Heat shield wrap on IC pipes?

[turbovanman²]

I see DEI now makes a pipe blanket/wrap, similiar to the starter heat shield blanket they make. They advertise to keep the cold in and stop engine heat soaking in? I think it would be great on the cold side of the IC tubing. Its expensive so maybe something similiar? Thoughts?

http://store.summitracing.com/egnsearch.asp?N=700+115+303185&D=303185

[overlordsshadow]

Well I could see its uses at the track or something but for me DDing the Shadow around and having a pretty open front end and no A/C condensor, if the Shadow is moving those pipes will be cold. It also depends on which side your cold pipes are on and how long they are in the engine bay (the run length). Mabye these are another 'every tenth second and every single hp' mod. It has to be remembered that if you deflect heat from one thing its going to hit another. Wrap everything but the block and head with this stuff and your engine will be all the hotter (I think I'm right to a certain extent).

[Boosted Baron]

In theory it should work. I noticed that Kevin (GLHS592) has what looks to be header wrap on the cold side of his IC. My only experience with any sort of wrap is on my parents 440 Dart with underchassis headers. We wrapped the headers and underhood temps went down, but it took longer for the car to cool between rounds. With this we're talking the opposite, keeping cold out. Yeah, the heat is going somewhere else, but you are going to keep the charge cool so I would say try it. Not to hijak, but on a related note, what about wrapping the hot side with header wrap?

[Tony Hanna]

I'll throw another take on wrapping air intake and IC pipes. It's prettymuch pointless.
At full throttle, the air is moving fast enough that it doesn't have time to pick up a significant ammount of heat from the pipes. Somebody did a test that proved this several years ago. The results are probably still floating around the 'net somewhere if a person wanted to spend some time with google.

[turbovanman²]

Tony, I agree at WOT when your moving but in the staging lanes, getting to the track, around town etc those pipes get heat soaked pretty quickly, :(

[GLHS592]

I noticed that Kevin (GLHS592) has what looks to be header wrap on the cold side of his IC.

It is DEI header wrap. I don't see how wrapping the upper pipe could hurt you. It has to keep the hot underhood air out of the pipe. Even if it doesn't work, it serves another purpose. I didn't have to sand body filler on my upper pipe. :lol:

[8valves]

I have wrap on my pipes anywhere it's near the radiator. The heat soak part of it will be helped dramatically, at least that's what I found.

[cordes]

I agree with Tony about the WOT business.

As to heat soak, there is one factor that needs to be addressed in my mind. How much does the under hood temp of the engine bay vary? In my mind I would think that that temp would be a constant due to the fact that we are talking about heat soak while idling. We have all decided that it should not make any real world difference while WOT when I would think that the temps would increase.

With the assumption that the engine bay idle temp is constant, I would put forth that it would make no difference if the upper pipe was wrapped or not. As I understand it, one cannot eliminate the process of heat transfer, but merely slow it down. Therefore the pipe will eventually become the same temp as the under hood temp regardless of wrap. I am forced to believe that this process will happen in a time frame which would again eliminate any real world advantage to wrapping your pipe.

The only way I can see it being an advantage would be in short stoplight to stoplight bursts which could cause a temp fluctuation in the engine bay to become more significant. Even then, depending on the pattern the temp could stabilize at a higher temp. Aaron mentioned wrapping it by the rad, which could be a good idea depending on your setup. I know that my omni radiator stays at a very constant temp when it is fully warm, although my shadow will fluctuate depending on fan cycle etc.

[Tony Hanna]

As to heat soak, there is one factor that needs to be addressed in my mind. How much does the under hood temp of the engine bay vary? In my mind I would think that that temp would be a constant due to the fact that we are talking about heat soak while idling. We have all decided that it should not make any real world difference while WOT when I would think that the temps would increase.



I can't help but wonder if the underhood temps would increase at WOT. Granted it's obvious that they would sitting still, but I wonder what effect the increase in the volume of air moving through the engine compartment during acceleration has vs. the additional heat produced? Probably depends alot on speed and open surface area on the front... That's the main reason I usually remove the weatherstrip between the cowl and the back of the hood. It gives the air another place to escape and hopefully allows a little better airflow through the engine compartment at speed. Who knows if it really helps, but it seems like it should.:)

If a person was real worried about the IC pipes heat soaking, a neat trick would be to jacket the pipes with larger pipes, and force outside air through the gap. I'm sure the cost and extra weight of a setup like that would far outweight any benefits. It's just a goofy idea I had.:)

[overlordsshadow]

You TD's 3 inch charge pipes become 4 inch mammoths... Nice

[johnl]

In terms of physics/chemistry, what is the benefit of, for example, a 10* intake temp drop?

I mean, isn't that the real question? If there is a major consequence of such a drop, then we all better wrap our pipes post IC and insulate the IM.

[cordes]

There is a decent increase in densityfor a 10* pressure drop IIRC. I know they say that your tires will loose aproximately 1PSI for every 10* drop in ambient temp. Regardless, if there is a gain to be had from some thing so simple, I would go for it.

[Tony Hanna]

I really wish I could find that test I was talking about.
It wouldn't be hard to reproduce though. You'd just need to be able to log IAT's before and after wrapping the pipes to see if there's any significant drop. I'm betting there won't be.

[overlordsshadow]

We've had intercoolers and header wrap for many years now. Do serious, sponsored racers us it on their coolers? I guess they have water to air but just throwing it out that the pro racing world may have the answer?

[Tony Hanna]

We've had intercoolers and header wrap for many years now. Do serious, sponsored racers us it on their coolers? I guess they have water to air but just throwing it out that the pro racing world may have the answer?

Looks like Stephane uses exhaust wrap, but nothing on the IC pipes. That might not be a good comparison though because his IC plumbing is out front and probably gets plenty of airflow over it to keep engine heat from being a problem.
http://www.turbo-mopar.com/forums/photopost/showfull.php?photo=42

Also, not a sponsered racer I know, but from the pics on his site, it doesn't look like Gary D. was wrapping the IC pipes on the Reliant either.

[cordes]

I agree that most of the professional racers might not use it, but that their cars are so different they might not need it. Logging the intake air temps would be the way to go in the test. I too think that there would not be any difference.

[Speedeuphoria]

I may let you know, the car is getting ready for full duty(not just sitting in the garage any longer:nod: ). My IC pipes go right next to the rad. The cold side pipe is pretty much touching the rad because of the stupid headlight bracket/bucket and the adj screw that is on that little leg.(who needs stupid headlights anyway?:eyebrows: )

I have datalogging capabilities and IAT in the cold pipe just before the TB. The only prob right now is my LMA3 auxbox channel 4 doesnt seem to want to work w/ 0-5v(I need to send it back and they take there time so not till winter). But after I get the tune good I will switch over to the IAT and record some and wrape the IC pipe and compare. I have W/I but will not use it for the test because it will be scewed(well if I do see a change I may try it w/ the w/i to see if as big on difference is shown, if any)

[overlordsshadow]

Parts on summit, they are shiney and tempting. Wrapped my downpipe last night with the header wrap.



http://store.summitracing.com/partdetail.asp?autofilter=1&part=DEI%2D010417&N=700+400384+115&autoview=sku

[turbovanman²]

Parts on summit, they are shiney and tempting. Wrapped my downpipe last night with the header wrap.



http://store.summitracing.com/partdetail.asp?autofilter=1&part=DEI%2D010417&N=700+400384+115&autoview=sku

Thats what I linked to, :thumb:

[overlordsshadow]

ah lol, low on memory space I guess. Only ever look at the current page once I've read the previous. Plus I was looking around on there for something to insulate the intake manifold and saw that.