7.3 E350 intercooler project completed

[BW3340]

Hey everyone, I’ve lurked on this forum off and on for about a year but only recently did something that I think is worth posting.

I’ve been planning on intercooling my 7.3 van after a trip to Yellowstone in September, the grades headed through the Rockies kept my EGT’s right around 1250, coupled with the fact that I’d been looking at tuning for a bit to get better throttle response and more top end I knew that something had to change, so I started gathering parts. I started installing them mid October, I had my first real test run today and I have to admit I’m pretty impressed, I achieved about a 250-350 degree reduction in EGT’s (I’m not sure how much ambient air temperature is playing into this because it was about 50 degrees cooler then my last real hard pull)

Initially I had planned to do a full write up on this but I had a fixed time slot in my buddies shop to do the tig welding and bead rolling for the pipes so taking pictures and making things look nice went out the window. It’s not 100% done I still have some dressing up to do on wires and hoses, and I ran out of room for the intake so I mailed that part in but I wanted to post this asap in case anyone else was thinking about doing this and wanted to ask questions while everything is still fresh.

Parts used
-08+ front end
-6.0 F250 intercooler (I’m pretty sure it was out of a 05)
-2001 F350 spyder pipe
-3x 2001 F350 humped upper intake boots from riffraff (driver side intercooler to pipe needed to be shorter then the factory boot so that’s how we did it.)
-factory boot for p/s
-misc hoses for rerouting
-I plan on making custom AC lines to free up room for a cold air intake where the battery used to be under the hood but that’s a future project


Test fit of the IC after hole sawing into the core support, I marked the upper mounting bolts as high as possible then measured down to find hole center, had to clearance with a plug stone for a few hours, to keep the tubes from rubbing


under hood shot, ran out of real estate for the air cleaner setup I wanted, long term plan is to re route AC lines and put a cold air intake (i think off a 6.0PSD) where the under hood battery used to be.


Hot side pipe overview, it looks like a lot of things are touching but there's actually clearance on all sides, although its slim, will need to keep on eye on this to see if things start to rub


Hot side pipe into IC, should have taken a photo from the other side too but its pretty tight to the ABS valve in its new location so you would struggle to get by without moving that (which was probably the hardest thing to relocate)


Hot side snaked under the relocated p/s res


Hot side into Spyder, you can see the intake here to, we shot a 90 of the turbo and snaked it around the Spyder boot, had to oval the pipe a bit to get it to fit under the body.


Best pic of the Spyder I could get, I don't think we had it seated 100% where we wanted it when we were fitting the pipes for welding because the cold side is running in there at an angle, that wasn't happening before but the boots from Riffraff have a bead in them and we bead rolled the pipe so its sealing well so far.


Cold side headed over the trans dip stick


Cold side headed into the IC, if I was going to do this again I would have ran new AC lines from the get go near the drip rail at the cowl, it looked like we had a lot more room to work with on that side then we ended up with. I'm tired of working on this thing for a bit and everything functions so I'll just live with it for a few months.

Scope of work
-move ABS valve to rear of van approx 1.5”
-relocate battery to frame
-shorten upper radiator hose roughly 4 “
-shorten degas hose at degas bottle roughly 1”
-bend trans dipstick tube roughly 2” to fit under cold side ic tube to spyder
-install 08 front clip
-build custom lower IC bracket
-cut 2x 3.5” holes in core support to fit intercooler
-relocate power steering cooler
-install lower alternator bracket off ambulance and relocate alternator
-clearance factory upper alternator bracket for ic tube fitment (factory belt was used)
-relocate power steering res to drip rail
-clock ccv 180 out
-bend AC lines as needed (will be replaced in the future with custom lines
-shorten steel oil fill tube and replace rubber section with bulk hose to clear hot side IC tube

This was truthfully a fairly difficult modification but the results are there for it, especially if you are like me and use your van for a lot of mountain travel.

Feel free to ask any questions! I hope to get the pictures working tomorrow.

[simplesez]

Tough project. You've got my interest!

[REF]

Nice, I recall someone else had done this a few years back too, big project. For tuners, take a look at Power hungry performance Hydra Tuners. I’d stay away from DP

https://gopowerhungry.com

[BW3340]

Originally Posted by REF

Nice, I recall someone else had done this a few years back too, big project. For tuners, take a look at Power hungry performance Hydra Tuners. I’d stay away from DP

https://gopowerhungry.com

So far everyone I've talked to has recommended PHP Hydra as well but they're all 7.3 pick up guys, I'm assuming you're running their tunes on your van? how do the library tunes translate to Econoline 7.3's? have you had to get any fine tuning/revisions done? that so far has been my only concern. I reached out to 1023 diesel to see if they would want to work on this project with me but I haven't heard back from them yet.

[b. rock]

Any reason you used the F series 6.0 intercooler instead of just the E series?

[BW3340]

Originally Posted by b. rock

Any reason you used the F series 6.0 intercooler instead of just the E series?

I started with the E series intercooler but the driver side tube off the cooler shoots in at about a 30 degree angle. On mock up I didn't think that I would have room to clear the radiator. in hindsight I think I could have made it work but the mounting was easier with the pickup i/c and it has better aftermarket support.

[REF]

Yes, I went with the stock tunes for the van, runs great. John Wood recommended and provided the tuner as a replacement for the P.O.S. DP Tuner I had in there when I had his transmission built and installed, I had also talked to PHP about running it in the van, they told me it would be fine. I went with their 65hp daily, 40hp tow and a high idle.

[1der]

The Hydra REF and I are running are specific to the van based 7.3. The tune library is specific to the ECM code on our van.

I am very happy w the Hydra. It is not as much "power" as the the DP but I also do not have black smoke, high EGTs and a weird tranny surge around 45 mph.

[dokaman]

I also have been very happy with my Hydra tuner on my 01 7.3l

[Lilnuts2]

BW3340 thanks for sharing. This is on my list.
Where abouts are you located?