Forums Forums Enthusiast Forums A - Z Autowirral In line cooler on the fuel return?

When I went to the Lancer rolling road day the other week, a few of the cars ran a fuel cell in the boot of the car rather than the OEM tank.

After a few runs on the dyno, the fuel cells in the boot where getting quite warm - to the point where you couldnt touch it for more than a few seconds.

The reason being that the fuel circulates the car. Its pumped up from the tank to the engine, and what the motor doesnt need, is sent back down the fuel return line to the tank - each time getting warmer and warmer.....

What I was thinking was fit a small oil cooler, or similar in the return line to cool the fuel on its way back to the tank.

Theres a lot of talk about cold air feeds for induction kits, but what about cooling the fuel too - surely this has to be a decent idea to help all air and fuel going in to the engine to be cooler.

I recon something could be made up - litterally, for a few quid........

seems like the logic works! but surely if it was sumthin simple and was effective someone would have developed sumthin? Won't the fuel flow faster if its warmer though? (as you can tell i dont know that much bout engines but am tryna understand!lol )

There have been systems made to cool fuel, Crytec or something I think they are where called. They use a cold gas to cool the fuel rail to get cooler fuel in to the engine. Its quite expensive though

A cooler in the line wouldnt do the job as well, but it would cost a fraction of the price!

The viscosity of fuel doesnt really change with temperature as it has a very low freezing point, and it evaporates at very low temperatures. Petrol in Liquid form doesnt burn either, its the petrol vapour that burns

well thats my new thing for today learnt!! you should give your idea a go. if it wasnt makin a difference you can always take it out! would be a quality sense of achivement if you got that to work!

The fuel is turned into vapour anyway. The only time fuel is altered is the ignition point, it doesn't freeze, so will be unaffected in the engine.

Are you just talking about the warmth from the cell at the back? You could use a water jacket?