Not sure if some of you may know, but there are two intercooler designs out there.
1. tube and fin
or
2. bar and plate

what are the differences in terms of of design and method of cooling. advantages or disadvantages of both.

I notice that HRC uses bar and plate, and companies such as greddy and hks use tube and fins.

why?

thanx

-K-

I forget why but bar and plate is better.

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Kaiser, i may be wrong, but the way i think it is, is that the tube and fin is basically a tube that is flattened to form the air channels and these air channels are then sandwiched between cooling fins to form the intercooler. Inside these flattened tubes there is no restriction, just open space hence their increased flow rate. they have more flow but less cooling efficiency. A bar and plate unit is imagine a rectangular channel made up of 4 plates for the sides. These sides surround the squiggly fins. Then these assemblies are stacked 90 degrees from each other to form the intercooler. so if you look at the intercooler from the outside you see the channels and squiggly fins alternating in layers. if you look on the inside of the intercooler you will see the same thing just oriented 90 degrees. so there are cooling fins on the outside and the inside, which increases cooling efficiency and decreases flow rate but the HRC ones are designed very well and flow really good! You can tell the differences in general by looking at the intercooler from the outside if the solid channels are rounded then it is most likely a tube and fin, if they are flat like the HRC's then it is a bar and plate.
lates
james

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