[Icekube]

FINALLY fitted my intercooler!!

So last November, I was over in Utah for work, and while there decided to take advantage of American eBay, and got myself a CXRacing FMIC delivered to the office (I had this planned in advance, so borrowed a suitcase big enough that it would fit inside for the return journey!)
much cheapness:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/CXRacing-Int...2735ed&vxp=mtr
they do sell the exact same cooler with an install kit for a 335i, but its 500$, so I got this one and figured id make my own mounts.

got it home and it sat pride of place(ever increasing pile of car parts) in the livingroom for a couple of months, before finally getting some mounts done. with it being a "universal" cooler, it has no mounts on it, so a local exhaust shop welded on some 5mm alloy angle onto it. we guestimated the position from this thread: http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=456694 however, as you will see, the European crash bar is different to the USA spec one. luck would have it we managed an alternative solution without having to re-do the mounts.

unfortunately i don't have properly detailed step by steps, as we were kinda working against the clock, trying to beat the rain, but here are the snaps i have!

Much thanks goes out to Aragorn30d for helping with the install (and moaning that I never post any progress stuff on the forum...)

Bumper off, FMIC vaguely in position:



We had to cut out a large section of the plastic scoops etc from behind the bumper/crash bar, here you can see the hole, the old intercooler still attached with the new one to the side, and the section of plastic removed:





After this, we removed the old intercooler (yay rusty bolts!) mocked up the new intercooler having it sitting on some bricks to hold it in the right place, then reattached the crash bar, to mark the position of the holes. This is when we realised that the European crash bar is different to the USA one in the reference thread, the USA has the lips on the outside, and a nice 90deg angle on the inside, we were planning on mounting the cooler to the underside, just like the other guy.

The European crash bar is a U channel, with flair'd ends, as luck would have it, we managed to work the intercooler mounting inside the U channel, and bolt down from the top. the FMIC is isolated with some 1inch high density rubber washers, and some oval'd lock nuts. we had to cut about 15mm off the end of the alloy protrusions, to get it sitting in the right place.





i didnt want a big chavy intercooler shining brightly behind the bumper, so out came some black spray paint



and mounted, nice and stealth!



next up, was doing the rest of the plumbing, and ditching the EGR, cooler and all! I bagged a second hand Allard EGR delete, and a blank for the exhaust manifold. I had forgot about the two coolant lines that need plugged, so we had to improvise with an M14 and M20 bolt to block them off.

inlet side was nice and straight forward, straight reducer from the cooler, 90deg alloy, 45 deg silicone joiner into the OEM pipe (retains the boost sensor) and then a straight joiner onto the Allard piece



Turbo outlet side was a bit more challenging, as the OEM pipe didnt leave much scope for turning down and then into the cooler, i had a 63-51mm 45deg reducer that i had planned to use, but it was just too short, so we had to cut this back, and made up an Alloy 45deg section out of some old intercooler pipe, because of this, had to use some garish blue silicone hose



And finished!



close up through the grill, happy with the level of stealth (and yea, it needs a clean!):




Next up I have a freshly rebuilt Garrett GTB1756 from an Alpina D3, and some brand new Alpina D3 injectors (from an early 535D)

it will need a new clutch (im not sure, but i reckon its on its original, and has done 200k....), also planning on fitting a 330D cover plate for some extra clamping force (pending us actually getting a look at it, see if it is the same)

[Aragorn30d]

Heres me moaning about you never posting anything about your car, then when you do finally nail together a decent post no-one even bothers to reply

Ah well, it'll be good to get the turbo on and see what the wee motor can do! If it doesnt beat the ~220hp folk are getting from stock 177's i'll be rather pissed off!

[borinous]

wow cant believe i only just found this thread!!

Intercooler looks good now get that turbo fitted

[Icekube]

Originally Posted by borinous

wow cant believe i only just found this thread!!

Intercooler looks good now get that turbo fitted

Turbo an Injectors are already done, didn't bother putting a thread up for it though, no-one on here cares because its only a 4 cyl

currently running around with the stock map, seems to have a bit more go already without a remap, and no major smoke clouds either...

We have the Alpina file that were going to flash onto it and see how that is. Just not managed to get around to that yet, hopefully this weekend!

[borinous]

ah nice. I agree no one would care!lol
Are u running a decat as well?

[Icekube]

yea its got a Decat mated to an OEM 330D exhaust

[borinous]

sounds good, did you get it custom made or buy off the shelf? i see Ecotune sell one.

Ive got a BCS backbox with a straight through center section currently. so thinking a Decat would be a good compliment to that

[RajB]

Serious kudos to you for this. It's very easy to just buy an off the shelf ready to fit kit but to buy a generic inter cooler then do all the work to get it fitted is excellent.

Always like these mods as shows a bit of passion and perseverance. But like my roof swap. A lot wouldn't try it and it's only once someone tries it it becomes an easier mod.

Congrats. You deffo need to remap it now especially after the decat.

[Icekube]

Originally Posted by borinous

sounds good, did you get it custom made or buy off the shelf? i see Ecotune sell one.

Ive got a BCS backbox with a straight through center section currently. so thinking a Decat would be a good compliment to that

it was a place in Fife (pipedynamics) that fitted the 330D exhaust, and made up the de-cat pipe

[Icekube]

Originally Posted by RajB

Serious kudos to you for this. It's very easy to just buy an off the shelf ready to fit kit but to buy a generic inter cooler then do all the work to get it fitted is excellent.

Always like these mods as shows a bit of passion and perseverance. But like my roof swap. A lot wouldn't try it and it's only once someone tries it it becomes an easier mod.

Congrats. You deffo need to remap it now especially after the decat.

Cheers it was some 335i owner in the US that put me onto the CXracing front mount, its bigger than any off the shelf cooler available, and cheaper to boot! there is also a 4" wide one thats bigger still!

Its on the cards to get a remap, but for now we are just going to try loading on the Alpina D3 map. it has the Alpina D3 Turbo and Injectors retrofitted, so it should be happy with the base Alpina map until i can organise a proper remap

[The0pportunist]

Great build, can see a lot of time & energy gone into this. I would have kept it silver though or any other colour to kind of show there is something special there.

[borinous]

Originally Posted by Icekube

it was a place in Fife (pipedynamics) that fitted the 330D exhaust, and made up the de-cat pipe

Oh right cool do u remember how much they charged? out of interest

[Icekube]

Originally Posted by borinous

Oh right cool do u remember how much they charged? out of interest

iirc it was 210£ for the Decat and fitting of the 330d (OEM) system, think they take about 180ish for the decat pipe

[borinous]

nice one cheers mate

[AWSAWS]

Your intercooler looks very tall. I just had a vrsf fitted.
Same height as stock intercooler I think but about 3 times deeper.

[Icekube]

Originally Posted by AWSAWS

Your intercooler looks very tall. I just had a vrsf fitted.
Same height as stock intercooler I think but about 3 times deeper.

This one is about 25% larger than the vsrf cooler, and much cheaper.

Obviously it's not a simple bolt on, but you can't have everything

[AWSAWS]

Originally Posted by Icekube

This one is about 25% larger than the vsrf cooler, and much cheaper.

Obviously it's not a simple bolt on, but you can't have everything

Very true!

I went for the VRSF with it being much cheaper than any Wagner, Forge or evolve FMIC I could find. As you say, knowing it is a simple plug and play design was important to me.

You must let us know how you get on. I've seen great results from mine.

At santa pod, started a drag run at 113F. Mid race temps dropped to 69F. Finished off at about 80F. With meth injection. So finished a run cooler than I started where with a stock IC it would be a higher finishing temp. Probably would have ended on 120F going on past experience.

[Jim1985]

Looks fantastic, I love how its completely invisible from the outside, I hate exposed FMICs. How are you finding it? How much are you expecting to up the power?

[AWSAWS]

I get the impression FMICs don't up power but let you run lower IATs for longer. (May be wrong because on some posts gains are shown.)

What I suspect is where you'd be running say 400HP and see that drop to 380HP when temps go up, the FMIC will let you stay at 400HP for longer and get back there quicker when things heat up.

[Aragorn30d]

Yep more or less, though with raised boost pressures and stock cooler, that temperature rise can happen so quickly that you basically never see the 400hp. Either because the ECU immediately retards things, or because your tuner can simply never get to 400hp in the first place as its getting too hot.

Diesels are less clear cut than petrols too, they're not as effected by high charge temps as a petrol is. It still hurts power, but maybe not to the same level.

[Icekube]

Originally Posted by Jim1985

Looks fantastic, I love how its completely invisible from the outside, I hate exposed FMICs. How are you finding it? How much are you expecting to up the power?

Exactly, I didn't want it screaming out "modified" through the bumper, happy with the super subtle look.


We got the Alpina turbo and injectors fitted, and flashed the stock Alpina map, so it has a bit more go than stock, wont get around to getting it custom mapped for a bit, so will need to wait to see what gains are there to be had

[jackstrath]

Diesels must be different injector wise , all I know is that you wouldn't be able to stick another set of injectors in a petrol and expect it to run fine , if the jump up in size wasn't to extreme you might get away with it but you would certainly end up doing damage running different injectors with out the correct map !