mk1 Golf G60 Intercooler/radiator options

I want an intercooler and radiator set-up thats efficient, fits well and doesn't look cluttered with pipe work. 

I intend to blank off the bypass pipe on the charger so should give me some more room to play with. I have seen a radtek intercooler and radiator kit for just under 1k. Also the merc sprinter intercooler kit from bartek (about £550 with u bend).

What do people recommend? Pics of your setup and spec would help me

Cheers

The Radtec one is a bad design, crap restrictive flow and sharp bends in the tubes and end tanks. I have their earlier model and I believe that the later model is better but still not good.

I should of done a lot more research before buying it but it seemed a sensible "made for the job" solution at the time.

Superchargers are more sensitive than turbo chargers to the flow and restrictiveness of the intercooler. Ideally you want to flow a certain amount of CFM with no more than a 1psi pressure loss across the unit. If the unit it too restrictive then you will lose boost pressure and generate more heat as the charger tries to shift the air.

A good place to look is the Bell Intercoolers website (http://www.bellintercoolers.com/_pages/customAirCore.html) - I found their tech support very responsive to emails as I tried to work out the best combination.

There are two key things that you need to work on, CFM and PSI. ie how much air can be shifted through the intercooler (Cubic Feet per minute) at a given air pressure from the supercharger (Pounds per square inch, ie the force of the air)

The Bell ones are rated at 10psi for all CFM values that they quote. Be careful as other manufacturers quote at some theoretical max boost.

So your G60 is producing 8 to 10psi and about 300CFM with the standard pulley - you can use this to play around with sizes on the bell charts.

If you decrease the pulley size then the charger will generate more psi and flow a greater CFM - well at least you hope it will within the design of the charger. Some have reported as much as 17psi with a 62mm pulley, although 68mm is common.
Do remember that you will be spinning the charger faster (Ratio of crank pulley size 5.5"(140mm) to charger pulley size 78mm) so things will get hotter and bearings/seals wear out faster !!

Greater flow and pressure means more bhp if it can reach the engine and be complimented with the correct amount of fuel.
For an engine to produce 300bhp with 17psi of boost you will need about 450cfm (@17psi) which means the intercooler needs to match this flow capability and not lose more than 1psi of pressure across it (lost pressure just generates heat). If you cross reference this to the Bell ones that's about 600cfm@10psi - ie if you increase the pressure you need to increase the flow capability of the intercooler - it needs to be just right so whacking an enormous intercooler in there is bad, as the pressure drop across it will grow as the charger does not have enough pressure to drive it through.

I know you asked a simple question - I find it good to understand how and why these things are sized and rated !!! You can safely ignore me if you want !!

Oh and do not blank off the boost return - ever !!

The G60 seals in the scroll need lubrication, the boost return provides an oily mist to keep them lubricated.

Your G60 will fail prematurely without this lubrication.

Thanks for that advice my goal is as much torque as possible.

 With regards to the boost return I dont believe its as bad as you make out. 

I had a corrado g60 with a blanked boost return. Gwerks gave me a special lubricate to spray in it every 3k. Had charger with stage 4 and 68mm serviced at recommended interval with no problems at all. 

Does anyone have a Golf Rallye G60 Intercooler? How does this fit in the Mk1?

They were air to liquid coolers I think

I ran my g60 with boost return  deleted….used the white grease …and when I had my charger serviced was told that basically the white grease / combined with very fine dust  had  made a grinding paste . Causing wear to the scroll. ..I was recommended to pour a cap of engine oil into the charger every 1000 miles. ..

mk1jim said

I ran my g60 with boost return  deleted….used the white grease …and when I had my charger serviced was told that basically the white grease / combined with very fine dust  had  made a grinding paste . Causing wear to the scroll. ..I was recommended to pour a cap of engine oil into the charger every 1000 miles. ..

Ah thats useful to know. What intercooler did you use jim?

Intercooler was already on . I bought this car already converted . Looks like a copy of the rallye intercooler

I see that the Rallye ones were the more traditional air to air. Not seen one fitted to a mk1 though. Bartek to an uprated version that is 10mm deeper - not sure on its CFM rating though as they do not state 

My charger is stage 4 already and will be rebuilt shortly. I want to run 68mm pulley, custom map with a standalone ecu, custom manifold and exhaust. Not really sure how much lb/ft torque and bhp that will make?

I have a port and polished dx head I've heard you can use on the pg block but not sure if the stock valves would be ok?

What ECU are you thinking of?

This is a plot with a couple of different chips from the time when I ran a Rallye G60 engine in my mk1.
The head was polished and ported with standard cams. The G60 was Jabba prepared to the stage after stage 4 (not sure Jabba offer that any more, but it was already done when I got the charger). 68mm pulley, stainless 4 branch mated to a Jetex exhaust. Running Digipants and the Radtec intercooler and rad.



Not sure if the valves are different between those heads. I have a 1H Rallye head for sale from an engine I bought that I only wanted the block from - will probably stick on eBay - I want £50 for it. (It was a running engine).

rallye intercooler is too big for a mk1 iv'e tried several intercoolers on mine and settled with the merc one in the end.
cooling wise use the g60 rad perfect for the mk1and is a twin core.if you want a topfill rad use the ends off the topfill and attach them to the g60 core again works really well.
I also blanked my charger off and use a cap of engine oil every 1k not had any problems yet.
I'm in the middle of designing a lube kit that attachs to the rocker cover and will vent to the charger and to a catch tank.will test it on mine for a while and see how it goes.

That's a good graph to go off ade which chip did you end up using in the end ? pitstop chip looked the best in terms of torque and low down grunt.

Hi Ade, did you end up keeping the Radtec system?

paul_h said

That's a good graph to go off ade which chip did you end up using in the end ? pitstop chip looked the best in terms of torque and low down grunt.

Cheers Paul - went with the Jabba one in the end because there was something weird going on it the pitstop one where it would sometimes hold the revs at 2k for a few seconds when off throttle - never did get to the bottom of it

Laughingboy said

Hi Ade, did you end up keeping the Radtec system?

Hi mate, yes that is still what is in there now.
Have winter plans for something more efficient !!

paul_h said

rallye intercooler is too big for a mk1 iv'e tried several intercoolers on mine and settled with the merc one in the end.
cooling wise use the g60 rad perfect for the mk1and is a twin core.if you want a topfill rad use the ends off the topfill and attach them to the g60 core again works really well.
I also blanked my charger off and use a cap of engine oil every 1k not had any problems yet.
I'm in the middle of designing a lube kit that attachs to the rocker cover and will vent to the charger and to a catch tank.will test it on mine for a while and see how it goes.

Hi paul this sounds like the route I will take. I will probably buy a kit from bartek.

 How does the merc intercooler and g60 radiator fit in the front. I dont really want to butcher the front of the car too much. Do you have a picture of clearence? 

Cheers
Rich

lhasadreams said

What ECU are you thinking of?

This is a plot with a couple of different chips from the time when I ran a Rallye G60 engine in my mk1.
The head was polished and ported with standard cams. The G60 was Jabba prepared to the stage after stage 4 (not sure Jabba offer that any more, but it was already done when I got the charger). 68mm pulley, stainless 4 branch mated to a Jetex exhaust. Running Digipants and the Radtec intercooler and rad.



Not sure if the valves are different between those heads. I have a 1H Rallye head for sale from an engine I bought that I only wanted the block from - will probably stick on eBay - I want £50 for it. (It was a running engine).

Hi Ade,
Your head sounds good. Is it complete?
Ive heard that the head bolts are a different size for 1H heads. Will I need to get the block machined to accept the different bolt size?

Otherwise im on the look out for a pg head.

Cheers

it fits really well are you going to use a header tank or going for the topfill rad ?