Project Icey Reservoir-*WARNING* Lots of DATA

[Fade 2 Black]

As far as how the a/c does long term I can't say since I didn't collect any data before the IR went in. I have only driven to/from work once as well, I don't DD my L every day now but I didn' notice any adverse affects as far as the a/c went.

I don't road race my truck either. I am not going to even try to speculate responses to your questions because without any hard data other than what I have provided that would be pointless IMO.

Running a vehicle on a dyno with the a/c off and then commanded to stay on is the ONLY way to measure how much HP is used, I know of nobody on here who's done so yet. Testing the system in all modes, uses and configurations will take time and as I have more pertinent factual data I will of course make it known.

If one LOOKS at the screenshots you can see that when the system is turned on, no matter how high the IAT2's are, that they begin to drop almost immediately. If I can find an inexpensive way to measure the actual fluid temperature coming from the IR compared to before I will do so.

 

[Fade 2 Black]

Damn doubles. :bash:

 

[Brahmus]

Considering our #1 enemy is heat, I'm all ears. I do have a few questions that may have been answered but I didn't digest.

#1 What is the max Delta T witnessed with the unit on and idling and cruising? (What is the best # you saw as compared to ambient and w/o the system on?) I might butcher this question so I'll try again. What is the maximum temperature reduction from the system that you witnessed in various senerios?

#2 Once down to the Minimum temperature witnessed, how long did it take to climb back up with the unit off under different senerios? (This question has to do with the fact that at WOT the a/c is off, Just trying to figure out how long the effects would last under WOT)


As I don't race any. I think this is a great idea for a daily driver, spinning the Eaton a bit harder, to recoup some of the loss from the extra heat generated. Being as we use the a/c down here 10 months out the year don't see any down sides to it. I am just trying to figure out how much I'll benefit from it and how.

Why the concern of high temps and which Freon to be used? What is the highest temps the intercooler system would see?

 

[Venomous01]

Good debate!:beer:

 

[Fade 2 Black]

You have to remember that the info posted is the actual drop in the temperature of the AIR after going through the intercooler and not the fluid temperatures.

Having said that, 10* is the largest decrease in air temps witnessed, no matter how high the ambient temps were and 8* seemed about the LEAST amount of temperature drop observed.

I have not done any high-load, high speed testing yet, only highway cruising and some stop and go traffic.

From the time the a/c was turned on until the lowest temps were seen (maximum temperature decrease) was around 2 minutes and when turned off the same amount of time expired for the temps to increase back to a peak.

At the track with 20# my IAT2's have been as high as 160*

By lowering the IAT2 temps you decrease the margin for detonation, have a more dense air/fuel mixture and maintain more spark longer in the tune. Cooler air=more power.

 

[Venomous01]

Cooler air definitely means more power, but do the benefits of this piece outweigh the negative aspects. Even more importantly where does this product apply (road racing, drag racing or daily driving/cruising). My assumptions were:

Drag Racing: Ice in the I/C box is better for cooler IAT2s then this product b/c I assume for this product to work the car must be on. Well most people in the staging lanes leave there car off. If they turned it on and left it idling the engine comparment and airtemps would rise thus negating the affects of this piece.

Open Tracking/Road Racing: You are mostly WOT the entire time so if the tune demands the a/c off @ WOT this product would provide no additional "performance gain" in this area.

Cruising/Daily Driving: This is where this product would shine IMO. At a stop light those of you who monitor IATs and IAT2s closely like I do will notice they rise in this case. This product could help keep them down at stop lights on hot days and during cruising on hot days. However does this product shorten the life of the a/c system? Does it drag on the motor? Is this worth the cost? Possibly, but additional data is needed and feedback can only tell.

 

[Brahmus]

My assumptions were:

Cruising/Daily Driving: This is where this product would shine IMO. At a stop light those of you who monitor IATs and IAT2s closely like I do will notice they rise in this case. This product could help keep them down at stop lights on hot days and during cruising on hot days. However does this product shorten the life of the a/c system? Does it drag on the motor? Is this worth the cost? Possibly, but additional data is needed and feedback can only tell.

I have to agree here! Hence my interest.

I don't know if I follow the idea of shorten life of the a/c. Why would it? These trucks run with the a/c on in desert heat for 100 of thousands of miles. The compressor only knows to run or not.

Drag on the motor would be the same as without it IMO.

But I agree, we feed on data, the more the better. .hahaha

 

[Steve@TF]

Cooler air definitely means more power, but do the benefits of this piece outweigh the negative aspects. Even more importantly where does this product apply (road racing, drag racing or daily driving/cruising). My assumptions were:

Drag Racing: Ice in the I/C box is better for cooler IAT2s then this product b/c I assume for this product to work the car must be on. Well most people in the staging lanes leave there car off. If they turned it on and left it idling the engine comparment and airtemps would rise thus negating the affects of this piece.

Open Tracking/Road Racing: You are mostly WOT the entire time so if the tune demands the a/c off @ WOT this product would provide no additional "performance gain" in this area.

Cruising/Daily Driving: This is where this product would shine IMO. At a stop light those of you who monitor IATs and IAT2s closely like I do will notice they rise in this case. This product could help keep them down at stop lights on hot days and during cruising on hot days. However does this product shorten the life of the a/c system? Does it drag on the motor? Is this worth the cost? Possibly, but additional data is needed and feedback can only tell.

for drag racing, just while sitting in line waiting for your turn, then while in the staging lane, would be a help when using this product. Fade2Black's results showed that the temps started to drop immediately. and as your driving back after making a pass, you can have the a/c on helping cool the water down more. ive got my i/c pump set to a toggle switch so i can leave the water circulating even when the car is off. not the full effect of the a/c box but i think it would help.

for road racing, you cant be going WOT the entire time. when you slow down to go through a turn or get too close to someone etc... there are plenty of times when you wont be WOT. at that point, the a/c box would be on and doing some immediately cooling. even if only for ten seconds, i assume it would do some measurable good. i can only speculate though since i havent done any open tracking personally

i just spoke with the designer of these thingies. i discussed with him Fade's concerns with the inlet/outlet sizes. The Icey Res was designed to work in place of your factory i/c box. so in order to fit the factory size hoses, he kept them the stock sizes. Fade used the factory box in conjunction with the ICey Res which means he had to make a bigger hose fit (from factory IC box to ICey Res). i told the designer that i would prefer to run it as Fade did too. what we detemined would be the best solution would be to make a threaded inlet and include the two different sized male barbs with the box. that way the end user can decide for himself which he wants to use.

we also discussed the universal ICey Res boxes as well. we plan to make two different sizes. a LARGE sized box that will be about the size of a car battery. the customer can install it in their battery location or in their bed/trunk or wherever. this would be perfect for the ultimate hardcore racer. the LARGE size box would definitely have way more effecient cooling capabilities.

we plan to also make a smaller universal box for those people who want the box up front in the engine bay but do not want to relocate their car battery. this box would be a basic rectangle with mouting tabs that customers with various cars from camaros to vortech'd stangs could mount anywhere in the engine bay where they can find the room. i plan to start a thread in the blower bistro where s/c guys from all makes can chime in on what size would be good for the smaller size box. we want the box to be able to fit somewhere in the front of most vehicles. whether it be in the engine bay or behind the front bumper.

 

[Venomous01]

I have to agree here! Hence my interest.

I don't know if I follow the idea of shorten life of the a/c. Why would it? These trucks run with the a/c on in desert heat for 100 of thousands of miles. The compressor only knows to run or not.

Drag on the motor would be the same as without it IMO.

But I agree, we feed on data, the more the better. .hahaha

My assumption of decreased A/C like comes from the idea that 1) the a/c will be on more often used to cool the air going into the engine and 2) it will be used to cool the cabin (which in theory should take longer) and cool the iat2s. It wasn't meant to split duties and re-engineering it to do so may shorten the lifespan of the system. Take that truck and do the same thing in 100 degree heat running this box and cooling your cabin and 1 of 2 things will happen. Either your a/c in the cabin doesn't work as well b/c it's splitting duties or the a/c system is working harder and being strained. My initial thought is the a/c system won't work as well, but that remains to be seen and at this point is pure speculation.

My assumption of drag comes from the idea that the a/c is an accessory that drags/robs power from the motor b/c it takes power to run it. Similar to the theory of underdrive pulleys this would essentially be the opposite b/c you would have the a/c on more often then normal. IATs can get high in certain performance venues, but on the streets they rarely get high enough to worry about it.

 

[Steve@TF]

My assumption of decreased A/C like comes from the idea that 1) the a/c will be on more often used to cool the air going into the engine and 2) it will be used to cool the cabin (which in theory should take longer) and cool the iat2s. It wasn't meant to split duties and re-engineering it to do so may shorten the lifespan of the system. Take that truck and do the same thing in 100 degree heat running this box and cooling your cabin and 1 of 2 things will happen. Either your a/c in the cabin doesn't work as well b/c it's splitting duties or the a/c system is working harder and being strained. My initial thought is the a/c system won't work as well, but that remains to be seen and at this point is pure speculation.

as noted, the a/c system is only going to work as hard as it can. now if you run it at full blast because you want to cool your IAT2s and cabin, then i dont think it should be much of an issue. im sure people do this all the time in their everyday lives. the vehicle manufacturer designed the a/c system to be able to do this. granted, if you use your a/c system constantly then it may shorten the overall lifespan but then you'd probably be doing that anyways if you typically run your a/c that much.

 

[Steve@TF]

make that a TRIPLE post! :cuss: :bash: :fart:

 

[Steve@TF]

damn dirty double post! :cuss:

 

[Venomous01]

for drag racing, just while sitting in line waiting for your turn, then while in the staging lane, would be a help when using this product. Fade2Black's results showed that the temps started to drop immediately. and as your driving back after making a pass, you can have the a/c on helping cool the water down more. ive got my i/c pump set to a toggle switch so i can leave the water circulating even when the car is off. not the full effect of the a/c box but i think it would help.

To that point does this work with the car off? B/C if not the question that comes to mind is this setup better then just leaving the car off and adding ice into your I/C box?

for road racing, you cant be going WOT the entire time. when you slow down to go through a turn or get too close to someone etc... there are plenty of times when you wont be WOT. at that point, the a/c box would be on and doing some immediately cooling. even if only for ten seconds, i assume it would do some measurable good. i can only speculate though since i havent done any open tracking personally

I don't think there is 10 seconds on an open track where you aren't WOT probably at max 5-7 seconds so will the box turn on and provide efficient cooling in that short period of time?

I'd like to see a road racer get there hands on this and datalog the affects on the track. Road racers are the ones that deal with heat the most. Steve contact Carlos (RaceBronco) and ask if he is willing to test this. He would be a great person for testing and he'll give you an honest opinion from a road racer stand point. He is always at the track and is an experienced instructor for speedventures.

 

[Venomous01]

as noted, the a/c system is only going to work as hard as it can. now if you run it at full blast because you want to cool your IAT2s and cabin, then i dont think it should be much of an issue. im sure people do this all the time in their everyday lives. the vehicle manufacturer designed the a/c system to be able to do this. granted, if you use your a/c system constantly then it may shorten the overall lifespan but then you'd probably be doing that anyways if you typically run your a/c that much.

So with this idea the a/c's ability to cool the cabin will be affected. how much it is affected remains to be seen. My concern is with running the a/c system constantly on the box will shorten the life span of the a/c system.

To my second bold the OEMs didn't engineer the a/c system to do double duty and if the system has say a lifespan of 60,000hrs to it then using it for cabin purposes 30% of the time is hardly the same as using it 30% of the time as well as 80% of the time for the box while driving. The a/c system will still be on longer with the box then not and thus like ever part out there the more you use it the shorter the lifespan.

I like this debate and would really like to see data in performance settings. Interested, which is why I bring up these points. I personally don't use the a/c all that often so this product does intrigue me.

 

[Fade 2 Black]

Making assumptions is pointless. The compressor pumps a given amount of freon and the two systems are in PARALELL with one another so the two evaperators are independant. Paralell gas, hydraulic and electrical circuits all perform similarly in that the laod is distributed simultaneously through all the "branches" of the circuit at the same time. The IR circuit isn't taking away from the cabin evaperator and vice versa. You have added freon capacity as well as IC fluid (I had to add about 1.5 gallons EXTRA to what I drained out).

The ONLY track (dragstrip) drawback I can see at this point is from heatsoak caused after you park from the engine and this is COMPLETELY UNAVOIDABLE no matter how you slice it. Running the I/C pump constantly with a fan in front of it is standard practice for me as well when trying to cooldown the fluid and it's a slow process at best in GA heat/humidity.

See here once again:

With me driving around slowly the temps were ~140*, you can see by the engine speed in the first pic I was stopped and idling-in my driveway.

While stopped in the driveway when I turn it off the temps shoot up at once.

 

[Venomous01]

Very interesting data you're providing Fade 2 Black. I like what I am seeing. Steve any plans on testing under other various conditions. Like I said reaching out to Carlos would give us even more data. If Carlos likes it hell I'll be all over this in a second.

 

[Fade 2 Black]

Just FYI, each little "step" in the yellow line on the graphs = 2* change in temps. :thumbsup:

The lower of the two graphs shows an 8* rise in temps after the a/c is turned off. That 8* increase happened in 15 seconds.

 

[Fade 2 Black]

This 10* drop in temps while cruising took place in 1.88 minutes.

A/C on at 461 seconds:

Temps down 10* at 574 seconds:

 

[Venomous01]

I like lower IAT2s!:beer:

 

[Fade 2 Black]

Here you see that while cruising in 100* heat at 6:00 pm here in GA on the highway that the inlet air temp is 104* and the IAT2 temp is 110*!!

That's SIX DEGREES above the inlet temps and only TEN degrees above ambient temps!!

Live Link kicks ASS! :coolman: