New Intercooler????

MSP4EVER

Member
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Mazdaspeed Protege 2003.5
I have a question?????

I'm thinking to get the spool intercooler for the msp but I dont know if a change the intercooler and I stay with the stock turbo I will get more Horsepower or will remain the same HP. Please Help Me
 
are you planning on upping the boost? if so, how high? if you're planning on boosting around 9 psi or so, an fmic is prolly not the best way to spend your money. do some other basic stuff first. the stock intercooler should be plenty fine for now.
 
Stick with the stock intercooler. Bigger FMIC's are expensive, and there's much more you can do with your money that would get you much better performance than a FMIC.
 
...that said, iON performance says their FMIC frees up some HP, but it is definitely spendy...
 
Of course, ION's FMIC will give you some extra HP, but not nearly enough by itself. It's really meant for people who are already modded.
 
Horse s***. If the man wants to mod his car, let him do it. Don't give him negative feedback on the first thing he asks about. Personally, FMIC was the first thing I did to mine. Didn't even have 500 miles on it before I went with a FMIC set-up. Mine was one-offed for around 1K...Later,
 
it would serve as a effiency helper, it will let you run the car for a longer time and not suffer from heat soak as quick and the stock one does. if your patient wait till the upgrade becomes available.
good luck
 
It's the first major engine mod I have planned. It's ridiculous how fast the stock IC gets heat soak here. So it will free up some power on the stock set-up, let me run longer without heat soak, and support my future mods (including upped boost)
 
An intercooler is definetly a costly mod but it will help you safely boost higher and gets rid of that dreaded heat soak that the stock MSP has giving you more power consistently in different weather and driving conditions.....plus it looks cool:D
 
I am definately getting an FMIC...... when i get the ca$h. ;)
I was heatsoaked like mutha all summer. Now that cooler temps are back, the MSP is rockin! :)
 
jersey_emt - just to correct your info, the dyno runs which showed ~20whp gain on our dyno-dynamics dyno was on a STOCK MSP running STOCK boost. From changing over to our stage 1 FMIC set-up, the car actually picked up 0.2psi more boost as there was less pressure drop in our FMIC set-up vs. the stock set-up.

Gains are more pronouced as soon as boost is increased. With the same car, we added a 3" cat-back as well as the Greddy Profec B set to 8.9psi boost, the car made 192.2whp which was 71.6whp more then baseline on the same dyno on the same day. The major difference being there was no heat soak @ all :)
 
Imissmy3rdgen7 - heat-soak is much more pronouced on forced induced cars.

For simplicity sake, turbo cars have higher throttle body intake temps vs a N/A car in the same environment. To combat this, an intercooler is introduced into the plumbing before the throttle body. The I/C is designed to cool the air from the compressor of the turbo to more "liveable" levels before being ingested into the motor to mix with fuel & spark to create power. When the I/C becomes saturated with heat (ie: from increase boost levels, poor conductivity, poor flow characteristics), the temperature out of the I/C increases. Hence this makes the motor more prone to knock. Cold dense air gives more O2 molecules for combustion, the hotter the air, the less the O2 concentration. Hence a sign of heat soak is power loss.

A 2nd sign of heat-soak is "sluggish" performance. Especially after the car warms up, you turn off the car and go again. You'll feel more "lag".

The above is just a simplified explaination. There's several other symptoms of heat-soak which are more technical.
 
Errrr I dunno if this is due to the Heat Soak....but could that also be part of the hesitation? I only notice the hesitation when the weather is really hot/humid and been driving the car hard. If it is totally different, then I appolagize for my stupidity.

I like the look of the FMIC though....how much does it cost????
 
Coming from someone who lives in Orlando too, I can say that it's damn hot here. Just yesterday at school, I was sitting in my car at school & I looked at the cars around me. The hoods were so hot that the air was blurry above them from the heat rising (like the air behind jet engines at the airport :eek: ). I would love to be able to get a big FMIC...do you know how awesome it would be to completely eliminate heatsoak. (2thumbs)
 
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FunkyCold5 - the hesitation is due to an overly rich fuel map. When your car becomes heat soaked, this problem becomes more apparent as there's less O2 to combine with the fuel.

If you were to go pedal to the metal from stoplight to stoplight, you'll notice that after each stoplight, your car will become laggier as well as less powerful.

Our stage 1 FMIC kit runs $900US + shipping. (this is the club member discounted price).

Here's a picture of the stock IC vs our stage 1 FMIC:
UPVSOE1.jpg

Here's a picture of the stage 1 FMIC installed:
fmicbfg.jpg


Here are the facts & results:

- Charge temps went from 60C (post I/C on the stock set-up) down to 20C on our stage 1 FMIC.
- The Dyno Dynamics dyno is known to read ~15-20% lower #'s vs. Mustang dynos, Dynojets and Dynapaks. So keep that in mind.

Stock car baselined: (Before stage 1 FMIC) - boost was 5.5psi peak
(Run #1) 120.6whp peak @ ~6000rpm, 125lb-ft torque @ 4200rpm
(Run #2) 119.4whp peak @ ~6000rpm, 114lb-ft torque @ 4200rpm
(Run #3) 116.2whp peak @ ~6000rpm, 106lb-ft torque @ 4700rpm

After stage 1 FMIC added (w/ stock airbox & K&N panel filter): boost was 5.7psi peak
(runs #1-11 were all higher then #12, we stopped at 12 runs)
(Run #12) 139.3whp peak @ 5800rpm, 146.3lb-ft torque @ 3900rpm.
Baseline Dyno Run:
b4dyno.jpg

After Stage 1 FMIC was installed (12th dyno run showed)
aftdyno.jpg


After an EBC was installed and our 3" cat-back, boost was set to 8.9psi and 192.2whp was made. This was the 12th run as well that set the 192.2whp


MazdaDryvr - Our FMIC kit is designed around the car and gives you the option of replacing the stock MSP radiator w/ the stock p5 radiator. By replacing the stock MSP w/ the stock P5 rad, your car will run cooler. (rad capacity also increases so you have a larger heat sink) So yes it would be beneficial.
 
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IC upgrade

Rumour has it that Mazdaspeed is coming out with an IC upgrade?

Is this true? If it is true, and I buy it and get it installed at the stealership, wouldn't logic dictate that they can't pull the "you've voided your warranty" crap?

After all, it'd be an OEM product, installed by one of their own techs.

Just wondering

Regards,
Brian
 
brianseto - Yes that rumor might be true. However even if you purchase a MazdaSpeed Part, they can deny you warranty (if you ever go to a Subaru dealership and by a "SPT or STi" part, it'll say that warranty is voided on that part).

the IC upgrade will be the same physical size, just w/ metal end tanks. It still won't address the issue of heat soak the way a proper FMIC set-up would
 
If I get one, I want it to look more like this

fb31d4ee.jpg


I just like the intercooler to fill up all of the lower grille.
 

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