Water injection

[rt172]

Please take a look at this link:

<a target="_blank" href="http://www.noswizard.com/water.phpWater injection

Has anyone had any experience with this sort of thing? In the warm weather yesterday, my MK2 172 felt really sluggish, especially at low revs and when crawling along in traffic. Its not been much better today, but late last night it was fine again. My guess is that it just got too hot under the bonnet and it was sucking in great gulps of warm, oxygen starved air

Ive had a nose around the engone bay and I cant figure out a sensible way to get more air to the engine - its just too packed in there. The only sight I get of the road beneath the car is from the back of the engine, and that is right next to the start of the exhaust system.

Just wondering if water injection might be the solution to getting cool air to cars like the 172 that seem to run especially hot under the bonnet. Before anyone says anything, I dont really want to fit Nitrous - too much hassle, too expensive and not exactly insurance friendly.

The water injection kit is about £170, although I have no idea how or where it would fit to the car...

Any comments?!
Cheers,
Rhys

 

[BenR]

water injection wont do a thing for your NA car, since your not experiencing detonation. I use my 172 in HK where temps are around 32 deg all day long. And i dont feel any difference. The engine may run very hot, but where it sucks air in and the rate at which it does so. It rarely has enough time to reach the same temp as that of the engine.
N20 would actually be easier to set up than water injection and yield far more power...and you dont have to tell the insurace company.

 

[rt172]

Bugger - well, Im not going to argue with you, but would water cooled air not be the same as getting a better supply of air from outside the car (which I cant easily get)? Im sure cold air gives better perfomance than warm air...

Oh yeah, I think telling insurance is a good idea. Wouldnt like to leave myself open to having expensive insurance cancelled in the event that I actually need to use it!

 

[BenR]

My N20 kit is a 2 bolt on/off affair so i can take it off after a crash..eer! with a 8mm spanner.....and they cant rell, chuck it in a bush till you collect it later.

Water will cool the air, but as you know, energy cant disappear, so the water will then be warm, although the created average of air/water temp will be lower. But you will also be replacing the carrying capacity of the air with water, since water is heavier than fuel. So you will need to flow more air to get the right fuel/air mixture. No point really, its mainly a device used on turbos to prevent detonation due to their insane temps of around 800deg in the turbo. You wont get detonation at all as the 172 has a knock sensor and will r****d ignition timing. Best thing to do, is to fed tha airbox the most cool air you can. If your smart enough, you could link a pipe up to an aircon duct and feed it freezing air!!!

 

[bluerxe]

[BenR]
why has noone ever doen this? Sounds feasible. Could most aircon units give the volumes necessary for induction?

 

[BenR]

HAHA, i dont think anybody has since aircons use about 5BHP to run, to u had better be making at more than 5 using it!
I guess you could, and it would easily supply enough air (on full blast). If not, you can just put small holes along the ducting so it wont suck in the majority of the warmer outside air until resistence/air pressure is low enough inside the ducting.

 

[rt172]

BenR - excellent explanation; pretty much answers the question and knocks the water cooling thing on the head. The air conditioning thing briefly crossed my mind with my last car, but it seemed like a lot of hassle for something that Id probably screw up and end up busting altogether.

Anyway...did you at any point explain on the forum how you managed to set the nitrous thing up so it is so easily removable? And is it possible to remove all trace of the system in one go?

Rhys

 

[BenR]

making a removable system is actually quite easy. Most cars you see, will have the solenoid bracket drilled into the chassis or bulkhead somewhere. But what i did is look for any 2 bolts near each other (about 2"-6") and use these to bolt the bracket holding all the equipment to. Just make sure the bolt aint for anything serious though....but i dont think anybody is that stupid. On my fiesta, i used the bonnet release catch bolts.

ANyway, i made up a simple steel plate of about 8"x4" and mounted everything on here. The fuel pump (needed on a carbed car) sits to the left the N20 solenoid is int he middle and the fuel solenoid on the right side (copper fuel line goes across the N20 solenoid).

Thats all bolted to the car and there is the basic setup. Just need to put the midro switch anywhere you can to be turned on when the throttle is at its max. I used the little enrichment pump on the carb....activated at full throttle to switch the micro switch (a little bracket was used and bolted to teh carb).

Thats all, the nylon pipe from teh tanks in the rear i have hidden in the door sills. but can be taken out in 2 mins....tanks in a recessment under the boot. Little switch on the dash inplace of a switch blanking plate.

allwired up easilt cause yuo only need one negative to the battery cause its all in sequence (the wirering) and teh bracket is earthed anyway being bolted to the car. wires and pipes run through a existing hole in the bulkhead, so it can all be pulled out through there.

a pic would be better so i will try and get one posted.

 

[BenR]

thinking about the aircon thing, it would be quite hard. You could tap the ducts from the compressor, or you could take a pipe fron teh throttle bosy all the way into the cabin, and place it near the air vents.....all silly thoughts really...but i wonder why nobody has created a cold air induction system to increase efficiency and power.

also, a while ago, there was a sort of electric turbo which you put inline with the induction system, and could give 10+ BHP, couple this with a viper and you would have a good system for power, but would cost about 500 quid all in.
sorry, just bored and dreaming or crap.

 

[Nick Read]

Yeah you dont need water injection, like Ben said its just for cars running high boost and in danger of detonation, on a NA car this doesnt really happen so you dont need it.

The aircon thing is a bit of a non-starter, plus I would imagine that whatever your aircon can push out is a lot less than your throttle body can suck in at high revs.

Its not that hard to get cold air to the inlet, if you want to go all out, wrap aluminium tinfoil round the airbox, and put a big ramscoop under the headlight or in the foglight. Thats all there is to it.

 

[BenR]

ive built a custom sealed airbox for my Rt out of fibreglass, painted silver, with a stainless top and an airfeed to the front. Only problem is i need to clean it so often cause it sucks up all mater of sh*t on the motorway.

p.s. i think we were all pissing about on the aircon thing...problem is you woud require power to make power, and i doubt you would make more than 5bhp off it.

 

[Noswizard]

There is a cold air system for turbos and we have been working on one for a year or so which will be for sale later in the year all being well.
Regards
Trev The WIZARD of NOS

 

[PaulD]

There have been a LOT of NA cars that have made huge power increases and fuel efficiency increases from running water injection. Many V8s ran it in the 70s from the factory. Lost popularity coz of the filling up the water reservoir, and a hassle.

I believe the thing about only needing it for detonation is a bit far fetched.

My friend runs his 205Gti on water injection, by a atomiser in the throttle body driven by a switch and a pressurised water system.

The increase in air density is advantageous for any engine, as the density allows more energy to be burned from each discrete displacement of air.

I believe its worth a try on any car, but of course its always a start to get some cold air feeding directly to the engine from the fron bumper. Cant be that hard to modify to fit.

Hope this helps...

 

[BenR]

whats this cold air system for turbos?

 

[Nick Read]

A peltier device perhaps?

 

[BenR]

i thought that they were very inefficient and mainly used for stuf like heat sinks on miroprocessors?