Glossary of car terms

Of intercoolers and radiators

what is the difference?

A radiator appears in all cars as a means to cool the engine down. As you probably are aware, if fuel and oxygen are burned together they'd heat up the surrounding area pretty quickly. It isnt very good for the metal in the engine to just melt away so we need a coolant. The engine is surrounded by a "jacket" filled with water. This water is circulated by the radiator
in a sequence like this

radiator--> cool water-->jacket-->cools engine--> water heats up-->hot water--> radiator--and so on


Intercooler

A turbocharged or supercharged car uses the chargers ability to grab LOTS AND LOTS of air from the atmosphere and chuck it into the engine.
I would like to stress that when you grab all this air, and COMPRESS it, the air heats up which isnt very good coz hot air expands, and so if it expands, it will escape. Totally defeating the purpose of the charger.

Therefore you need an intercooler, a device usually placed where air can come in at full speed,
(hint: front of the car, or at the bonnet, sometimes you see a big whole on the bonnet)
the air flows ontop of the intercooler, and cools down the air INSIDE the charger.