Anyone who has seen the 89 Prototype knows it has been done, but can it be recreated?

Hopefuly others will chime in with some more pics, Ive got them but cant find them.

I figured I would give it a shot since I need to upgrade the IC on my 3.4DOHC turbo, the one I have works, but... ahh what the heck, I just wanna do it, theres no sense trying to justify it.
SO here we go

I of course do not have a digital camera right now, but I'll do my best until I get one.

For starters, I got a spoiler off a friend for $50. Now my Yellow GT needs a new spoiler, the old one is warping (which I at one point in time was convinced was impossible, but whaddya know) So Im going to pull the bad spoiler off it and chop it up.


Heres our dimensions
Green (between wingstands): 26.625
Blue (front to rear with a little left over for edges):10.5
Red (top to bottom of wingstands): 3 in the front 5 in the back

Okay for my first idea, I was thinking of sealing the spoiler perfectly, then getting a IC core thats 26" wide and putting it in the middle, then sealing the wing stands to the decklid, and cutting holes through, and attatching pipes to the bottom.

Ideas?

I suspect the one in the picture has no fans, and relise on ambient air for cooling. One disadvange would be the long plumbing required to reach the Cooler and the TB from back there. But it does look cool.

Yea I was thinking about fans, I figure I can either raise it up a little and put some thin fans in, or duct it down and out the trunk and out the back or bottom.

As far as length, its not much farther than a typical FWD setup.

Id like to at least raise it a little and angle it farther foward. I'll put a scooping vent on it if I can find one that wont look like an air conditioning vent, lol.

I might try building a little rig to see if I can find a sweet spot for air flow.

Ive found some interesting ICs on ebay (hey im going to be cutting it up anyway) a 2.5" thick one would work great, a 3" would be ok as long as I lifted it a little

look at a 911 turbo whaletail for inspiration ..perhaps use a wrap around one piece spoiler to scoop the air into a set of grates down into trunk area and out a back diffuser outlet of some sort below the taillights ..bubbajoe probably could come up with a viable setup

One other thing, its probably not going to get as much wind back there as may thing. The wings on our cars in my opinion are just for looks wth roofline.

quote Originally posted by Francis T: One other thing, its probably not going to get as much wind back there as may thing. The wings on our cars in my opinion are just for looks wth roofline.

a 308/328 type of extension on the trailing edge of the roof might fix that

quote Originally posted by 86GT3.4DOHC: Anyone who has seen the 89 Prototype knows it has been done, but can it be recreated?

From the one thread I found in an archive that's actually an '86 chassis with an '88 cradle; not an '89 prototype.

I think in the pictures with the decklid up it shows the piping coming into the trunk and then off into the engine bay.

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Go water to air

That intercooler setup takes advantage of the airflow pattern that forms at high speed. The air going under the car will actually curl up along the rear fascia and up onto the decklid. He's using that to ram air into the bottom of the intercooler. The obvious drawback is that the intercooler is only functional at high speed.

To Francis T: The Fiero spoiler is actually somewhat functional... but as a drag spoiler, not an airfoil. This subject has been covered many times. The search function is your friend!

BTW, why not use water/alcohol injection and nix the intercooler?

That wing mounted intercooler is certainly unique but I cite two problems with it that makes it impractical. First, the pressure piping is incrediably long which will add to the lag. From the turbo outlet to the intake will have to be pressurized before boost is established. Second, the pressure piping is under the hood which is only going to heat the charge. The charges is heated by the turbo, cooled and then heated again. I imagine there is some gain.

What would be better is the find a way to mount the intercooler in the snorkel, closer directly above the intake. Kinda like the Subara WRX with the hood scoop, but reversed.

I just finished mounting my water cooled intercooler in the Fiero. I will have to post pictures. I figured it to be the best solution, but yet have finished the piping. Possible this weekend.

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87 Fiero GT (3.2 Turbo)
E-mail: david88@peoplepc.com
www.angelfire.com/pa5/davidfiero/

I say that that is a quite inefficent design for what can be had under the car.

Be prepared to fiberglass like crazy, and make your own stands, which could turn out to be quite hard as I tried making a set of regular stands to no avail.

if you think about it, its not that much more than any other intercooled car, and in them all of it is exposed to engine heat, where as only about 18" on each leg will be with this design, theres really nothing I can do about that though, so im not going to worry about it.

What I do need to figure out is airflow over it.

No disrespect but I dont think that air is going to flow up over the rear bumper flow against the stream, and under the IC then, up through the IC again against the common air stream of the car. All the air being displaced over the car as it moves foward is going to be pushing back over these very areas, granted there will be an air bubble behind the window, but the general air mass will still be traveling tward the back of the car.

I realize its not the most efficient design, neither is the car. How many cars have you seen with Alch or W-2-A ? okay now how many with a spoiler in the decklid

I think im going to pull the spoiler off my yellow GT and build a rig about 12" high with strings and weighted strings on it to measure where the air is flowing in that area and how fast.

If all else fails, I can spray it with CO2 from the bottom when on the strip, and run puller fans on the street.

[This message has been edited by 86GT3.4DOHC (edited 09-01-2006).]

that air has to travel a really long distance before it enters the intake. the setup doesnt look to efficient to me

You indeed as pointed out have extra lag. I kept my intercooler to TB very short and thus have very little lag. Almost cant noice it. If you do it and get a lot of lag time, I think you'll grow to hate it. Nothing like hitting the go pedal and having to wait and wait. One more thing and I dont know who it will affect the functionality of a spoiler intercool, but the wings look much nicer moved aft about 3 or 4 inches. I did mine and luv the look. There's some fed law that puts them where they are.

You would spend your time better trying to engineer a intercooler for the side scoop. I bet you would have some buyers then. Again, that is a cool intercooler he has there, but I question its efficiency.

I always thought a good way to mount an I/C is face up in the trunk...then cut a hole under the spoiler and block off the back center section of the spoiler...creating a scoop to force air through it....then all you would need to do is cut holes in the bottom of the trunk somewhere to let the air escape...this setup would have the advantage of shorter hardpiping I/C piping...that and the I/C wouldnt be visible from outside, only a rather funky looking wing on close inspection

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Air-to-Water-Liquid-Intercooler-Drag-Use-up-to-1200-HP_W0QQitemZ250022870010QQihZ015QQcategoryZ33742QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

That intercooler (the one from e-bay) is the one I have, except a little smaller. They are of good quality and I as of last week just mounted it. I will have to get some pictures. In fact I am on my way to the garage now to continue with the installation. I feel this is the best solution. I tried the Saab intercooler in the driver side vent and it just was not functioning. I did not want to mount anything in my rear truck. So, I will be testing this out. I will report back.

I have to say Fiero people are very creative, innovative, and dont mind doing there own engineering. I guess that is what makes the Fiero such a great car, they are fun to work on. Any other car you would just mount the IC up front and that would be the end of it, but with the Fiero you are required to be creative to solve problems.

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87 Fiero GT (3.2 Turbo)
E-mail: david88@peoplepc.com
www.angelfire.com/pa5/davidfiero/