60mm intercoolers of eBay ?

Hey Nath,

I know theres a guy from Mexico who has one as he posted in a thread a while ago saying he's had no issues.
Funnily enough i just sent him a message about 20 mins ago asking about his intercooler how it fits/ did any thing need modifying, build quality, any performance gain etc.

As i'm in the same boat as you don't want to pay £500 for something if one less than half the price does the job well enough!

I know their were threads on the "other" site slagging off the cheap intercoolers but i havent seen any evidence.

If i get a reply from the other guy i'l let you know what he says

 

Yeah there was a group buy on the french ones on the "other" site a while back and they all appear to be fine no negatives that i read. I think the french ones mainly come from a company thats a bit like the french k-tec
But the french ones are around £260 i think when the Chinese ones are about £160/£180

 

I've debated if I should get the French one. There seems to be a whole French forum that uses it without issues.

 

Thing is though if the french company is selling them at that price they must be a type of Chinese inter cooler for them to have their profit margins?
The only problem is as you've said theres a fair bit of feedback for the french ones scattered around the net.
But i can only ever find tiny replies about the Chinese ones, like "yes its fine" or "no issues" and no evidence or anything to ever back it up!

 

I'm just waiting to here back off of Haomaru as he's the guy from mexico with a Chinese one. If he says everything was sweet i'm going to do the same and get one.
I know what you mean about the pictures, the french one is the exact same pic as some of the Chinese ones - just with the brand name removed from the pic!

 

I just answer youre pm, IC is ok, easy to fit, and do the job

 

Some pics when i fit mine
http://i949.photobucket.com/albums/...6793B92-2060-00000110737EE9C4_zps510310e0.jpg
http://i949.photobucket.com/albums/...005AF64-2060-000001109E4EC414_zps70391c79.jpg
frame holders
http://i949.photobucket.com/albums/...DC5E070-2060-00000110947E8507_zps8be035f5.jpg
finish
http://i949.photobucket.com/albums/...BFF8EE7-2060-0000011084167F84_zpsc31c9398.jpg
http://i949.photobucket.com/albums/...1B6C212-2060-00000110B11BC499_zps31f3bfc4.jpg

 

From what I remember they look the same from the outside as a forge one but its the pattern inside them that's different, could be wrong though. Can be seen if you look at them side on.

 

I'm guessing this one?

http://bit.ly/YO9lbH

 

Be careful. A lot of the chinese claim they are the manufacturer, but are distributors.

 

If I can get ten deposits do you want me to run another groupbuy ?

 

Thing is I work for a manufacture, we have a product made by the same people as a stores own brand, almost the same, yet we sell it a double the price because its a branded name...

 

Poohbah was alluding to the design of the more expensive ones being better ( which undoubtedly they are , but twice the price ? ) due to design of fins etc.

 

It´s the same IC only the brand on front

 

Its not..

 

That's my point, both the products I've mentioned are made to the same spec, one a shop name brand, the other a named brand... The name brand double the price.

 

There not though. There is no way that the chinese ones are as good as the KTEC/other brand ones in terms of lightness. No idea in cooling capacity.

 

Lol They are better, ktec IC sucks, forge is the same quality as the chinese one, chinese and forge have the same specs.
Big IC is made for air flow be colder, the bad is that bigger core needs more air (cause lag, dependes of the core size). If u want for track use u need a big ic, if u want for 1/4mile leave the oem.

Mexico have the biggest chinese market in the hole world for everything, they even do mexican artesenal stuff in lowest pricess and better quality. As everything there ara good quality stuff and less depends on many parameters. There are many examples of oem items tha sucks in every aspect, that´s a why the afm develops everything for u´re car

 

Forge and Chinese ones are not the same.

I have had the two side by side.

 

Got any pics, that would help.

 

No- I dont have the Forge one anymore. I can tell you tho the Chinese one is miles heavier.

 

Its more heavy, could be, but the internal core i think is the same. I got the chinese and saw the forge (never in my hands) looks the same. Worst case If the core is thinest it could be a better eficency but that depens only of the core, if the weight comes from the body i dont c a big deal. Any way it works, i did check that.

 

Chinese core


Forge core


And I quote "chinese one has about 1/100th the internal surface area of the forge".
Not to mention you can actually loose power with a bigger IC to (a few psi in boost).

 

Well i've taken the gamble with winner racing on ebay.

Shared a few emails back and forth with a bloke called "dave" their English is excellent tbh.
its the one for £175 with p&p but he said they pay the customs charge at their end which is why its a bit more expensive than the others (they range from £152-£190ish i think). And i have email proof from him that if i do get charged customs fees they will reimburse me.
He also said its a brand new factory so their overheads are a bit higher than the other Chinese company's hence the price is a little bit more due to better quality assurance etc.

Anyway when it arrives i'l post up a bit more of a detailed review about it if anyone interested?

 

@jones82 which one did you buy, post a link?
Yeah would be great to see the inside fins of it when it arrives.

 

I got this one
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/60MM-FMIC...rs+Type:2.0+Renault+Sport&hash=item1c2cdacf59

Not the cheapest of the Chinese ones, but theres another winning racing spares shop on eBay which makes me think they are actually a manufacturer as they say rather than just a distributor.
They've also said theyl be doing aluminum radiators soon and they'll send me a link when their in production and if i send them some of my old hoses they will make me free silicone replacements for me as they want to go into producing silicone hoses but have none to copy at the moment.
So all in all from the emails i've had off of them they do seem like a genuine manufacturing company.

Anyway its all paid for now, and the dice have been thrown so i'l just have to wait for it to turn up and hope its not a piece of shit that disintegrates as soon as its fitted!

 

OK, hope its a good IC, when it arrived take some pics to c the core.
Get some logs to se the admision air temp improvement
I didn´t take pics of my chinese core, but i´m shure is not the same as show on u´re pic. There are many manufacturers out there so...

 

Ok well done a bit more research and winner racing have supposedly been around since 1998 and all they make is radiotors and intercoolers.
Pretty much every review i can find is all good saying its better than oem fits perfectly etc. (although most seem to be related to radiotors rather than intercoolers)

I should hopefully know more tomorrow as that's when its due to turn up!
If it does that's a bloody quick turnaround coming from china!

 

Still sounds promising!

 

Well it arrived today so very quick delivery from china and i didn't even pay for express delivery!
Here's a few pics, apologies I'm not a great photographer!
Core is similar to the other Chinese one but i think a bit neater?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/96713932@N08/9838289415/

Welding seems ok to me?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/96713932@N08/9838266064/in/photostream/

And the whole thing
http://www.flickr.com/photos/96713932@N08/9838374923/in/photostream/

Opinions? As i'm no expert?

Won't be fitting it for a couple of weeks i think, but it will give me some time(Hopefully!) to data log the standard setup so i have something to compare it with.

 

I think it´s ok, place it ´ll take about 30 mins.
JackU the car, take out the hopper, then the oem IC only have a couple of clamps unscrew them take the hose out and u just have to pull up the IC so its way out. Put the new one on the radiator frame(There i have to sand the IC support because it didn´t fit well) and be shure on fitting well the hose´s and thats it.

 

Cheers i've found a guide with pics etc. Its just finding the time tbh, mentally busy at the moment!

Does it look the same as the GPI one you had?

 

Does the standard core (inside) look similar to these cheaper 60mm coolers?

 

I put a pic up earlier it's similar but a bit better (I think) but im no expert!

Il be doing some testing in a week or two hopefully for temps and boost pressure