I got a couple patents for a client developing an AC based intercooling system. Sadly, he passed away in 2018. I was skeptical that the AC had sufficient cooling, but was looking at worst case, and the system would have some stored cooling, so maybe it could work in the real world where max boost is just a few seconds.

I went through the calculations a few years ago but can't find my notes, Can someone point me to an article on computing the intercooling BTU requirements.

Thanks

 

https://www.theturboforums.com/thre...-over-an-ac-based-intercooler-project.385637/

BTU requirements will vary so drastically from system to system, I don't know you would ever start to look at this for a universal system other than to develop the maximum cooling you can at any given time and apply it across the board.

 

Not looking for a universal answer, just the steps to estimate the cooling in BTUs for specific turbos on a specific engine at a specific boost to provide a decent benefit. I can't find my notes.

 

This is a thermodynamics problem, google how to find enthalpy of the system (calculate the heat and work requirement), that gives you an energy requirement. You can convert the heat energy into whatever unit you want (you don't have to because your going to have to find the cooling energy requirement). You will have to make some assumptions about ambient temperature and what intake temp is desired. Make sure and work in °K to keep the equations happy. I'm not smart enough on it to understand how the effective reservoir of your AC system works (energy/time IE heat soak), and its been a few years since I took a thermo class, and I didn't do that well at it. Hopefully someone smarter will chime in, you may get a more comprehensive answer in the advance tech section.

These A/C type systems have existed in various forms in the past. I think they never hit the main stream because you are forcing the engine to do work to build a cooling reservoir. An intercooling or injection system use an external coolant reservoir (air, water, ice, chemical phase change). These systems are lighter, cheaper and in most cases very efficient. I don't mean to discourage you, maybe there is some awesome tech we haven't seen yet.

 

You can make a good approximation from air massflow and the desired temperature drop.

Heat flow = massflow X specific heat for air (Cp) X temperature drop required

Units will most likely be - imperial......metric:
Heat flow - btu/s......kJ/s (=kW)
mass flow - lb/s.......kg/s
Specific heat - btu/lb.R(0.24)........kJ/kg.K (1.005)
Temp drop - *R or *F..........*K or *C (absolute versus non makes no difference with deltas)

 

I would do this ass backwards using mass flow and iat temps from someone with a similar setups logs. That way you can see what your current intercooler can do. Decide how much better you want to do and that's what you're new system will need to do. Thermo is a very complicated subject and using real world data + a new goal is problably the most realistic way to do it. The temperature difference before and after intercooler combined with mass flow will give you the energy number you're looking for