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Truck Encyclopedia (7): What is an intercooler for?

However, relying on a turbocharger alone, the engine is not a job to keep to itself, and the turbocharger must be equipped with a guy - an intercooler, so that the engine can work safely.

What exactly is the intercooler that can be so powerful, and sit down and watch me analyze it slowly.

▎What is an intercooler?

An intercooler is a radiator whose role is to lower the intake air temperature of the engine. The intercooler looks a lot like a water tank radiator, but unlike a tank radiator, it is air that flows inside.

▎Why does the turbine need to be equipped with an intercooler?

As mentioned in the previous article, the turbine is driven by the exhaust gas of the engine, and the exhaust gas temperature plus the speed of the turbo tens of thousands of revolutions makes the turbine extremely high when working.

On the one hand, the air pressurized by the turbocharger itself is heated by the heat conduction of the turbocharger itself, and on the other hand, it is heated by air compression, and the air temperature that finally reaches the combustion chamber becomes very high.

The lower the air temperature, the higher the air density, and the higher the oxygen content in the same volume of air, and vice versa.

However, after heating by the turbocharger, the air density is greatly reduced, the inflation efficiency is low, and the oxygen content is low, which ultimately leads to a decrease in engine power.

Seeing that the power enhancement method that has been painstakingly made is offset by the excessively high intake air temperature, it is really not cost-effective. So the engineers came up with a solution, which was to reduce the inlet air temperature, and the intercooler was born.

极限工况下的涡轮

▎The solution is there, but what to cool it down?

The most common types of intercooler cooling are: water-cooled intercooler and air-cooled intercooler.

Air-cooled intercooler: The so-called air-cooled refers to an intercooler that uses air as a medium to dissipate heat.

The air-cooled intercooler generally needs to be arranged in front of the front of the vehicle, and when the vehicle is moving, the external airflow passes through the grille of the intercooler for heat exchange to cool the high-temperature air inside the intercooler.

Water-cooled intercooler: The so-called water-cooled is an intercooler that uses liquid as a medium for cooling.

This cooling system generally shares a cooling water tank with the engine's cooling system, and some models use an independent cooling system.

▎ Air-cooled and water-cooled, each with its own advantages

Volvo's air-cooled intercooler (far right)

The advantages of air cooling are: the structure is simple and the cooling effect is better, but it needs to be installed at the front end of the vehicle, which increases the length of the air intake pipe. Contaminants that accumulate over time can also cause cooling efficiency to deteriorate and need to be cleaned regularly. This is also the reason why many truck drivers install insect nets on the front of their vehicles in the summer.

MAN's water-cooled intercooler (bottom left)

The advantages of water cooling are: the pipeline layout is flexible, which can be arranged close to the engine intake manifold, reducing the lengthy air intake pipe, because it is not exposed, it is not easy to have dirty problems, but the disadvantage is that the water cooling pipeline is relatively complex, and there is a certain hidden danger of leakage.

▎ How to maintain the intercooler

The intercooler, like the radiator tank, does not require special maintenance. The only thing to note is that the surface of the intercooler should be cleaned frequently to avoid too much foreign contaminants covering it, resulting in a decrease in cooling effect.

How, after reading today's old driver's class, I finally understand the relationship between the turbocharger and the intercooler, which are "good friends". Since the working principle of the turbocharger leads to a high intake air temperature, which affects the efficiency of the engine, an intercooler is needed to suppress the intake air temperature, so it is much simpler.

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