Upgrading A heat exchanger

White Rabbit

New member
Ok i was asking bout a 3sgte into a st184 earlier and now im back for jus myself. Anyways here is the question. I know its common practice for st165 owners to just get a larger heat exchanger to avoid FMIC and holes in the hood to keep the sleeper look. I was jus wondering personally which would be a better upgrade on a st165 that would take the least hassle to install. A ford mustang cobra exchanger or an svt lightning heat exchanger.
 

Toxygene

Active member
Well, I believe that having the largest heat exhanger is in your best interest. I had heard that the Water to Air intercooler on the ST165 heat soaks quickly. I would believe that this has a lot to do with the volume of water that the whole system uses. If you increase the volume of water by adding a larger heat exchanger then you effectively allow more time for the water to cool down before passing through the intercooler again.

So if you can shoehorn that Ford Lightning unit in there try going for that.
 

d1alltrac

Active member
LFP offers their Cobra/Lightning heat exchangers in either single pass or dual pass. Not sure how a dual pass LFP compares to the dual pass afco though.

Logically the lightning one would be better than the cobra since its bigger so it'll hold more water, but I guess it really just depends on what you can fit and have good airflow to. I'll probably go with the Cobra one, it's wider so it'll fill the fog-less opening of my bumper better, and the opening is less than 6" tall so I would think the extra height of the Lightning one probably wouldn't get as good airflow.

here are the dimensions LFP emailed me:

Cobra-Single and Dual pass
29 11/16" wide
6" tall
2 3/4" thick

Lightning-Single and Dual pass
27" wide
8 3/8" tall
2 3/4" thick
 

88st165

New member
this is the one i used.... http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/NEW-Liqu ... dZViewItem

i thought the brackets would be how they were pictured in the ad but they were not, which was no big deal to me. but you have to lose the fogs and brackets. the dim are 24x7x3 and its pretty good quality there are also pics on mr2oc b/c some of those guys are using it as well.

pics:

dscn2579jg1.jpg


60d2030dks8.jpg
 

Toxygene

Active member
TomsGT4":1qahmg9p said:
I don't understand, how can they give a horsepower rating for that?

Fits nice by the way.

I would imagine that they probably calculate the amount of heat that occurs at a certain amount of boost and then try to figure out the amount of latent heat transfer that can be attained using the cooler until the unit becomes heat soaked.

And they probably try to figure in the amount of airflow for a specific displacement and juggle all those numbers in a crazy formula to come out with a horsepower range. :shrug:
 

ChrisD

New member
I have the LFP Mustang one in my car. Bigger would have been tougher to fit. This one wasn't 'easy' either.

If you lose the A/C condenser, I could see you fitting something rather massive in that spot.

But to position it right up front like shown above on the 165, you will not be able to fit that tall Lightning HE.

Go with the Mustang one, it's pretty good. Or if you can find a cheaper one like posted in another post above, that looks pretty good too.
 

Sleeka_89

New member
just curious, how much water does the stock system hold vs the amount of water in this upgraded unit? There would be a bit of weight?
FMIC FTW :D
 

krazybyzzle

New member
88st165":1koy3adt said:
this is the one i used.... http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/NEW-Liqu ... dZViewItem

i thought the brackets would be how they were pictured in the ad but they were not, which was no big deal to me. but you have to lose the fogs and brackets. the dim are 24x7x3 and its pretty good quality there are also pics on mr2oc b/c some of those guys are using it as well.

You wouldnt happen to have a tutorial on how to install it now would you? planning on getting the same one...
 

killer_siller

New member
i've got a 185rc HE on my st165. the AC condenser had to go, and the bumper doesn't QUITE sit correctly, but i got to keep my fogs!
 

maxaud

Active member
My RC heat condensor probably doesn't do as much as it could seeing as how the AC condensor sits right in front of it...
It's be nice to flip them and hook up my condensor sprayers.
 

88st165

New member
krazybyzzle":3uttcf2r said:
88st165":3uttcf2r said:
this is the one i used.... http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/NEW-Liqu ... dZViewItem

i thought the brackets would be how they were pictured in the ad but they were not, which was no big deal to me. but you have to lose the fogs and brackets. the dim are 24x7x3 and its pretty good quality there are also pics on mr2oc b/c some of those guys are using it as well.

You wouldnt happen to have a tutorial on how to install it now would you? planning on getting the same one...

no i didnt document the install when i did it.... that was the only pic i had. i could however take pics of how it is mounted with the brackets and you can get a really good idea of how it is done.
-all i did was i had to cut off the fog light brakets :cry:
-grind down the welds
-i made the brackets out of 1/8" thick aluminum sheets i had laying around (bent them by hand to a shape similar to an S, alum is nice b/c its soft enough to work with but still plenty strong and it doesnt rust... i still want to flat black it though)
-measure and centered everything how i wanted, marked and drilled the mounting holes on the brackets
-2 bolt holes to the intercooler, 2 to bolt to the bumper support (its tricky to bolt it to the bumper support because you have to go through one of the holes which is only like 2" big and insert the bolt and hold it while you tighten the nut down)

ill try to have those pics in a few days.
 
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