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My Disasterous Intercooler Install ( X _ X )


Toxic Beast

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  • Member For: 18y 6m 7d
  • Gender: Male

Recently purchased my first real performance mods, of a 1000hp plazmaman cooler and rapid's piping kit.. love the combination ;)

Many thanks to XF_Falcon , Chris (rap1d), Jim & Alex for their guidance and help on my DIY job ..

However I don't think I'll ever attempt something like this again,.

in the end after all the effort, I would of happily paid the professionals to do this for me in a few hours , rather than spending a few days mucking around with this myself as im clearly not made to do this stuff myself =p

I thought If im capable of changing my oils, boost salanoid clean, cross over removing and front bumper remove.. I'd be capable of doing my cooler install myself but I stuffed up big time..

came across 2 dramas...

#1 I did bend my aircon pipe exactly how they are in refrence pictures off the forums, but my cooler still was scratching up against it so I ended up bending the aircon line completely out of the way and I had broken it around the welding on the condesor ... it leaked ALL its gas OUT..

#2, while trying to bolt the brackets down, one of my mates was helping me drill the holes, and had actually drilled a 2mm hole at the bottom of my radiator which leaked out all my coolant =[

So we putty'd up the hole with JB putty or something and just waiting a day for it to set before I put in new coolant =[

Spent the week doing my intercooler install in steps, as my cars been in the drive way for 7 days now..

First spent my time removing my bumper bar and intercooler pipe work..

a.jpg

1-1.jpg

Then came the cooler in the mail =]

b.jpg

Masked up my cooler

2-2.jpg

Bent the aircon lines right OUT OF THE WAY but tooo far!

even how I bent it like this, it still rubbed against the cooler so I really dont know what to do as my coolers sitting more to the left because of this!

3-2.jpg

4-3.jpg

Got the cooler on finally !

5-3.jpg

and heres the final pic of when everything was intact.. but I hope my radiator won't leak anymore otherwise I'm in a bit of trouble

6-2.jpg

7-1.jpg

I'll have to read up on refilling the coolant now as I havent done it before, but any advice on here would be very welcome..

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  • Member For: 17y 11m 26d

hay mate good work. good to see people having a go. rather than pay some one else.

just poor the new coolant into the header tank slowly. and when the level is right (should take bout 9 litres) just run the car with the header tank cap off for a while and top up as req. make sure the heater is on to unsure you dont get any air locks.

good luck with the radiator not leaking.

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  • Cryptic Clothing Company
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  • Member For: 16y 7m 21d
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  • Location: Brisvages, Capalaba

that's crazy... I was thinking about doing the diy cooler and piping.. but after looking at that.. I better leave it to the shop.. great pics and the finished result looks awsome. great job

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  • iTs alL DaRDy........
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  • Member For: 17y 5m 26d
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  • Location: Adelaide

mate

good try

that a/c ;pipe is no good bent like that so ull have to get that sorted before summer

have u replaced the condensor yet?

bad luck with the rad 2.

hopefully you sort it all out and ill bet your pleased with the cooler setup!

nice 1

mike

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  • Member For: 18y 6m 7d
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thanks guys!

I was actually expecting comments like "you newb, shoulda left it to the pro's" believe it or not ;)

that's crazy... I was thinking about doing the diy cooler and piping.. but after looking at that.. I better leave it to the shop.. great pics and the finished result looks awsome. great job

thanks buddy.. yer I actually woulda prefered to pay $200 - $300 or whatever it was to get pro's to put it in rather than ruining my newish car..

but maybe I'm just a one off that sucks at doing diy to his car.

mate

good try

that a/c ;pipe is no good bent like that so ull have to get that sorted before summer

have u replaced the condensor yet?

bad luck with the rad 2.

hopefully you sort it all out and ill bet your pleased with the cooler setup!

nice 1

mike

lol yer, I'll have to get it replaced before summer =/

I'm not sure if I should just get my condensor welded and regassed since I've already bent the a/c lines ..

I was thinkin if I bought a new one, I'll probably break it again ..

but yer I hope my car works fine when I try it out Monday night, otherwise all this effort woulda been for nothing..

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  • <put funny sh*t here>
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  • Member For: 18y 3m 23d
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  • Location: Perth, NOR

Glad to see you got it all done in the end mate! Spewing about the aircon line, but yeah that's a pretty decent kink in the line there :(

I hope the rest all goes well for ya. I guess if you get a new condensor, you could probably apply some heat while its off the car and bend it out of the car pretty easily maye?

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  • Member For: 17y 6m 2d
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how thick is the cooler?

when I put my process west cooler on I just bent the line towards the radiator and it fitted in nicely.

I always have these troubles when DIYing, nothing ever goes to plan!

what else are u doing - tune or anything?

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  • Member For: 17y
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A little tip on the aircon piping. I did my rapid cooler and piping combo a few months ago but from memory I took out the airbox. The reason for this was that during the bending of the pipe, it gets caught on some wiring that's clamped down under the airbox. The top half of the piping bends alot more the joint/bend(whatever it is) actually sits alot closer to the headlight sipport as oppsed to the front bar.

Its bad luck you had some issues but for me its far more satisfiying doing it yourself as opposed to paying someone to do it.

Oh and I did it during a quite day at work and took only 5 hours :P ( sorry just had to rub it in a bit)

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