tenspeed

Here's what I did for the majority of the Labor Day weekend. I read about rock damage to intercoolers and the cost to replace them. I've seen the plastic guard that Audi places directly on the intercooler face and figured that I could come up with something that would work better for less cost.

My initial plan was to stack a couple of billet grills and have some metal grill material attached to the back. I bought two Ford F150 lower grills and some honeycomb metal from CustomCarGrills.com. That grill mesh has a 77% open area. Here's a shot of the materials.




When I got into working on it in earnest, I removed the air intake snoid because I was constantly bumping into it. A pair of screws and it's out of the way.



Here's a shot of a spare grill (S7 black optics) that I used to form the mesh to fit over the lower two rows. I got it cheap because some of the lower stanchions are cracked so I put the blue tape on it to hold it steady while I was using it.



This is a shot of the mesh in place. I put sheets of paper inside so I could see the holes when attaching the wire that holds it in place.



Hand formed wires attach the grill to the stanchions.



Shot of the inside.



Bottom section under construction. Cardboard taped to the ends to determine the size needed. Blue tape in the center to line it up when in place.



Bottom left is the billet grill. Top left is the mesh over the OEM grill. The intercooler is on the right. Wires were pushed through from the front and folded over.



Finished product.



I noticed that my car had a bunch of junk between the air conditioner condenser and the radiator. Mostly bugs and cottonwood fibers.



I cleaned it out the best I could and applied some tape over the gap at the top.

chenthu

you took the front bumpers off to do this?

I just bought the license plate delete and have no idea how to put it in - when I do a search online it says there are only two clips and I cant find where (or I am scared!!)

tenspeed

No, the bumper stays in place. I removed the cover and the air intake at the top.

On the plate delete, there are five tabs at the top. Those come out last and go in first. The four larger tabs on the bottom are released first, the plate delete swings out and you pull down to free the top five tabs. Install in reverse order.

IknowHuhA6

Very nice!! I hadn't seen this post before. I know what my next mod is now!
Thank you Tenspeed!!

tenspeed

You're welcome!

****** and improve. I usually make guards out of hardware cloth to keep the big bugs and small birds out of the grillage area. Stepped up my game for this project.

Here's another shot taken when the exhaust was installed.