Cold air intakes: useless?

[TBravery]

View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCi2yo4UqPI


Regarding cold air intakes, has anyone actually taken a dyno test? I'm not sure if they tuned the ecu in the video.

 

[XdemonicfleasX]

Wouldn't buy into those vids

 

[Dar-Dar]

I like their videos because they are funny. I watched almost all of their vids, but I don't take those guys that seriously.

Cold air intakes will show similar or the same power on paper as the SRIs. But what can really affect a car power is temperature or air temperature. During regular driving, the engine bay will get hot, meaning that the air temperature will also get relatively hot. With the SRI's case, it will take in the hot air coming from the engine bay. This will result to loss of engine efficiency and power. Cold air intakes are routed differently and take in cooler air far from the engine.

An engine's efficiency truly depends on the air's property. A cooler air has a higher density than warm air. Higher air density will provide a better combustion. Better combustion = better efficiency = more power. Also, in terms of air density: Cold air>warm air>humid air/vapored air. I don't really want to jump into the scientific explanation to it. Lol.

The SRI's show a pretty high gain of power during a dyno because the hood is always open and there are fans blowing air towards it. In reality, it will not be the same. Especially during real time driving.

 

[Dragos]

This can be measured with a similar approach to theirs. Dyno the car the same way before and after. No ECU changes or anything else in between. That should shed some light on the results. Overall I think their method of power increase measurements was pretty decent.

For carburetors cai can make an impact for ECU cars you can get improvements but I do not think from cai only. ECU tunes will deliver more I think.

This is not an argument for not getting a better cai, just that power wise not the biggest impact.

 

[Dragos]

From what I read on wikipedia about mass flow sensors ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_flow_sensor ) the ECU will actually always correlate the air temp and quantity and adjust the ammount of gas injected. So in my understanding cai will make an engine run smoother and more efficient maybe, but power wise the ECU will always make it aim for the stock numbers, with possible small variances.

Doing a ECU tune and a cai diff story

 

[Dar-Dar]

I love their channel. You should see how they customized an EG hatch.

 

[Dragos]

I love their channel. You should see how they customized an EG hatch.

Never watched it until today but i find it to be a pretty good show. It is not for the purist crowd maybe but it can be good fun

 

[Dar-Dar]

It's good stuff. They are clowns (mostly Moog) but they are good to watch. Lol.

 

[S2KJAY]

I agree with the video. It's a pipe with a filter on the end. I know for sure no real horsepower comes from a dumb intake. Stock airbox with maybe a k&n will work better Imo. Needless to say my c.a.i is for sale lol.

 

[Bulkybear]

From what I've read and seen without a tune boltons (including intakes) are useless, but with a tune they do add power. Even short ram intakes while they don't cool the air anymore efficiently as the stock airbox will, they flow more air as they are less restrictive. This also has to do with the type of filter most are used with. I read a study that showed the stock filter having the no impact on power while filtering out almost all contaminants. Aftermarket intakes (including k&n) sometimes increased power but let a lot more contaminants through.

 

[coffeeholic]

i have a 9th gen civic si and have seen the 8th gen intakes they have intakes for my car but the 2011 intakes cost less would a 2011 intake work for a 2012

 

[boejoula]

i have a 9th gen civic si and have seen the 8th gen intakes they have intakes for my car but the 2011 intakes cost less would a 2011 intake work for a 2012

From what I read, no. But I hear skunk 2 is coming out with one. If its like the 8 th gen intake, I will be getting it and selling my k&n typhoon.

 

[Dar-Dar]

I agree with the video. It's a pipe with a filter on the end. I know for sure no real horsepower comes from a dumb intake. Stock airbox with maybe a k&n will work better Imo. Needless to say my c.a.i is for sale lol.

Lol. You need an intake to get hp. An engine requires an inlet and an outlet. You can easily change a car's hp by putting different variety of intake or piping/tubing. Different intakes can change the volumetric flow rate going into the engine, depending on the piping's length and diameter (there are much more factors involved, but length and diameter are one of the common ones). This goes for both short ram intakes and cold air intakes. Volumetric flow is defined as Q = v*A, where v is velocity of the air and A is the cross sectional area where the air is passing through. The velocity of the air is dependent to the speed (rpm) of the engine. Once the A is changed (bigger or smaller diameter), Q will change. Volumetric flow is pretty much related to Mass flow rate (or mass air flow). A combustion engine's efficiency or power is dependent to the mass air flow/mass flow rate, either if it's an inlet (intake) or outlet (exhaustion).

You also cannot always say that the bigger piping, the more hp. There's always a limit for what size the piping's diameter has to be for certain engines. Otherwise, there will be a disturbance within the piping that will cause an unsteady flow and efficiency loss. Mechanics of Fluids, Bernoulli's Principle.

And yeah, tuning the car does a great deal of increasing hp. Fuel management is a must. Lol.

 

[HeelsandEers]

I agree with the video. It's a pipe with a filter on the end. I know for sure no real horsepower comes from a dumb intake. Stock airbox with maybe a k&n will work better Imo. Needless to say my c.a.i is for sale lol.

A stock airbox will be better than a poorly designed, untuned cold air intake perhaps. Any off the shelf cai with a proper tune will net gains over stock however.

Is it anything noticeable on a mostly stock vehicle? No, not really.

 

[coffeeholic]

From what I read, no. But I hear skunk 2 is coming out with one. If its like the 8 th gen intake, I will be getting it and selling my k&n typhoon.

thanks i dont get why the 2011 civic si intakes are cheaper than 2012 i mean it a pipe with a filter whats the tech in that

 

[zulu]

thanks i dont get why the 2011 civic si intakes are cheaper than 2012 i mean it a pipe with a filter whats the tech in that

Because you're paying for the R&D too. Back in 2006, a CAI for an 06 Si was north of $300 too. The prices slowly drop over the years.

 

[zulu]

The best part about the video is that they DYNO with the hood closed. There is NO airflow under the hood, no matter what size fan you put in front of it. Since the factory box is sealed against the hot air, the dyno's look terrible for any open element filter because its sucking in SCORCHING temperatures. Nobody dynos with closed hoods. The under-hood temps arent realistic. The latter part of the video is just hocum. You're telling me that a filter cramed on a 30 foot tube doesn't make power? Who knew. If CAI's dont make power, how did I shave .3 off my 1/4 mile and 2 mph faster through the trap in my RSX-S. It's not the driver because I suck at driving.

 

[spdandpwr]

Not sure what's this hearsay about CAIs not making power. Does anyone not remember the gains seen by the Import DPS intake on the 8th gen? You need to dyno-tune your parts to make power. More air needs more fuel in order to make more power...and ecu won't correct for that from dyno to dyno runs.

 

[Dar-Dar]

I have the Rick Spec'd CAI and it makes a huge difference compared to my old Injen CAI.

 

[spdandpwr]

Exactly!