I think the two holes on the bottom you can see are for the license plate bracket on the non-eco models. There might be other holes for the top, not sure.

 

IAT is not the problem here...

you shouldnt. Unless you guys stick a license plate in front of it, a grille isnt going to choke off the airflow in the smallest manner. Above 35, ram air effect negates the problem anyways

 

No problem, I know how to use a drill. I bought the same grill as tteel and made some brackets similar to the carriage works brackets. I drilled holes where the red dots are in the pic below. But with brackets it's not going anywhere if something hits it. If you just screw it into the plastic (as per the instructions) it would probably would go somewhere if something big hits it at speed.It would probably protect the intercooler but break the plastic inserts it's screwed to.

 

What do you mean IATs are not the problem, thats exactly the problem, If you cut off the air to the charge air cooler, you care pumping hot air into into the intake.

And by putting a grille in front of a heat exchanger will indeed cut down airflow. Basically take the area of the grille and divided by the total open area of the opening and it tells you what percent blockage you have. Ideal with stuff like this a lot where I work constantly figuring out how much I can guard something but maintain the cooling of my heat exchanger, be it a radiator, charge air cooler, or some other type of cooler.

See link...http://www.fecon.com/products/view/?productid=24
I had to guard the coolers on this machine but still keep air moving in order to cooler 600 hp.

So for the charge air cooler, like others have said if you block it, your temps go up, kill power, and start using more fuel to try to cool.

 

I guess my line of thought is that ambient air temp is the important factor here.
Living up here where temps are cool to cold as compared to down south I'm not sure there would be a problem.
Haven't broke 90f here yet and doubt we will....Soon temps will be dropping,snow will be on the ground,slush,rocks and crap all over the road.
There won't be cooling issues then!
I am a little curious as to the actual routing of coolant for the intercooler,where it is taken off etc....anybody know?

And yeah I ordered one off EBay and will be putting it on....

 

Explained in the other forum, but there is no coolant as in water going into the aftercooler. Its just the outside air going across the fins that cool the compressed air inside the aftercooler that is coming from the turbos.

 

Ahh I'm funny that way about drilling anything on the new truck

 

http://www.gnttype.org/techarea/turbo/intercooler.html





Interesting stuff....smart guys should do some calculating here!
So by the looks of it any surface area loss on intercooler should affect performance but if it's cooler out then it will balance out in the end!
Too many variables here to say but if we are talking damage just how hot would things have to get?
What would be damaged first?
Just how much air flow would have to lost to damage something and at what speed is a ram air affect negate any lost surface area?

Exhaust temp is 250-350f,heat of compression for combustion air coming out of turbo...what temp is it at?
Maybe some guys with turbos in the past could enlighten us on typical temps being observed..
Again all in all I'm thinking the cooler temps we have up here will more than offset any lost surface area from a grille guard and unless you have complete blockage of intercooler the chances of damaging something are slim....but you may see a loss of performance if driving in very hot weather and limiting air flow

 

Does anyone know if the F150 shares the intercooler with the SHO? I doubt it, but am still curious.

 

roger than, blonde moment, I was thinking initial air temps before boosting.

 

Did some testing today on the efficiency of the intercooler with NO lower grill.

Outside temp 98 degrees. 63% humidity. Absolutely miserable hot here in east Tn.

Plugged in my ScanGauge E and stated observing IAT. Pulling my 7500# travel trailer in the Smokey mountains. If that's not a good test of the intercooler I don't know what is.

I'll preface this all by saying that IAT is normally within a degree or two of ambient air temps.

Anyhow, I watched IAT. A low speeds of less than 35mph or so, I saw IAT temps of 20+ degrees over ambient with a peak of 145degrees while sitting at a red-light.

Once moving, though, it quickly dropped two the noel within a degree or two. Even with substantial load and close to max boost.

Am very impressed with the efficiency of the factory piece. Guess I need to buy one of the lower grills and test it with reduced airflow.

 

I got my grille, but not had the chance to do any testing with my SGII