View Full Version : FMIC Upgrade?
BALANCE
10-17-2009, 08:48 AM
What advantage do heat soaking metal pipes do for you over stock plastic and rubber insulated one's? Also the larger the FMIC is the further the boost has to travel to make it to the intake. Will going to a larger FMIC make for a little bit of lag or not let the turbo work as smoothly/quickly as stock? Not planing on changing out stock turbo so I want what is best for my set up. I know that cooler air is king for turbos just not sure what this mods pro and cons are.
What advantage do heat soaking metal pipes do for you over stock plastic and rubber insulated one's?
Metal can expand with heat so do glass plastic will shrink and Im pretty sure rubber will do the same.
bigger turbo = more lag. Take longer to spool up power. The guy I bought my EVO X Turbo from says the same thing his Bigger Turbo has more lag than EVO X Turbo. His bigger turbo and a tune get him to 430+ to the wheels & he is running E85 fuel.;) FMIC and piping shouldnt cause the turbo to lag. IDK. maybe Mike from RRE can shine some light on this.
Ladogaboy
10-17-2009, 12:24 PM
In a nutshell:
Going to a larger FMIC will not significantly increase lag in the RA since, if you look carefully, you'll notice that the air is traveling the same distance. It matter in Subarus, when people would go from top mount to front mount, significantly increasing the distance the air had to travel, but in our case, the air is already traveling that far.
Metal pipes have an advantage over rubber or plastic pipes in that they do not expand as much. Everything expands, but when you are comparing millimeters (rubber/plastic) to to microns (metal), it is a huge difference.
The primary reason for upgrading to hard IC piping is because of the increase in spool up. There really is no down side other than weight. Personally, I would go with aluminum, but I know a lot of people go with steel for some reason. :confused:
Moving from a small single-scroll turbo (think RA) to a medium twin-scroll turbo (think EVO) will not increase the turbo lag. Going from a medium twin-scroll turbo (EVO X) to a larger twin-scroll turbo (Blouch Dominator, Garrett series, FP Red or Green) WILL increase turbo lag.
BALANCE
10-17-2009, 03:26 PM
When I say travel I didn't mean tube length but the capacity the FMIC has now compared to a larger one. Its seems like it would take longer to build boost and deliver it if the IC increases in volume. Aluminum is lighter and dissipates heat faster then steel so that is a good point. But metal actualy expands more then you would think .005" to .010" at high temps maybe .001" to .004" at moderate temp.RRE any input?
Ladogaboy
10-17-2009, 03:50 PM
When I say travel I didn't mean tube length but the capacity the FMIC has now compared to a larger one. Its seems like it would take longer to build boost and deliver it if the IC increases in volume. Aluminum is lighter and dissipates heat faster then steel so that is a good point. But metal actualy expands more then you would think .005" to .010" at high temps maybe .001" to .004" at moderate temp.RRE any input?
There is a little bit of a drop off (probably not noticeable though) with a larger IC, but the general consensus is that the benefits far outweigh the negatives. The same is true for hard IC piping. Even .010" of expansion is significantly less (fractions of a millimeter) than the flex and expansion of rubber and plastic IC tubing, which can be measured in millimeters.
BALANCE
10-17-2009, 04:00 PM
Gotcha good stuff.:) What would a Upper and lower IC pipe added on to stock FMIC gain you if anything?
Ladogaboy
10-17-2009, 04:12 PM
Gotcha good stuff.:) What would a Upper and lower IC pipe added on to stock FMIC gain you if anything?
In terms of power? Some people claim +5-10 hp or so, but I think the main benefit would be in the turbo response time.
TheBlackBeast
10-17-2009, 08:36 PM
We dropped a evo X FMIC into my ride for a better ability to cool the air going into the engine. This decreases wear, allows more air to be packed in and more power to be made. New pipes will be needed for one end of the FMIC, I forget which one, but for RRE its just playing with tubes...
Anymore FMIC? & How much?
Ladogaboy
10-18-2009, 02:34 AM
We dropped a evo X FMIC into my ride for a better ability to cool the air going into the engine. This decreases wear, allows more air to be packed in and more power to be made. New pipes will be needed for one end of the FMIC, I forget which one, but for RRE its just playing with tubes...
I believe the upper IC pipe is the one that needs to be cut down a bit, since the EVO X IC is much taller than the Ralliart's.
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