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Process West WRX Verticooler installation


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So as quite a few of you know, I bought the Process West Verticooler for a 15WRX to install on my GT. Overall the install went well and everything fit close. Trust me it was by no means a perfect fit, but things were close enough to work. The one thing that absolutely would not work was the supplied intake piping. It was too short no matter which way you tried it. (Insert joke here). The kit also came with a new alternator cover that would not work either. The WRX setup just seems way different for that piece.

 

Here is all of the kit as it was shipped.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_092933_zpsvdrjztzd.jpg

 

Here is a side by side of the stock vs. the Process West. The new one is just huge compared to stock and weighs about a gazillion times more. The quality is great and the paint quality(Could be powdercoated) is great as well.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_093928_zpsxotsmwmx.jpg

 

Now on to the install. The Verti cooler mounts from the bottom with two brackets. It actually mounts to the top transmission case bolt. On the WRX there is a mount(looks like torque mount from the pics)mounted to that same spot and they have the intercooler mount to the same spot. Again as before all the brackets are of really nice quality, so I have no worries about the bracket holding the weight of the intercooler. One other really nice thing about the new location of the intercooler is that you have great access to the rear of the intake. Stuff that was buried before, now is really easy to get to.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_104457_zpseu4ibjyr.jpg

 

As mentioned before, I tried to use the supplied intake piping because it was really nice. It seems though as we have discussed before that the wrx intake setup is just different enough that it will not work. So I guess I will be selling the intake piping now that I cannot use it. Once I had the verticooler installed this is how it lined up with the intake tube. Not exactly optimal.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_110815_zpsplv0ejmj.jpg

 

So I looked at this for quite a while and was trying every which way to make it fit and had absolutely no luck. Then on a whim I decided to look at the Perrin intercooler hose that now was an extra part due to having to use the supplied throttle body hose included with the kit. It had a funky jog to it that looked about like what I needed. After some messing around I decided it would work as long as I cut the accordion part off of the stock intake tube. This was a bit nerve racking because if it did not work I would be SOL, but I decided to give it a go. Low and behold, it worked. This is what I ended up with. I know it is not perfect, but I think it works pretty good considering.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_192309_zpsbhs5bbfi.jpg

 

So this is how it all looks once everything is installed.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_130142_zpsrc2mryem.jpg

 

SO now that the verti cooler was installed I needed to move on to the duct work. This was very tricky and I did my best considering that the included parts were in no way designed for our cars. I removed the hood scoop setup from under the hood. I had to trim it a bit and mess around with things, but it ended up pretty good. It is not perfect, but I think it will get the airflow to the cooler efficiently enough. I will begin tuning again this week, so that will really tell the truth.

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_182322_zpsba5dgjht.jpg

http://i1378.photobucket.com/albums/ah113/BBPeik/20160619_183110_zpsmowbeh7s.jpg

 

I hope this helps any of you thinking about going this route. I appologize for any confusion in the write up. As I mentioned earlier it got up to 111 at my house today. It was about 104 in the garage. A bit better, but not the best for sure. Even so, I think all turned out well.

Thanks for reading

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From what I remember, there's enough extra length to be able to stretch things out to get to the PW TMIC (possibly without repurposing the Perrin coupler), only question would be whether or not this would push the BPV into the ABS unit. If you can get me a couple measurements from the end of the coupler to some fixed locations (firewall or something), I might be able to compare to the RacerX charge pipe.
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I'll take a tape measure to things after I get home and see what happens. I have to go spelunking and try to find a fastener I dropped anyway- I'm hoping it ended up inside a fan shroud, but after 45 miles of driving, I'm not too optimistic about it still being there.
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Purchase it at your own peril. CNT stuff is all chinese cheap knockoff stuff that steals another company's design. That's an AVO copy. No guarantees that it will perform better than our stock intercooler. There's lots of things to think about, not only size. The fins per inch in the core on both air sides matter and pressure drop across the core is important too. Go with one that has been properly tested and engineered with proven results rather than products that have been thrown together willy-nilly and cheaply and rushed to market for the purpose of capturing market dollars as quickly as possible before everyone finds out its junk.

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Not sure. It may be possible to combine the process west and the racer x to get a suitable unit. If not my ghetto perrin throttle body hose set up worked pretty good.

 

The OEM charge pipe is quite a restriction for just the OEM IC.

 

BBPeik - I've got a Racer X charge pipe in storage. I'll send it out to you for a test fit if that's helpful to the insall. PM me if interested.

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Well I just got home from my first day out in the world driving since the install. It was well over 100 on my drive home and it ran great. Overall the car just feels a lot happier. Runs much smoother in all driving situations. I expected some DAM correction today simply because of the heat, but instead DAM FNC and FNL all stayed right at zero. Vry happy with the install and would highly recommend this product. Of course tuning will tell for sure, but I expect good things there too.
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The OEM charge pipe is quite a restriction for just the OEM IC.

 

BBPeik - I've got a Racer X charge pipe in storage. I'll send it out to you for a test fit if that's helpful to the insall. PM me if interested.

 

From what I have understood the stock charge pipe is fine up to 400HP and even a bit more.

 

Quote from fahr_side "I have stage 3 5th gens at 335whp on the stock intake, and it's no where near maxxed out. The only intake I've tuned that gave a good smooth MAF curve was the Blitz item, and that's just a MAF housing & cone filter that sits in it's cool carbon scoop thing. Added not one extra hp over the stock intake though, even after carefully retuning for it."

I may still hit you up on the test fit though.

Edited by BBPeik
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Quote from fahr_side "I have stage 3 5th gens at 335whp on the stock intake, and it's no where near maxxed out. The only intake I've tuned that gave a good smooth MAF curve was the Blitz item, and that's just a MAF housing & cone filter that sits in it's cool carbon scoop thing. Added not one extra hp over the stock intake though, even after carefully retuning for it."

But fahr_side was talking about the intake there, not the charge pipe. I thought he was a pretty big supporter of replacing the OEM charge pipe. Don't think the OEM charge pipe was so much of a restriction, just a common failure point. Plastic tends to split/crack.

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From what I have understood the stock charge pipe is fine up to 400HP and even a bit more.

 

Quote from fahr_side "I have stage 3 5th gens at 335whp on the stock intake, and it's no where near maxxed out. The only intake I've tuned that gave a good smooth MAF curve was the Blitz item, and that's just a MAF housing & cone filter that sits in it's cool carbon scoop thing. Added not one extra hp over the stock intake though, even after carefully retuning for it."

I may still hit you up on the test fit though.

 

Charge pipe and intake are two different animals though.

 

From what I've read the charge pipe can have structural issues at higher than stock boost pressures.

 

Same idea as Rutchard lol

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I think somewhere around 23 PSI is when it blew. Most of us on the stock MAP sensor and MAF tuned (vs speed density) won't ever get past 21 so for most of us the failure of the charge pipe won't happen until it has gotten brittle many years from now.
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I just measured. Looks like from the firewall to the back edge of the inter cooler inlet pipe is 10". Mind you it is at about a 45° angle so that measurement is not perfect. Hope that helps.

 

Got tied up yesterday afternoon, but I was able to measure today, and here's what I found:

 

IMG_20160621_164641.thumb.jpg.656df970f6c2f49c235511555658f8cd.jpg

IMG_20160621_164646.thumb.jpg.8d0d1b1daff781f1d57860fce5f662f4.jpg

 

Looks like 11" from the firewall (compressed the padding a little when I meansured) to the shoulder of the stock TMIC inlet pipe. By my best guess, there's easily another 1/2" to 3/4" of length in the charge pipe if you keep the clamps completely on the silicone coupler and behind the beads on the pipe sections, maybe more if you push it. You could also buy a little length by flexing the TMIC end outboard and adding in some extra length at the charge pipe to TMIC coupler. It'll be close, but I wouldn't feel comfortable saying it's definitely going to work.

 

This might rule out using a Synapse DV in "pull" orientation (vacuum lines would push into the ABS unit block), would most likely be fine in the "push" orientation though. Alternatively, you could rotate the valve so the outlet points down and come up with a different hose to use to get back to the inlet.

 

 

Once we get this figured out, I wonder if PW would be willing to sell us a kit without most of the charge pipe parts we can't use? Seems like a lot of extra parts that would end up sitting on a shelf in someone's garage, because I don't know that it'll work with a non-PW TMIC due to the length difference.

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