (V-SPL)<---

WHERE! WHERE! WHERE!! SHOW ME SHOW ME SHOW ME!!!!!

[Sydneykid]

Hi FLIP, suggestions to your questions follow.........

"200rwks on the stock turbo. Is that possible?

Not in my experience, you need to run close to 1 bar to get 200 rwkw and the ceramic turbines don't last very long at that boost level. R34 GTT's have plastic compressor wheels as well.

"hi flow standard turbo"

We have a R34 GTT that makes 250 rwkw with a GCG hi flowed R34 GTT turbo.

"Intercooler"

My suggestion would be a standard R32 GTR intercooler, they're good up to almost 300 rwkw. For $700 to $800 they are very hard to beat. R33 and R34 GTR intercooler are a little better but more expensive to buy.

Hope that helps.

[JimX]

I would go with SydneyKid's suggestion of 2nd hand GTR cooler, but if you want something shiny and new that flows just as well or better, and is still good value for money, then buy a locally-built one. With the Japanese brands you're mostly paying for the name, you can get one just as good for a lot less.

I got a brand new Mick's Metalcraft cooler last week and it is da shit. There are other locally made ones just as good or better, just depends on how much you want to spend and what you want it to look like (with endtank inlet/outlet location etc). Sub-Zero do some bigass ones for fairly cheap too ($1500 or less)

[HSVKLR]

Ive just recently installed the UAS kit (Mick's Metalcraft) on my R32 GTST and i was extremely happy with the kit and the quality of the parts... HOWEVER, steer clear of Sillicon piping, it's cheaper for a reason, it's shit. Also UAS screwed me by giving me an R33 pipe instead of an R32 pipe and that caused all sorts of dramas. After i took it back to them to fix that pipe more problems arose as air was escaping from somewhere. UAS had it for 2 days and to this day the problem still exists - major pressure loss and loud air rushing noises....

Moral of the story is: FLIP pay the extra $400 or so and go with the TRUST kit.. i wish i had....

[JimX]

Originally posted by HSVKLR

Moral of the story is: FLIP pay the extra $400 or so and go with the TRUST kit.. i wish i had....

I would say the moral of the story is to go a few doors down from UAS and get Hills Motorsports to do it Nothing wrong at all with mine done at Hills. Looks excellent, the pipes are all perfect, all custom made in their metalworking shop. Shiny polished aluminium pipes with a small silicon joiner up to the throttle body. I can't imagine it being any better.

[HSVKLR]

Geez..... thanks for letting me know JimX

Ive heard good no wait, great things about Hills Motorsport.... poor advertising tho i didnt even know they were in the same estate as UAS....

Only tonight have i finally rectified my cooler probs...

[rev210]

Trust have several intercoolers on offer.

The standard turbo would do well with the 1st two base units.

The first is a direct replacement for the stockie cooler, flows more and is perfect for a streeter.

BTW your not really building a road/circuit car are you? I haven't seen many of these sort of cars around just people that say thats what they want to do and end up having a mish mash that does nothing very well (they also have no race/circuit experience and never end up doing any). I think Sydneykid and a few others who circuit race can point you in the right direction setup wise all the same.

[FLIP]

Hey rev210, Ya i just want to have a fast street car that performs well in the track.

Sudneykid-what sort of set up would you recommend for circuit racing but something which is still fun to drive on the road.

[JimX]

Originally posted by HSVKLR

Ive heard good no wait, great things about Hills Motorsport.... poor advertising tho i didnt even know they were in the same estate as UAS....

I did the exact same thing! I'd only heard of UAS, so I went there to get my airbox/partition. I was then going to get them to program my S-AFC and fix my intercooler piping, but they don't program the S-AFC and they referred me to Silverwater I think. So even then I still hadn't heard about Hills.

Then Prank or someone mentioned Hills Motorsports in a thread, and I went and saw Mark and I haven't looked back since. I couldn't afford the intercooler piping, but in the end I just got a whole new intercooler anyway.

All the guys at Hills are really helpful and friendly, when my car wouldn't idle properly at the end of the night after the plenum/cooler upgrade, they all hung around until like 9:30pm trying to sort it out. In the end they made up a little vacuum hose restrictor for the idler motor, because the adjustment was bottomed out on the plenum and it was idling too fast.

Now it's all perfect, and they didn't charge me any extra for the restrictor or the time spent on it. These guys are really dedicated to their work and won't brush you off for the bigger projects like some other workshops do. Whatever they start they finish properly and for that reason my car will always be going back to Hills unless it's for something they can't do (dunno what that would be yet, they're miracle workers).

I'm not saying that there aren't any other workshops that are also like this, but now that I've found one there's no reason to change.

[Steve]

There is a company in sydney ( I think? ) called hybrid. I have one of their coolas and I am very happy.

As soon as it went on my clutch died a horrible death. After sorting out the clutch, with a power fc, ebc, pod and exhaust I made 203rwkw on tilbrooks dyno with a totally stock series 1 turbo at 0.85bar boost, and stock fuel system - injectors getting a bit lean though.

It is a 600 x 300 x 76 bar and plate rated to 650hp with a 2psi drop. It may be a bit big for your applications, but they may make smaller ones.

the reason I say all this is that the coola cost $800 new, which is alot cheaper than imported stuff.

[Sydneykid]

Hi Flipe, you asked "Sudneykid-what sort of set up would you recommend for circuit racing but something which is still fun to drive on the road."

Do you mean just the intercooler?

The standard R33 GTR intercooler is very hard to beat. We use them a lot. That's what the Gibson cars used (in R32 Group N form). They were good for 620 bhp, so I see no reason to argue.

If you mean the whole engine set up, well it really depends on how much horsepower you are after and what budget you want spend.

Also remember that a circuit race car depends a lot more on its handling and brakes than its outright power. It is very possible to go slower with more horsepower. I do many circuit drive days and driver instruction and it is not unusual to find the Skyline with the least horsepower ends up doing the fastest lap times.

You have to maintain some driveability (throttle response) on the circuit, which is why it is possible to build a good combination car. One that drives nicely on the road and also turns in very respectable lap times.

Hope that answers your question.