Video: A View From Inside The Intake Manifold At Wide Open Throttle

Video: A View From Inside The Intake Manifold At Wide Open Throttle

We, as humans, are curious beings. We like to see what can’t easily be seen. To that end, we have brought you a number of videos from Warped Perception before, from a see-through otto four-cycle engine, to a see-through Wankel rotary, and even a see-through turbocharged Briggs and Stratton on nitromethane. However, this time, Matt Mikka isn’t building a “see-through” anything, but rather taking us inside.

There’s no denying that the Mark IV Toyota Supra is largely responsible for the cult-status of the Toyota 2JZ engine. So it seems rather odd that Mikka would use his personal turbo Supra engine to run an experiment on, but we’re thankful he did. While it appears Mikka just popped off the throttle body and shoved a GoPro camera into the manifold, he actually spent several days building a fixture for it, which, unfortunately, he keeps under wraps.

In the video, you can see the throttle blade, velocity stacks, intake runner and ports, and the fuel injector spray, and how they vary as Mikka gets on and off the throttle. One cool aspect of the video is that he actually takes the car out on the street, so it builds boost under load – peaking at 25 psi.

On the left, you can see the visible portions of the intake port through the velocity stack. On the right, the flash condensation that forms for a brief instant inside the intake manifold, caused by slamming the throttle shut at 25 psi, and the plenum suddenly sees full engine vacuum.

One of the cool, unexpected byproducts of building boost on the street is what happens when the pressure of the manifold swings from high positive pressure from the big turbocharger at WOT to a high vacuum as the throttle slams shut. That rapidly created pressure differential, much like what is seen on an aircraft’s wings and/or wingtips at times, creates flash condensation.

Another interesting occurrence was that the post-intercooler IATs were hot enough to overheat the GoPro (a situation most of us will never find ourselves in, but an interesting bit of data nonetheless), as well as identifying a previously unknown oil leak somewhere in the intake tract. Once again, Warped Perception has given us a unique view into something which has previously only been visible as a computer model.

About the author

Greg Acosta

Greg has spent nineteen years and counting in automotive publishing, with most of his work having a very technical focus. Always interested in how things work, he enjoys sharing his passion for automotive technology with the reader.
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