SMIC Info True or False

[ian_maham]

After reading I've heard mixed reviews about Aftermarket side mount intercoolers and I just want to know what is what from people who have actually had experience and are NOT just speculating.

- SMIC can barely hold up to 325HP.

- No matter what you have to worry about heat-soak.

- Not good beyond 20psi because of heat-soak.

If this is bulls**t, which I hope it is, what are some decent SMIC that don't have to worry about heat soak and can push 25psi?

Thanks,
Ian

 

[91tizzy]

I pushed my stock sidemount pretty far with a 60 trim garret....cant give numbers but it did pretty well as far as heatsoak but the real problem is the restrictive inlet and outlet on them.

 

[ian_maham]

Sorry man I had to edit my post, I meant an aftermarket smic.

Thanks,
Ian

 

[whe3ls]

well a 2g side mount will support less that a 1g due to being thinner

 

[ian_maham]

well a 2g side mount will support less that a 1g due to being thinner

...Thanks for that valuable input

 

[whe3ls]

fine... side mounts are just a waste... not enough surface area...

 

[ian_maham]

I was just messing around. Sorry.
Anybody else have results

 

[hubz91talontsi]

...aftermarket as in dejon? Why waste the money.. use the stock one. Supra smic can handle 400 pretty well.

 

[E116]

What turbo are you going to be running? I know people have gotten 400hp with the supra smic. The hahn smic also sounds like a pretty good idea, but personally I would go with a supra smic.

here is someone with a hahn smic http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/newbie-forum/264874-hahn-smic.html

DSMunknown knows a lot about smic's. it would be a good idea to pm him and ask his opioin if he doesnt find this

 

[tkelly27]

Upgraded SMIC can handle ~400whp or so. Not sure about heat soaking. If you can get one cheap and don't plan on big power, do it. If you have to buy a new one, go ahead and get the front mount.

 

[rEclipserGST]

Why did the 1g's come with a thicker SMIC? To compensate for the stronger motor and 14b turbo?? Seems like they started getting cheap and put whack parts on 2gs

2g SMIC < 1g SMIC ???
2g plastic bov < 1g metal bov
t25 turbo < 14b turbo
7-bolt motor < 6-bolt motor
2g Exhaust manifold > 1g Exhaust Manifold
2g injectors > 1g injectors

Bastards

 

[PieEyedPiper]

I have a dejon SMIC and it does great. I've never felt it really heat up - but I'm a poor source for anecdotal information. I'm only flowing 25lbs/min. Nothing like the reported 40lbs/min that they say the core is good for.
But if it matters, I noticed an immediate difference in response over the stocker.

 

[ian_maham]

Why did the 1g's come with a thicker SMIC? To compensate for the stronger motor and 14b turbo?? Seems like they started getting cheap and put whack parts on 2gs

2g SMIC < 1g SMIC ???
2g plastic bov < 1g metal bov
t25 turbo < 14b turbo
7-bolt motor < 6-bolt motor
2g Exhaust manifold > 1g Exhaust Manifold
2g injectors > 1g injectors

Bastards

good comparison.

I plan on running a Evo316g here pretty soon cause I pretty sure my t-25 is gonna crap out soon.

I'll run it on my stock intercooler, injectors, and so on for now. But in the future I was gonna get a Supra, Han, or Dejon SMIC. And of course all the much needed peripherals to support the 16g. I was just worried about heat soaking and all of the nay-say.

Thanks,
Ian

 

[rEclipserGST]

I honestly think that upgrading the SMIC will prevent heat soaking. I mean, as fast as that air is passing thru, on top of that fact that heat is lost while passing thru the SMIC. I can't imagine a Large SMIC getting heat soaked from track use or even street driving. I can not say anything for AUTO-X use though.

But you can run 15 lbs all day on that turbo with stock fuel. I'm trying to tune for 18 lbs on my 14b at the moment with the stock 2g smic. I want to keep it fairly sleeper with the exception of an exhaust.

 

[Steve93Talon]

My original stock appearing setup was a 14b at 23psi falling to 18 over 6k on the stock SMIC. I made 289whp and ran 12.5 @ 109 with it. peak air temps were 400F pre-IC and 175F post-IC as measured with an Autometer dual channel peak/hold/memory gauge. Heat soak was pretty apparent by 3rd gear where the car would start knocking like crazy.

I then switched to a Dejon SMIC, no other changes, post-IC charge temps dropped to about 140F, knock went away in 3rd and was much more manageable in 4th. The car ran a new best of 12.1 @ 112 with no other changes (guesstimate 320whp).

Bear in mind that this was on a 14b at high boost, blowing ridiculously hot air out of the compressor. With a more efficient compressor wheel like an E16G, you should see lower pre-IC temps and therefore lower post-IC temps, which should put it in the ballpark of what a FMIC can do until you reach it's efficient limit. Airflow through the core shouldn't be an issue because the cross-sectional area is as large as a typical big FMIC.

 

[mosul210]

I use an Alamo side mount intercooler - no longer made, but a popular 1G upgrade in its time. Its almost twice as thick as the stock unit and mounts directly to the stock brackets. Some cutting of the wheel well splash guard is required. So far I would put my hp at the 250-280ph range (breaking-in a new motor) and I've never experienced any real problems with heat soaking. Having a side mount also keeps my car cool in the hot Texas summers where a front mount can impeded air flow to the radiator.

 

[the_mork]

On an 80 degree day I can make a third gear pull on an evo3 16g at 23psi with a Supra SMIC and never break 95 degrees post intercooler. I've never had the opportunity to run a logger while at an autocross but I can tell you that I've never heatsoaked my smic enough to be hot to the touch after a run.

 

[endeffect0]

Here is an interesting perspective.

I come from the world of turbo Mr2's.. while they are a weird and backward sort of cult, they dont have the option for FMICs, which forces them to get creative. Baiscally you have 4 options in the mr2 world. Bigger SMIC, Water to Air, Meth injection and trunk mount. Yes i said trunk mount. You cut a hole int the floor of the trunk behind the engine and lay a Fmic core flat, then cut a vented hood style hole in the top of the trunk lid and add some fans for good measure... told you they get creative.

Any way as it has already been said air to air intercooling is all about surface area and air flow. big fmic = big surface area and cool charge. but surface area counts in both width and depth
In the mr2 community it is not unheard of to see people rocking 'square' intercoolers. that being ones that are almost as thick as they are wide. and believe it or not they work pretty damn well. And with the added bonus of everyone being able to use stock radiators for pretty big hp because nothing is hogging the air flow.

One thing to note is that almost everyone is useing a puller style fan to move air though the cores constantly. this helps with the heat soak issue if your a drag guy and just keeps temps down on hot days in traffic. while moving the ic gets lots of air in those cars so its not too big of a deal.

Back to DSM's their are a lot of reason people do or dont wanna go FMIC on their cars. I didnt want to because 1 i don't wanna waist the money, 2 my radiator is fine damn it, 3 making all the bends to get to a fmic kills spools and looks retarted, ... i have others but that will suffice. most people want FMIC for less restriction at high Hp and for a cooler charger.

I did a large smic that cools my 20psi of boost. heres what i had to overcome. I replaced the stock smic for one 8.5 inches thick with a 1/2 larger outlet on the top to negate some of the flow issues. i made custom ducting from both the regular intake gill and the fog-light hole to provide air to the intercooler. I the mounted a small puller fan to the back of the intercooler and replaced some of the inner fender well behind the intercooler with mesh to evacuate the hot air. the lower IC pipe is a custom unit i fabed up in about an hr and the upper ic is an off the shelf job.

results.. no heat soak to speak of, great throttle response, especially compared to the stock unit. the car still looks stock and i am still on the stock radiator even at 20psi with no heat issues. I autox this car pretty regularly and took it to 1 track day. I have never seen any amount of heat soak more than a degree or two on the data logger never a double digit increase never over 5 i think... I dont think i could have gotten much better of a result from a FMIC for my application. also in this state it doesn't hurt to look as stock as possible. and it helps when picking on those dam srt4s and mustangs.

I hope this post is helpfull to someone.

 

[matthewdesigns]

I have never seen any amount of heat soak more than a degree or two on the data logger never a double digit increase never over 5 i think...

Are you logging air temps through your stock MAS, or have you installed an IAT sensor after the turbo? If through the MAS, then the air temps you are reading are at the filter, pre-turbo, and the IC will have no effect on that number, and will not reflect any heat soak in the core.

I'll chime in on the side of this argument. I wanted to go with a smic b/c this car was my DD, and I wanted to keep it looking stock. I've had my Dejon smic for about 2 years and I don't have any real reason to go with anything else at this point. I picked mine up for $50, and it's worth every penny. I didn't like the idea of a Supra IC because of some of the fitment issues folks have sometimes (I know not all of them, but a lot). If you can't find a larger smic for less than about $150, though, then you ought to at least consider a fmic, since they are getting really cheap these days.

I'm running an Evo316g at 25+psi through it (spikes past 30psi, drops to 25ish), and it stays pretty cool. I built some custom ducting for it, and sealed the ducting to the core (link to article), so it gets plenty of fresh air rammed through it. That's going to be critical for any smaller IC core to be as effective as possible. It will soak if I'm in higher boost for more than about 30 seconds at a time, but that's pretty rare even during mountain driving. It's generally only warm at the inlet, and it still cool at the outlet end. After a 1/4 mile pass, the inlet side is cool by the time I get back to the staging lines. I put down 327whp/361wtq through it early this summer, so it's definitely no whimp .

The only thing that would prompt a switch to any other IC for me at this point would be pressure drop. IDK what this Dejon unit is doing to intake pressure, but I plan on testing it in the near future to see what the difference is before and after the core. Dejon does not provide this kind of information...hardly anyone does for any core, for that matter.

 

[ian_maham]

Are you logging air temps through your stock MAS, or have you installed an IAT sensor after the turbo? If through the MAS, then the air temps you are reading are at the filter, pre-turbo, and the IC will have no effect on that number, and will not reflect any heat soak in the core.

I'll chime in on the side of this argument. I wanted to go with a smic b/c this car was my DD, and I wanted to keep it looking stock. I've had my Dejon smic for about 2 years and I don't have any real reason to go with anything else at this point. I picked mine up for $50, and it's worth every penny. I didn't like the idea of a Supra IC because of some of the fitment issues folks have sometimes (I know not all of them, but a lot). If you can't find a larger smic for less than about $150, though, then you ought to at least consider a fmic, since they are getting really cheap these days.

I'm running an Evo316g at 25+psi through it (spikes past 30psi, drops to 25ish), and it stays pretty cool. I built some custom ducting for it, and sealed the ducting to the core (link to article), so it gets plenty of fresh air rammed through it. That's going to be critical for any smaller IC core to be as effective as possible. It will soak if I'm in higher boost for more than about 30 seconds at a time, but that's pretty rare even during mountain driving. It's generally only warm at the inlet, and it still cool at the outlet end. After a 1/4 mile pass, the inlet side is cool by the time I get back to the staging lines. I put down 327whp/361wtq through it early this summer, so it's definitely no whimp .

The only thing that would prompt a switch to any other IC for me at this point would be pressure drop. IDK what this Dejon unit is doing to intake pressure, but I plan on testing it in the near future to see what the difference is before and after the core. Dejon does not provide this kind of information...hardly anyone does for any core, for that matter.

I understand that the fmic are cheap, but when there is no possible way to keep my fog lights and make my bumper not have a big smile, like so... . I tend to lean towards a smic. Maybe a dejon smic or a supra smic.

 

[the_mork]

I've had no fitment issues with my supra smic. I flipped the end tank ground off the lips on the sides, shoved it in there, placed exhaust strap from the mounting holes on the ic to the mounting holes on the car, and clamped my pipes on.

This was with RRE hard upper and lower IC pipes which are 2.25" and the IC has 2.5" inlet/outlet, 2.5" straight couplers double clamped have held up to an incredible amount of abuse. It was probably the best mod I've done to my car besides the evo8 ecu.

 

[LandoAWD]

^^^ Had nearly this same setup. Car went 11.6-7 at 125-6 with the previous owner.

 

[ian_maham]

I've had no fitment issues with my supra smic. I flipped the end tank ground off the lips on the sides, shoved it in there, placed exhaust strap from the mounting holes on the ic to the mounting holes on the car, and clamped my pipes on.

This was with RRE hard upper and lower IC pipes which are 2.25" and the IC has 2.5" inlet/outlet, 2.5" straight couplers double clamped have held up to an incredible amount of abuse. It was probably the best mod I've done to my car besides the evo8 ecu.

Sounds easy. It didn't require any custom fabrication or weird tools/straps?
Did you buy anything special for the install?

 

[LandoAWD]

http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/art...72-supra-smic-install-guide-long-version.html

We have a couple of install articles, actually...

 

[the_mork]

I did it slightly different than the way it is shown in that article. I ran straps from the mounting holes in the intercooler to the mounting holes on the car instead of wrapping strap all the way around the intercooler. This made it easier to install and IMO probably more secure. Including cutting the strap and test fitting things it took me about 40 minutes to install it. Recently I pulled it out and put it back in in less than 15 minutes.

The only abnormal tool I used was a tin snips which is pretty standard. If I didn't have one of those I would have just needed to find a way to cut the strap.

FWIW I also have an automatic transmission which gives me less room for ic pipe wrangling so it should be even easier for other people.