fmic pros n cons

[lukeo]

am thinking bout fmic, am only doing it for looks not performance, so will it make the car feel "laggy"? do you have to get a smaller rad or alter other parts? i know you may have to trim the bumper n cut trim. like i say am only interested in the looks, but wana weigh up pros n cons 1st

[MR Y]

It is said to be more "laggy" but to be honest when mine was fitted I didnt really notice much lag but I do think I felt an increase in performance, no you dont need a smaller rad

[Bubble]

I have fitted front mount intercoolers to three cars now and have never noticed a difference in the responce.

Trim the bumper and the metal crash bar behind it and drill a hole in the offside inner wing and that's about it.

[Lambo Door Kits Ltd.]

There can only be an improvement as your providing a cooler air flow to the intake. Cooler equals more dense air, which equals better combustion. Problem is your ECU isn`t mapped for this change and will throw in fuel to be on the safe side. This won`t kill your engine as more fuel is better than not enough, but your fuel economy will take a nose dive.

[lukeo]

cheers for input guys,any suggestions on which one to go for, i know different ones av didnt ways of piping up, are sum easyer to fit than others, and any ideas on best value for money?

[Spearmint]

With the stock turbo and a fecking huge FMIC on the only difference you'll notice will be extra lag as that same small compressor bolted to the side of your engine has to fill up a larger area before that pressurized air reaches the inlet manifold. With a small boost increase and the relevant fuel / ignition mods this difference may be negated.

As for what to go for, have a word with Andy W on here who sells his own FMIC which is a copy of the stock GTR version. Good for around the 600hp mark, so it is said. Decent value as well.

[im_gouki]

I have to agree with Spearmint on this. Been looking into a fmic for a long time , but everyone i see for the gts-t quotes 500 to 1000 bhp. All fine and well if you are running that sort of power. But with the standard turbo , even at stage 1 tune an intercooler rated at 600 bhp and very large will introduce lag and flow issues. Looking at the greddy/thrust range they have different size cores for different max outputs. The same kind of complications happen when upgrading turbos. Get that wrong and your power increase can come at the expense of driveability.
So matching the intercooler core size to your required output is almost as important as matching turbo characteristics.
My mistake was i thought it was the extra pipe lenght that caused these problems but it seems to be less of a problem than having a too large intercooler core.... i believe.

[lukeo]

i fitted a big/large fmic to me starlet and it did make it more "laggy" but pick up was increased in 5th gear, am really only wanting to do this for looks, nt power dont wana start messing bout wid with fuel mods n ignition n turbos n stuff like that, b there, done that, spent the money you know the rest

[b16 nyk]

Certainly noticed an increase in lag on my standard tubo'd gtst after fitting a large front mount

[Little Kez]

time for a larger turbo and more power, the interesting stuff