Zeus - I am with you 100% on this subject. Kind of like developing a solution before fully understanding what people really want......or will buy. I am very happy with Works re-flash and exhale, and will be in standing in line for further exhaust, intake and re-flash products, but the WWI will not be a solution for me personally.

There are a lot of other solid tried and true ways to gain hp and market share. WWI may end-up being a well-engineered product that works great, but it also has the potential for causing lots of controversy which may end-up causing more trouble than it is worth.

I think focusing time and effort on developing more mainstream upgrades will net more new customers and will keep existing customers coming back for more.

N10S

 

Water Injection = safe and very effective.

We have done thermocoupler testing on the Evo, and have been able to virtually eliminate heatsoak using WI without incurring the penalties associated with a larger intercooler (pressure drop and the resulting increased lag). Water acts as a natural anti-detonant (i.e. free octane booster), lowers emissions, and even cleans carbon deposits out from the engine. Best of all, water is free!

Larger air-to-air intercoolers are well and good, but even the largest intercooler is going to heatsoak when the car has been crawling through traffic and/or the ambient air temperatures are high. Water injection ensures that the 50th consecutive hard boost run on a hot day is every bit as strong as the 1st hard boost run on a cool morning. No IC can ever compete with the level of consistency in heat management afforded by water injection.

In short, I am surprised by the amount of misinformation that continues to pop up with respect to the applicability of water injection to help cool the intake charge and fight detonation on modern forced induction engines. I have traveled across the country and met with leading tuners and some of the greatest minds in performance tuning, and from the kid on the street to the leading engineers at various respected tuning shops, there are some common misconceptions and misunderstandings about what water injection is and how it works.

In brief: Water injection is not a new invention. Nearly all of the WRC rally teams have been running it for years, including Mitsubishi. Ford sold a factory water injection system on their Europe market Escort Cosworth back in the 1980s. Historically speaking, it was first used in fighter planes, then by hot rodders in the 1950s and 60s.

Today, the technology allows for fully atomized water vapor thanks to 125-psi pumps, purpose built jets, and comprehensive ECU mapping. Gone are the days of carbureted engines and spray bottle coolers.

But back to how it works:

Water injection cools the intake charge through the latent heat absorption of water in the evaporation process. Same principal as patio misters. The water vapor absorbs the heat in the intake charge and cools it down.

Since we know the engine is a giant air pump, and the amount of power it is capable of producing is directly proportional to the volume of cool, dense air it is able to ingest, the technology behind water injection makes perfect sense. Think of it this way -- everyone is concerned about air volume:

"How big of a turbo should I run for my power goals?” = How can I pump more air into my motor?

"How about my intake, can that be bigger? ” = How can I pump make more air available to my turbo?

"Can I run a bigger throttle body” = How can I pull more air into my intake manifold?

"Is the AFM restrictive? ” = Is this a bottleneck in moving and processing air volume?

"Will a brand X free flowing exhaust or downpipe help me move more air? ” = How can I push more air out and reduce backpressure?

"What about a custom exhaust manifold? ” = How can I push more air out and reduce backpressure?

"What about higher lift/duration cam profiles? ” = How can I optimize the combustion process for the volume of air I have available?

These concerns each address the given volume of air an engine can take in and how efficiently it can push it out again. They all, of course, come to play in determining an engine's power potential.

Equally important, and often overlooked, however is how cool and dense that intake charge is.

Its simple physics, really -- engines like a lot of air [volume], but they like a lot of cool, dense, air even better [volume + temperature].

Water injection displaces a small amount of air volume from the combustion process by replacing it with water vapor -- something that is not easily combustible like oxygen. So wait, it is actually reducing the amount of available air volume, right? And therefore it is a bad thing?

Yes. And No. That tiny reduction in air volume is more than made up for in the second half of the equation dealing with the temperature. A cool dense intake charge provides for better combustion than a hot one.

Want to address detonation? Look no further than the source of the heat that is causing it -- the real culprit behind blown motors.

After sitting in bumper to bumper traffic or a after couple of hard boost runs against that Mustang in the next lane an IC will heatsoak... regardless of how big it is...

and Houston, we have a problem...

Water injection does require that the end-user keep tabs on the water tank to ensure that it is not run dry, but this is no more of an inconvenience than checking your oil every other time you fill up at the gas station. There are some great articles on the subject here:

http://www.se-r.net/about/200sx/scc/...injection.html

http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/pr...scc_proj300zx/

-- DavidV

 

David-Thanks for the detail! I was familiar with the history, and to be honest some applications were effective and some were pretty poor.

I think your leading comment needs to be qualified by saying "Water injection can be safe and effective". It all boils down to the engineering of the system, the ability to effectively atomize and deliver the water particulates into the inlet mix, and being able to precisely meter the water volume required in a consistent and reliable fashion.

Considering the technology available today, I am not doubting that a precision system can be produced and implemented into a tuners packaging, and it sounds like Works is going to do just that. Certainly you have to realize that the proof of value lies not just in the additional performance upside, but also ensuring that the system doesn't cause any detrimental affects on the engine downstream. This will require lots of testing and then engine tear-downs for close inspection. This is the kind of formal data I think you will need to provide to people to make certain they can be confident that adding such a system is going to be a win-win in the end. This shouldn't be an issue considering your technical resources though, and will do nothing but lend credibility.

BTW- My earlier comments were not meant to discredit water injection or Works WWI efforts specifically. I think Works is doing an excellent job providing effective and alternative tuning products for the EVO, and I certainly plan to continue to support Works efforts by buying their products.

At the end of the day I just believe that there are many other more mainstream tuning parts that buyers are interested in that hopefully are also getting your R&D focus as well.

N10S

 

Ditto for me David...

I'm familiar with the complete application there in. I've owned 2 SE-Rs and frequented SE-R.net. As of late I've consulted and recommended water injection to an up and coming big hp SE-R owner/friend. I currently also have a non-intercooled Eaton M-62 supercharged Integra (that straight line kicks the ever-loving-**** out of my reflashed Evo). Point is that I've had limited experience with, and researched the **** out of the subject. It has the potential to be a great system... and the potential for great failure. Even if you design in all possible fail safes, you’re still adding another system to the car, and there by adding another possible point for a failure (my biggest ***** with piggyback systems and why I prefer a reflash). I'd rather modify, or better yet, "change the parameters" of an existing system on a daily driver. Now if your talking race car, all bets are off.

 

Dave thank you for the nice response to my personal message to you last month regarding the Works water injection system. Any ideas about ball park time to market and prices yet? I am with Zeus on the re-flash reliability and want to have the injection system in the tune.

 

Guess I should have better stated my post. It doesn't matter if the flash controls the system or not. It is still adding another system that may fail (pump, lines, nozzle, etc). I'd rather have a big honkin' front mount that is no more prone to failure than the OE unit on a daily driver... probably less likely than OE to fail do to heavier gauge aluminum in the bar and plate designs. Granted, you may be leaving hp on the table.

Depending on how aggressive Works gets on the tuning, I'd be worried that do to a plugged line, or faulty pump, split line, etc, I might lose the engine at full boil. For example, at the top of 3rd suddenly losing pressure on the water system lets say. On my daily driver that's not an acceptable loss. The majority of Evo owners are more than likely in the same boat. Remember I'm not saying that water injection is unreliable per se. I'm saying that in my opinion, with the option of a larger FMIC, water injection is an additional unnecessary variable no matter how "trick" it may be.

 

Zeus... I hear you on the dangers with another system but I can design my own ignition kill system using knock sensor output and other monitering points, so unless she diesels, I'm going to be ok. Moreover, my main objective is to lower my fuel not to generate a stable of new ponies. Dumping fuel to lower combustion rates and cool intake air temps is not as effective as using water. Not to mention that from a practical standpoint, it seems that water injection will only allow about 3psi more boost. I still agree with your notion that a re-flash is more reliable than a piggy back sys. The existing system must remain operable with a piggy back so the extra components make lower reliability a mathematical certainty.

 

In your case, it is a very viable option then. I'm talking more about the "mainstream user". I just don't understand why Works didn't offer a FMIC first to the masses, then something a little more "trick" to the more advanced user like water injection. I'm probably going to go the more expensive route with the massive Pruven FMIC. I think it is the more durable, and safer route for the daily driver. Again, I admit that one might be leaving hp on the table vs. water injection, but long run reliability will not be and issue.

 

Zeus..I am taking the cautious approach too. When I first got my car I had an aircraft engineer friend of mine looked her over and his comment was "the kind of heat you'er generating will substantially shorted the engine life." I ask about water injection and his opinion was that it would be a good way to lower combustion temps. It seems logical to me but it is only an opinion. I know that this method is much more popular in Europe than here but I do not know anyone who has one on thier car nor have I seen one with this kind of setup. I am hopping that works will succeed with thier idea to bring one out. I am in the SF Bay area often and can go to their shop for a look see. A larger IC would of course dissipate more heat, however it cannot lower things below ambient and H2o can. Reliability is much better with a passive system but here in Redding where I live we get temps around 218 in the summer.

 

I too used to work in aerospace... and highly agree with your friend. However, I'd prefer to use ceramics to keep the under hood temps down. As for the actual combustion temps... they are not that much higher than many modern production vehicles, and even though not as efficient at removing heat as water injection, tuning plays a huge roll...

 

"That kinda heat your generating" is your turbo, not the engine, that gets that hot. And the Big 16G is about as reliable as a turbo can be, 100,000 miles no problem with proper maintenance.

Now the bigger the turbo, the smaller the life span. The 4G63 is built to last and I beat the CRAP outa my 95 2G, never blew. (This includes an accidental shift to 2nd gear at 90 MPH, 11,000rpms, nothing blew)