Friday, September 02, 2005 - 08:07 am, by: Peter Nitschke(Pen)
How to Remove and Clean the stock Intercooler. Tutorial Kindly Provided by Paul Irwin.
One thing I was informed about when making my BFI was that I should have taken out and cleaned the intercooler whilst I was getting at the little satanic screws behind the headlight. I thought to myself for a little and then dismissed it as unnecessary...
Until... someone mentioned that depending on the treatment of the soarer before you owned it and also upon how old your soarer is, its advisable to clean it out because there is upwards of a pint of oil sitting in the bottom of some intercoolers.
Now if you ask me I think that's a little excessive. None the less, here is my step by (painful) step guide to removing/cleaning/replacing the stock TT intercooler.
The stock TT intercooler can be seen by looking inside the front right vent of the bumper (looking at the car) here is a pic of the intercooler inside the car, and also its location.
Yeah yeah yeah i know i have a few bugs stuck to my car!
Ok, a little warning before we proceed.
THIS PROCEDURE INVOLVES A SMALL AMOUNT OF FIDDLING AND A FAIR BIT OF CONFIDENCE. It's not real hard but could be quite easy to screw up your intercooler or have a hell of a time getting it back in.
Stuff You Need:
1) A 2.5L TT Soarer...duh
2) a bottle of Mineral Turpentine.
3) a bottle of Methylated Spirits (not really needed that bad).
4) a size 10mm socket!!!! (who would have thought) and wait for it....<drum> a 12mm socket!!!
5) One brother (or another personal assistant). <--Brother.
6) A bigger swear jar than you currently own .
7) The absence of any small children or women who are offended by profanities. "OMFG !!!"
OK. first things first.
Step 1) Jack the soarer up using ... a jack. the point I was advised to use to jack the soarer up is the "rail" that runs the length of the distance between the front and back wheels. there is one rail on either side of the car.
To fit my hydraulic jack under the soarer (which is pretty low) I had to drive onto a lump of wood to raise the side skirt clearance.
Once that is up its probably a good idea to place a chock under the rail as well just in case the jack fails or some village idiot twists the handle whilst you're under the car.
Step 2) Once that's all done, take off the front right wheel. if you don't know how to take off the wheel... well I really don't think you have the level of mechanical mastery to complete this task (which is almost non existent anyway).
Step 3) When you have the wheel off you will be confronted with the following view. the screws holding in the plastic shield must then be removed which will expose the intercooler.
I'm pretty sure all of the nuts are shown there. but if you miss a few I'm sure you can get this bit done.
Step 4) With the plastic shield off you should now be able to see the intercooler, in all of its undersized, pathetic glory. To get the intercooler out unscrew the following. (LOOK AT BOTH PICTURES)
Note that the second picture is looking at the intercooler from in front as if you have just been ran over and are looking up towards the front end of the intercooler. The black part is the side of the stock TT intercooler vent. I think that's a pretty clear description.
Step 5) Go get the swear jar. (important)
Step 6) The Pipes for the intercooler are quite a good fit and require a precise combination of force and profanities to get off. The task that makes this all the harder is that you CAN NOT BUMP THE INTERCOOLER FINS WHILST DOING THIS!!! They are incredibly fragile and will (and do) literally fold and crumble when you press them with even your little finger.
The best way I found to get the cooler off was to wriggle off the bottom pipe first with decent amount of force. Then slide the intercooler off the top screw (which is hidden behind that cable in the above pic) and then pull (or wriggle) down off the top pipe.
You should end up ( hopefully) with something that remotely resembles this.
Now its time for the cleaning!!!
Clean'n'Cool !!!...
With the intercooler out and about 40% of the pain over, its time to clean the puppy up!
Before you ask... no I didn't get a picture of the inside of my cooler... I totally forgot to! but let me say that it was pretty clean in there (or at least I thought it was!).
Step 1) Pour out any excess oil from the cooler by leaning it over and pouring it out one of the pipes... I didn't get anything out of mine. But others have claimed to get quite a bit from theirs... So give it a go and email me back about how much you got from yours, with the year model of the car. Might be interesting (I'll make a little table up when I get enough responses...) same goes for the supra owners who read this site. And any other people.
Step 2) Get something smooth and round to jam in the hole... Like a tennis ball (DON'T BREAK THE PIPE!) or a potato (don't leave any in there) or stretch a rubber glove over the end and elastic band it TIGHTLY down. Anything to make a seal.
Now get about 1/2 of your bottle of mineral thinners or turps and pour it in there and slosh it back and fourth for a few minutes with your hand over the other end. Then pour it out into a container. Here's the difference in colour in my turps when I poured it out!!!
After that I poured in about a quarter of a bottle of methylated spirits, and sloshed that around and poured it out. the reason being, back when I used to see the sun (and used to surf) the best way to get wax off a board (if you're putting a sticker or gorilla grip on), was to scrape off the wax and then rub the rest off with turps. The thing about turps is that it leaves an ever so fine layer of residue even after it evaporates, so you then rub on some metho and that absorbs the turps and leaves the surface dry!!!
Now some people will probably argue that the super fine turpentine (or thinners) residue might actually do the intercooler some good (protect it or something?) but I went for the metho out of habit more than anything so I don't think its mandatory.
Step 3) Let it dry a little and have a drink and put a few pennies in the jar (think of it as a deposit for when you put the thing back in)
Ok now the time comes to put it back in!
Go back to the car and examine the hole that's left where the cooler came out.
Now before even thinking of doing any screws up, put the hose ends on first! I initially screwed it all in place and ended up almost crying (in a masculine, tough... respectable kind of way)... Save yourself the dignity and put the hoses on first (they move around easier than the bolts).
Now I don't know if Satan was just swinging by my garage on this particular day or if I was just plain unlucky OR possibly the soarer pipes are very very tight fitting. but I had a HELL of a time getting them on! The hardest bit isn't necessarily getting them on, but doing it without crushing every fin in your core is the challenge...
Oooooh what a challenge! (putting another coin in the jar!) Make sure whilst doing this that your assistant (i.e.. brother) is lining up the air vent thing at the front of the car! Cause if it doesn't fit now, it may be a little harder to do later on!
Kinda like this!
Once the pipes are back on then just screw every thing back on in the opposite order to the first few pages (where amazingly enough... I took it off!!!)
Simple!
Now just get a drink and watch your assistant put the rest back together for you! ("How to make your brother do work for you" tutorial coming soon... haha)
Once that's all done, take out the supports and lower the car. Fire her up and take it for a spin, depending on the amount of oil in the cooler you may or may not notice the difference.
Previous
<--Brother. 
