I'm going to have to disagree with "you get what you pay for." aluminum is going to dissipate heat regardless. Surface area is another factor, not just whats inside and how many fins. With that being said if you think a 100-150 dollar IC off of ebay will be less efficient than my stock dual then ur an idiot. I have seen intercoolers like this do perfectly well at 350whp. I witnessed the dyno it has been on my friends car for 3 years now and is still holding up great. My brother has one on his turbo mr2 is a large ebay sidemount with a fan and it to is holding up great. If you can feel the cold side and the charge pipes are cold im going to have to say it is doing its job. If people want to spend more money on an IC great im not going to stop them. Im going by what i have SEEN in person not what i read. If it is bar an plate, doesnt have alot of pressure drop, and is a good size im buying it. Last time i looked the size i wanted was like 110 shipped to my door.

 

^ not tryin to start anything. But how many runs can the IC take B4 it starts bogging down (heat stroke)

 

myslow1, fins ARE surface area, the more fins there are, the more surface area there is; also, tube-and-fin FMICs (aka cheap ones) are not as efficent as bar-and-plate. Some are "good for the money," but ultimately a b-a-p will perform better

 

he made a total of 5 pulls on the dyno. The last 3 were pretty much back to back and he made the most power on his 4th pull. When all was said an done on his last pull the charge pipe going into the throttle body (cold side) was still cold.
l88 im talking about bar and plate ics they have them on ebay.

Im just saying why would i spend an extra 150-300 when i dont need to. Thats stupidity.

 

I'm pry going to get on off ebay. And if it doesn't perfrom like I want ill sell it and get a more $$$ one. I want something that will hold up for road racing/time tracks

 

it will hold up

 

and its not really a matter of perform/don't perform aka 'hold up'. Its more perform, or perform well. A cheap core will cool, a good core will cool better. It IS 'get what you pay for' when cooler air means more Hp. End tank design makes a difference even.
But here's teh tricky part. More surface area inside the core isn't always a good thing. The more surface area, the more restriction, the greater the differential pressure between end tanks, so a smaller turbo setup would suffer since its already pushing hard to create the flow you need. You need to find the balance point between how much cooling you want and how much restriction you're willing to deal with.

 

Have you ever looked inside the stock ic's? It is a horrible design. There is barely any cooling area, so of course a decent sized ebay core will cool better.

As for get what you pay for, compare an expensive core (garrett, precision, greddy, etc) vs a ebay core. The more expensive core will be very high fin/inch count vs a ebay core which is far from dense (you can see right through it with ease. The makes the cores smaller and have a higher efficiency rate. With an ebay core, you need a much larger core to get close. The best balance between high cost and ebay i have found is treadstone. Its not as high dense as a garrett, but no where near the as low dense as ebay. The also have the fins offset so you cool much better.

Going back to the aluminum thing, like i have said, it is a very poor conductor of heat. You need more fins to cool and the more aluminum used means more money. A precision 350hp core ($250) will cool better than a ebay core that is as taller and wider as it.

dont get me wrong, an ebay will work, but just at a lower heat transer efficiecy and will cause you to lose power over all and possibly more so after each pull

 

Really, this whole discussion goes back to the mod mantra: Do it right the first time. If you can't afford the $100 difference for a major part re-think what you're doing.

 

i can afford it im just not going to spend it. I think an ebay core will be fine for my car with the mods i want. Im not going bt therefore 100 > 250+