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intercooler "?"
- Thread starter charlie74
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PC
Obi Wan
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Re: intercooler "?"
Supercharging (whether driven by an exhaust gas turbine, a belt, a mechanical linkage or whatever) is just stuffing more air into an engine by pressurizing the air first. (As opposed to a normally aspirated engine which simply sucks air in.)
It’s a basic law of physics that when you squeeze a gas its temperature rises. So in the process of supercharging an engine’s incoming air stream the temperature of the air goes up.
A hot air/fuel mixture is more prone to pre-ignition (detonating). So it would be a good idea to cool the compressed air before it gets into the engine. Plus, when you cool it, the density goes up and you can cram even more into the engine.
One way to cool that compressed air charge is to run it through a heat exchanger. In the US we call it an intercooler because it’s in between the compressor and the cylinder. In the UK they call it an aftercooler because it’s after the compressor.
The most common intercooler arrangement looks like a radiator and exchanges the heat in the air charge to ambient air. But it’s also fairly common to see air to water intercoolers that exchange the heat in the air charge to a water jacket that’s integrated with the engine’s water cooling system.
In special applications like salt flat speeders you’ll sometimes see intercoolers in ice or dry ice baths.
pc.
Supercharging (whether driven by an exhaust gas turbine, a belt, a mechanical linkage or whatever) is just stuffing more air into an engine by pressurizing the air first. (As opposed to a normally aspirated engine which simply sucks air in.)
It’s a basic law of physics that when you squeeze a gas its temperature rises. So in the process of supercharging an engine’s incoming air stream the temperature of the air goes up.
A hot air/fuel mixture is more prone to pre-ignition (detonating). So it would be a good idea to cool the compressed air before it gets into the engine. Plus, when you cool it, the density goes up and you can cram even more into the engine.
One way to cool that compressed air charge is to run it through a heat exchanger. In the US we call it an intercooler because it’s in between the compressor and the cylinder. In the UK they call it an aftercooler because it’s after the compressor.
The most common intercooler arrangement looks like a radiator and exchanges the heat in the air charge to ambient air. But it’s also fairly common to see air to water intercoolers that exchange the heat in the air charge to a water jacket that’s integrated with the engine’s water cooling system.
In special applications like salt flat speeders you’ll sometimes see intercoolers in ice or dry ice baths.
pc.
G
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Guest
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Re: intercooler "?"
Yeah, let's not scramble his nugget with pressure differential.....at least not yet. :wink:
PC said:
Yeah, let's not scramble his nugget with pressure differential.....at least not yet. :wink: