Ok so I got my car tuned last week, Finally back to some power.

However when we were tuning it Matt (ZZP) noticed the MAF was tripping out every so often.
We pulled the MAF and noticed a little condensation on it and small water droplets.

He tuned it and said that there will be a bit of stutter every so often when you get on it because water is hitting the MAF. Apparently I have condensation in my intercooler. Well its annoying as heck now that I actually have pressure pushing through the intercooler. I will load it up and get on it and it basically spools the turbo and sputters a couple times while getting on it.

Turbo goes SSHHHHH-tah-SSHHH-tah-SHHHHH rapidly only droping a couple PSI when it trips. It doesn't do it all the time but cold mornings and getting on it shortly after start up it does it a decent amount.

Should I just keep boosting and try to blow it all out or is there something I can do to get the moisture out of there? Should I worry about it freezing this winter? I dont really want to take off the intercooler because I live in an apartment now and would have to take it apart in the parking lot. not to mention getting the up pipe on was a bitch because it doesnt fit 100% perfect.

 

block off part of your intercooler with duct tape to reduce surface area of the intercooler

 

What will this accomplish?

 

it will prevent the major slug of liquid from forming

 

on the ecoboost F150 Twin turbos the factory was applying tape to reduce the effic of the IC because of this prob.

when it is humid air, that is nice and cool, then suddenly heated up by boost it condenses out into a slug of water. you are just limiting the amount of temperature rise

 

So basically stop the Intercooler from doing what it does and the air wont condensate because the hot air from the turbo passing over the cooling fins creates condensation.

So the condensation will just stay in my intercooler forever or will the hot air not cooling move it through the system? If i block off the intercooler for some time will it come back basically.

 

no you are only blocking at most 20% of effective area... also zzp has a pretty restrictive intercooler so that isnt helping the issue either

 

So if I block off part of the intercooler with duct tape will it make the problem go away over time? Or will I have to leave the duct tape on forever?

 

Do what JapEatr said for a while, sounds like you have a significant amount of condensate. Or you could drop the intercooler and clean it out. What intercooler are you running?

 

ZZPs intercooler. I could drop it and sit it in front of a de-humidifier in my apartment but that's a lot of work in one weekend in a parking lot.

 

Get some starter fluid/brake cleaner/electrical connector cleaner. Remove and tip intercooler on end, blast the alcohol based cleaner in the top end let it drain out/displace the water. Give it a bit to dry out then re-install.

 

I may have some electronics cleaner laying around... Maybe I will try spraying some in each end of the intercooler and up pipe and let it dry over the weekend see how it works.

 

block the upper portion btw

 

If the temp is above 40F it should take a max of an hour for the alcohol based cleaners to evaporate

 

Thanks, noted. I was wondering what part to block.

If I use electronics cleaner, does that stuff take the moisture out of things and make it evaporate quicker? Or is it just an alcohol based cleaner?

 

the condensation sill flash off one the alchol hits it

 

Is the alcohol hitting you JapEatr?

 

started a hair early on a friday haha

 

What did you mean then? I couldn't make out what you were saying haha.

 

the condensation will flash off when hit with a displacing agent like alcohol or ethanol

spraying and let it air a few mins, then put together and go

 

Sounds good I will attempt this tomorrow and check back with results.

 

Results?

 

Shoot I haven't gotten around to doing this yet, My charge piping especially from the intercooler to the intake manny don't fit right so getting them back in the couplers is a nightmare.

Was planning on pulling the maf out and spraying down in then trying to fit the spray hose inbetween the up pipe and the loose coupler next to the intercooler and spraying it in blindly then letting it dry for a while.