D M R H - (MY COSMO)

. . . My personal Cosmo . . .

AUG-05

Independent testing has found the 20B-version intercooler to flow an average of just 280-CFM. Which is nothing special indeed. So you can imagine the standard intercooler can be quite restrictive for serious performance. One of the problems with upgrading the intercooler has been the lack of over-the-counter units available.

A custom install would cost up to AU$2000. There are cheapy Chinese made cores that flow as well as their $500 price suggests but I had an idea. "Buying power" ..... DNA performance in Sydney agreed to a deal as long as I purchased 20+ kits. The deal was to produce them in two (three) lots with the first batch priced at $1050. The second & now third batch were priced at $1300. Already the first 20 cooler kits have been sold & many of the third batch have sold already. Thankfully DNA let me buy them in three lots as a $36.5k outlay up front would have really hurt. The other coolers will sell eventually as there are over 130 JC Cosmo's here in Oz then I would have my cooler kit for around $1k saving about $1k in the process.

Ease of installation was important as many would require packaging & postage around the country. In fact, some have gone to the U.K & another to N.Z. So the kits came complete with piping, hoses, clamps & instructions.They positioned into the original locations & required the removal of minimal parts from the car to gain access. I was completing installs for some Sydney Cosmo guys in around 1-hour so there wasn't much complexity to them.

For the record, it is a Bar-&-Plate design core as flow is more important than ultimate cooling on a street driven car. The Silicon hoses dont flex like the factory ones & appear far more proffessional. Importantly, the shining silver cooler had to go. The reason for this was to remove the reflective frontal surface area from potential laser & radar targeting. High temperature matt black paint was used. Although the shiny look has gone the stealth look far outweighs the "Bling" in this case.

As can be viewed in this shot, the factory top pipes are gone. They simply wont align with a larger cooler unless your willing to have some seriously bent pipework. The new top-pipes have been mirror polished for added appeal. In a small way, its not as neat as the factory set up but performance wise, the results should outway any cosmetic perspective. Having said that, this look is what manufacturers are doing for themselves thesedays so in a way. You could say it is contemporary.

The whole installation was made easy by using the factory mounting points & brackets. Total installation time was 2-hours as I took extra time to think things through a little better. I'm pleased with the end result but now was the time to get out on the road & test the performance gains over the original unit. Reports from other users say the gains can be found over 3000rpm where the standard intercooler must become restrictive.

As can be seen the result is very difficult to notice unless you are looking for the cooler to start with. At a distance, it becomes very hard indeed. The paint will be shortly removed & recoated when I get access to the proper heat dispersing matt black. Its hard to find but worth the trouble. Then the desired look will be achieved....

So what is the feeling on the road like.? Normal driving yields no differences as expected but when you plant your foot, the difference is there straight away. Over 3500rpm when the second turbo kicks in feels better but the engine has recently developed a boost problem. Its making 0.7-Bar on the 1st turbo but drops to 0.5-Bar when the 2nd turbo comes on-line. After installing this new cooler its dropping to just 0.4-Bar due to the larger area to pressurize. (mental note, save money for Boost controller). Cruising down the motorways reeps results too. The added cooling means the engine is more responsive when you need to overtake. A touch test also reveals the cooler is working much better thean the original one. Overall, this is a very worthy upgrade worth every cent invested.