Intercooler - Painted black (just do it)
 

Want to avoid heat soak, want lower temps whilst waiting / staging at the drags or sitting at the lights, paint it black!

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I was amazed at the results as were the Mighty Car Mod boys.

In the end it's slightly worse when air flow is introduced but negligible in the scheme of things.

Watched it this morning. Don't really understand the science, I thought black absorbed more heat than reflective or shiny surfaces?

Might have to ruin my shiny PW TMIC haha

This is what I took away from the video:

Bigger difference when no air is flowing through the cooler,

[U]Minimal difference when air is flowing through the cooler.[/U]

While it will lose heat quicker when painted black with no air flow, it also works the other way and soaks heat quicker, so I suspect that with a top mount setup, this will work against you as your cooler sits in a hot engine bay. Sitting at the lights, or waiting to launch at the drags, the heat soak inwards will ruin it all.

Just use the gold heat reflecting tape.

using the Perth-WRX mobile app

Would have thought if a black cooler worked that much better there would be more of them on the market. - having not watched the episode yet

using the Perth-WRX mobile app

Reminds me of a certain individual many moons ago that painted their intercooler gold.

[QUOTE=Intra;802038]Reminds me of a certain individual many moons ago that painted their intercooler gold.[/QUOTE]

White 99 wagon and worked at Total Subaru for a bit yeah?

As previously said, black absorbs heat quicker, but also releases heat quicker.

To me, painting it black would simply eccentuate the conditions the intercooler operates in. Silver would operate in more stable condition e.g less fluctuation is air temps.

Furthermore, if your air temps are stable, then whether your intercooler is black, pink, white, shit brown or rainbow it isn't going to make a difference. The colour [U]will only effect the rate of heat loss as well as heat gain[/U].

I guess the reason why intercoolers are predominatly silver/reflective etc, is because the air around them in generally always hotter (aka ontop of the engine) than the air inside the intercooler. It is desireable to restrict this heat as best possible so silver will reflect better/absorb less of that heat.

Hence the reason why radiators are black. The temperature of coolant inside the radiator is generally a lot hotter than the air surrounding it. In this situation the heat will dissipate faster from the radiator which is advantageous.

From a logically point of view there isn't many circumstances where the temp outside the intercooler is going to be colder than the temp inside the cooler. This is the only time where a black would be of more advantage than silver.

Paging Kato.... This is part of his area of specialty!

Water to air FTW:D