Water injection kit install

[rfmarz@frontiernet]

Yeah, and now that bolus has the water injection installed, he'll just run away and we'll never be able to see where he rests his arms (except when he laps us again!).

[silver]

Which kit is good here are a few links to different kits.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/water-al ... enameZWDVW

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Snow-Per ... enameZWDVW

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/AEM-Wate ... enameZWDVW

Bolus and Darth, of course I'm looking to you two for guidence seeing as you both have a water injection system.

[CalScot]

The two tuning guys that I trust most both independantly reccomended Snow Performance stuff. If that's worth anything!
Both said H2O is a good insurance measure against premature detonation, but your system should be designed to cool and run through it's primary system first and foremost.

[silver]

Calscot, I hear you loud and clear.  Thanks for the advice on Snow.

I have to say that the system should be designed to cool and run through it's primary system first and foremost too, but, ITS NOT, and the money I paid for the car obviously wasn't enough for them to design it properly, I don't have the time or the patience to do it either.  All of Brammo's attempts to fix the issue have had 0 success.  So far they've tried a new aftercooler which is about 3 times the size of the original...no help.  They have tried giving us a larger pulley (with less boost for the laymen reading this post) which they guaranteed us would stop the heatsoak problem..no help except less boost.  The sent us a new tune to go with the lesser boost, which now the car runs smooth but, again, that had nothing to do with the heatsoak problem in the first place soooo it is what it is.

I'm sure there's something that can be done to the factory cooling system as a permenent solution, but I'm not going to be involved with trying to figure it out...I'm fed up with it, and Darth has proven that the water injection is a damn good substitute.

As a footnote....I never plan to run the car so long that I run out of water in the water injection system, in fact, if there's even the remote possibility that the car might travel so far as to run out of water, it's so simple to bring extra that, obviously I'll do it.

Damn did I hijack myself, haha anyways, this is the direction I'm going and I appreciate the feedback...anyone else got some input I'm listening.

[bolus]

Hold off on purchasing just yet.  I am talking with Perrin at Perrin performance (who installed my kit).  He is going to make a post about the kit soon in the for sale section and the price just got dropped from $950 to the price I paid for it $730

It is the new version of what is offered on his site that is waterproof (except for the control unit). 
http://www.perrinperformance.com/products/show/287

It is one of the best kits on the market with a lot of built in safeguards and tuning options.  He is going to make up special install instructions for Atom owners and be able to support it. 

Also, Darth and I are going to tune my car for the kit and then I'll be giving away the tune (this will be through me, not Perrin).  I still have on my original exhaust so it will need minimal modification to the turn to fit it to peoples cars. 

[maverick1]

Gentlemen...I believe the reason our current intercooler is not doing it's job very well is because of it's position (location) in the car. It does not get any direct air flow like the front rad does.  If you look at most every turbocharged car out there that has an intercooler they are positioned in the vehicle to get maximum air flow. Examples are Subaru STI, Mitsubishi EVO to name a few. The EVO one is located right at the front of the car getting maximum air flow. 
I think that if we were to use a similar design to the one Calscot used in the air box location  which maximizes air flow, and then remote the air filter to the side using a cone air filter it would solve the heat soak problem. Just my opinion.
I talked to a friend today who suggested going with a turbocharger rather than the supercharger. I mentioned the lag issue and he said a properly sized turbo would have no lag and be much more tunable than a supercharged system. 
I think I might try going to a turbo system and see what happens.
cheers

[bolus]

I'll be keeping my water injection when the car has a turbo and different intercooler.  It decreases risk of detonation, increasing fuel octane, increasing cooling beyond any intercooler, gets more power. 

Mav, a new intercooler is a ton more work than a water injection kit.  so it is still very much a viable option for our cars especially for the owners that dont want to install a new intercooler, move the air intake, fabricated cooling lines, remove the old coolant lines, etc.  4 holes, a couple of wires to the battery and a few zip ties and the kit is installed.

[bolus]

Oh, and we'll have dyno results to show stock tune, stock tune + water, and custom tune + water probably this weekend. 

[silver]

after the maf sensor and before the supercharger on the air intake tube.

[bolus]

[quote="Spanky"]
I need help getting educated on water injection systems. Where is this water being injected/sprayed that is reduces the air temps so dramaticly?
[/quote]

You can see the little white tube going into my intake here


The water cools down the compressed air that the supercharger is heating up.  Simply because water can absorb a lot of heat.  But the water also decreases the chance of the air fuel mixture igniting before the spark goes off (detonation).  So it essentially increases octane of the fuel.

So at very least you are cooling, but it also gives you the option of tuning the engine as if you were running higher octane fuel.  Add in some methanol into the mixture, which has a very high octane rating, then you can do even better. 

The only downside is if you tune aggressively and then run out of water or have a nozzle clog.  You could cause detonation and damage the engine. 

[nickpoore]

Again, some silly questions...

The Perrin kit does not seem to come with a tank.
What size tank do you need?

The Perrin system instructions make referrence to hooking up to the wiper relay.
Please explain when does the system turn on, and when does it spray water into the intake.

Thanks. 10^6.

[bolus]

There is no tank with the system so we bought a 2 quart tank.  Earlier in the thread I have pics of it.  Pretty much anything will work though it is best to have the tank level with the pump.
http://forum.atomclub.com/index.php/top ... #msg110408
We got these tanks from ebay
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/CANTON-R ... dZViewItem

At atomfest I'd go through about 1.5 quarts per session so it worked out good.

The Perrin kit turns on based on injector duty cycle.  So there is one wire that is spliced into the injector harness that detects the signal to the injector.  I can help people get the correct wire if needed.  Then there is a power wire that I originally had attached to the positive lead to all injectors (in the harness as well) that turned the kit on with ignition.  But since the Atom has that intermittent power drop that was giving the dash problems the kit kept turning off.  It probably just needs a capacitor to fix it.  But I wired it directly to the battery with a switch instead.  I currently have it set so the pump turns on at 25% injector duty cycle.  The control box has adjustments for this. 

So I turn on the car, flip on the power switch and then the pump turns on when I need it.  Stomp on the gas and the pump turns on automatically. 

I dont have the boost cutoff safety wires hooked up yet as mentioned in the manual.  Perrin and I are going to figure out how best to hook that up this weekend and include it in the Atom specific instructions.  It is not needed obviously but adds another margin of safety.  I also dont have the tank level detector hooked up either since the tank has a gauge on the side. 

So basically 2 positive leads to the battery with a switch, 2 ground leads, One wire to the injector harness  Pretty simple. 

[silver]

Bolus can you post a pic specifically of the sheet metal you used to mount the pump, so I can get an idea for fabricating mine

[bolus]

I drilled 3 holes right into the firewall behind the seats.  I'll get pics later

[silver]

thanks...I'm pretty set on the snow performance model....it's specific to the Cobalt SS and I'm checking prices right now...so far this is the best, but I'm not done searching yet.

http://www.blujay.com/item/Cobalt-SS-Sn ... 04-1860265