Is this a decent location for my IAT?
 

Got the Flyin Miata intercooler with their silicone hoses, so I don't really have a great place after the intercooler to mount my IAT in front of the radiator. I wanted to see what you guys thought about this location. Would I be ok to weld my bung to the end tank of the intercooler right here? I swear i've seen this done. Let me know what you think.
https://www.miataturbo.net/gallery/f...ront_mount.jpg

Don't even need a bung. That's exactly where my IAT sensor is, and I just drilled & tapped the end tank and threaded the sensor in directly. The metal is surprisingly thick in that spot on most ICs, so you shouldn't have an issue. Doesn't need to be 100.00% airtight, just enough so it won't fall out.

That's an interesting setup with the fans in front of the radiator.

Thanks Joe, good to hear. Just wanted to confirm it before I started hacking on my new IC. The pic I just snagged off of google for ref. I have no idea what kind of car that is. Ha.

Gotcha.

I didn't really look close enough to see that it isn't even a Miata.

Boost leak. :)

Yeah, Joe, I'd prefer that particular item to be 100% airtight.

Oh, for pete's sake... Just how much air do you pussies really think is going to escape from a dry 3/8" NPT fitting relative to the total airflow through the system? One ten-thousandth of a percent? If any one of you owns an instrument even remotely capable of measuring it, I'll eat my catalytic converter.

Use teflon tape or RTV on the threads if it's gonna keep you up at night.

A little leak here, a little leak there...

It's too easy to just seal 'em up.

:giggle:

You fuckers done got joe irritated

This reminds me of a conversation I had with a friend of mine about his G35:
Ash: My door sill covers are broken. I need new ones. They make them that say Infinity and ones that say Skyline. Do you think I should get the Skyline ones?
Me: Only if you were willing to do a complete JDM identity conversion. They would look dumb by themselves.
Ash: But making the car RHD will be sooo hard!
Me: Dear God. Why do I even hang out with you?


I think that's how Joe feels right about now. lol.

Mmmm...Catalytic converter... Lol, Joe I think you're pretty safe with that bet.

I thought you wanted these sensors to be as close to the valves as possible to get the most accurate density calculations.

On my 280z I made a throttle body spacer out of some high temp acrylic (or something similar) and drilled and tapped it for the NPT fitting. The thing you have to worry about is heat soak, which is why I chose that plastic.

Some people go as far as to drilling and tapping their intake manifolds, but then they have to use the coolant based corrections or else the sensor will be terribly heatsoaked and cause the engine to run rough on a hot restart.

heatsoak is why most of us here at mt.net choose to put them out of the engine bay and in front of the radiator.

My electric turbo needs all the help it can get.

If the IAT sensor goes where the O.P. suggests, then it could still pick up heat from the radiator.

But ... what if the IAT goes in the front part of the IC end cap!? That way it would be physically blocked from radiator heat and would have maximum exposure to outside cooler air.

Spot shown in red, based on the original non-Miata picture:

http://www.snarc.net/iat.jpg

The effect of the air flowing over the sensor will be plenty to cancel out the effect of any radiated heat from the radiator I would think. Besides, unless the OP has a really long core the sensor would be prominently displayed, which isn't actually a problem, but not a whole lot of people are trying to show off the sensor.

Then why does mine still heat soak? It's already in the IC outlet pipe.

Or do you just mean the air flowing over the sensor in the context of the sensor being in the end cap?

evank, yours may still heatsoak, but it should be drastically better than if it was right outside of the throttlebody directly behind the radiator and in the hot engine bay...

mine is in a similar area right on the bottom of the end tank