ebay intercoolers

personally, i wouldnt buy an unbranded critical component like an IC off ebay... most of them are cheap knockoffs that look pretty on the outside... some things to consider:

1) material quality: can affect cooling ability, heat soak, etc.
2) flow properties and pressure drop: might make ur setup very inefficient

call me a brand whore but i'd rather spend some extra money on something i believe took some amount of engineering to make

 

^^^i agree with the brand whore

 

you whore

 

what do you mean by "brand whore?" :ugh:

 

i agree too intercooler is very critical part of the wrx.

 

damn that chick has some pretty skin

 

read nasioc, they have some good articles on the ebay IC, they actually tested some. I don't trust em' myself, but then again I don't trust anyone

 

AIRBRUSH!...prob. a burn victim in real life :eek2:

 

i just want some ice cream now :dunno

 

go check out www.bellintercoolers.com they seem like a pretty nice company and can make you what ever you want for a decent price.



Alex

 

FYI, there are only a few intercooler core manufacturers. there are a limited number of companies that make the cores and they distribute them to other manufacturers that do they end takes and pipings. i have had VERY good luck with buying cores from ebay and fabricating the rest of the kit from scrtach. now i say this and they've been used on many different cras, from 700 whp supras to custom turbo'd gs400's.
don't slip or underestimate no-name brand intercoolers.

 

like i mentioned before, there maybe about are about 5 or 6 main intercooler producers. they make the "cores" not all the full kits. companies like turbo xs, perrin, cobb, etc. don't produce their own cores. they buy cores and produce "kits" with the piping and whatnot. of course there are variances in types like bar/plate, tube/fin, and pressure drops within similar brands of cores. but for the most part, comparing like cores to like cores of same sizes and same number of rows, there won't be all that many differences in pressure drop ( the thing most people are concerned about).

pretty much any time an intercooler doesn't fit well is the company that makes the "kits" fault and not the "core" companies' fault.

i wouldn't hesitate in buying a no-name intercooler from the internet. if i where to weigh the pro's/cons between buying a full kit against buying a core and having everything fabbed, many of the times i have suggested fabbing everything if the price were right on the core.

 

i know of a guy that had a turboxs fmic on his wrx. He got his sti and bought the ebay fmic and the quality is just as good. He only had to buy an elbow which was mentioned in the ebay description.

 

Steer clear of the cheap ebay intercoolers...most of them lack the required amount of fins inside the core to actually cool the air. Even though they are large the air passes through the core too quickly and doesn't cool the charge. While they may look good on the outside, its the inside fins that make the most difference in both cfm and efficency.

Doug

 

yeah that skin is 'too' perfect, who notices something like that? 8]