sjl01

O.K. guys did a bit of a mod today with my CAI and thought some one somewhere might want to do it.

Oh yeh 1st atempt at a DIY post, so go easy on me.

The aim was to get cold air to my CAI.

I brought some aluminium tube to do this.
I used a cordless drill
A posi screwdriver
A junior hacksaw blade
A pair of small cutters
A 5mm drill bit
And a partridge in a pair tree.
first disconnect your battery,

then jack your car up (safley) you need to remove the passenger side wheel (my car's right hand drive)

Then the plastic undershield from under the bumper, there are a few plastic screws holding this, remove them(i could'nt get all of mine out as the heads were chewed up), i was able to remove some allowing me to bend the shield out of the way, it is quite flexible.


Now from the pic below you can see the tube i used going through the side wall and into the engine bay, this is more or less where my filter is, if your filter is higher up in the engine bay you just need to extend the air feed pipe.
Simply mark where you need the pipe to go through, then take your drill with 5mm drill bit and drill a series of holes close together in a circle , then use your hacksaw blade to cut out the plastic bits left between the holes you drilled, this is quicker than trying to cut the whole thing out without drilling.

I fed the pipe through as you can see, up to the filter, then useing my cutters i cut down the side of the pipe( about 7-8 inches) and opened it out, this fitted around about 3quaters of the filter( i'm looking for somthing to use that will fit right around the filter but this works for now)

Above the hole where the pipe goes drill two holes about 1inch apart from each other, i then used some very thin steel wire, put this through the two holes into the engine bay and around the pipe holding it in place(i will be making a bracket to replace this) but the wire does hold it securely.
Now you need to feed the other end of the pipe towards the front of your bumper

Now on my tib i removed the fogs so i could put mesh in, if you still have the fogs in you can still do this mod by, removing your fogs and meshing or direct the feed towards the large oppening in the bumper, mine goes to where the fog light was, because i have mesh there it was easy to fix the pipe behind it simply shape the pipe at the end so part of it fits around the lip where the fogs went.

and secure it in place to the bumper with your prefered adhesive.
In the pic below it looks like this from the outside, you can't realy see it at a glance as it's not that noticable.

I know i might get ripped about this, but some other noobs may find it a cheap way to feed cold air to there filter , unless they have an AEM CAI.
When your'e done put the shield back in place, pop your wheel back on and connect the battery back up by the time you've done all of this your ECU will be reset and ready for you to drive hard so it can adjust to the new amount of cold air going into the AI.
I noticed a good difference when i put my new CAI in, now i've done this and took it for a spin it feels even better, i think it works.
please feel free to give input in case i've missed somthing.

Rd1tib

i like ur thinking, im about to do the same with mine but im gonna have a cone sticking out of my grill so the air would be rammed into the filter area.

sjl01

One of my mates used some sort of cone on his subaru but he had trouble with it, because it was to close to the front he was sucking water into it when it rained.
I know everyone has thier way of doing things, but i thought about his car when i did this and thats why the pipe is set back, hopfully this way i won't have the same problem.

brian01tib

This is better than the resonater mod, but a CAI is better. I ran my car like that for a few months before my AEM came and the real CAI is loads better.

kb5133

Do you have a pic of where your new ducting meets the filter in the engine bay? You might want to fabricate a collector where the the duct starts at the mesh screen. If air is not being forced into the duct then the filter is just pulling in the ambient air around it which is probably just as hot inside your duct as it is outside. Those dryer ducts are made out of aluminum and conduct heat very well. Which is not the effect you are looking for. If you can force more air into the duct you could probably keep it cooler or maybe you want to try a different material for the duct. A lot of folks fabricate CAI from pvc... At home depot you can pick up the flexible plastic plumbing pipes (4"+ diameter) and they also sell these collector boxes that hook right up to them (large square open end on one side and a matching connector on the other side for the pipe). You could mount the open end of the collector in front of your mesh screen. That would collect and probably push a lot more air to your filter.

I've actually been looking into doing something similar to this to blow cooler air directly onto the intake manifold. I already have the AEM CAI. But I wanted to see what impact, if any, doing this would have on the air inside the manifold. That sucker gets super hot and it would be easier and cheaper than doing the spacers. Whether or not it would make a difference temp or performance wise????) I have all the air and surface temp probes to check this. i just gotta get off my ass and do it.

brian01tib

I doubt that you can make a better CAI with PVC pipe than AEM has. You can just heat wrap the AEM which is easier and cheaper.

kb5133

You can't make one better than the AEM, but that's not what I'm talking about. I don't want to make the air going in cooler. I want to make the air in the manifold cooler by lowering the temperature of the manifold so that it doesn't heat up the air coming in as much. I know the that the spacers do a great job of doing this, but I'd like to see if the same thing could be achieved without having to take the manifold off.

sjl01

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (brian01tib @ Sep 16 2006, 09:46 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>This is better than the resonater mod, but a CAI is better. I ran my car like that for a few months before my AEM came and the real CAI is loads better.</div>


This is being used with a CAI, my filter is vertualy right where the pipe goes through the wall, Could'nt afford AEM but got an AOS CAI for cheap and it works a treat.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (kb5133 @ Sep 17 2006, 01:57 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Do you have a pic of where your new ducting meets the filter in the engine bay? You might want to fabricate a collector where the the duct starts at the mesh screen. If air is not being forced into the duct then the filter is just pulling in the ambient air around it which is probably just as hot inside your duct as it is outside. Those dryer ducts are made out of aluminum and conduct heat very well. Which is not the effect you are looking for. If you can force more air into the duct you could probably keep it cooler or maybe you want to try a different material for the duct. A lot of folks fabricate CAI from pvc... At home depot you can pick up the flexible plastic plumbing pipes (4"+ diameter) and they also sell these collector boxes that hook right up to them (large square open end on one side and a matching connector on the other side for the pipe). You could mount the open end of the collector in front of your mesh screen. That would collect and probably push a lot more air to your filter.

I've actually been looking into doing something similar to this to blow cooler air directly onto the intake manifold. I already have the AEM CAI. But I wanted to see what impact, if any, doing this would have on the air inside the manifold. That sucker gets super hot and it would be easier and cheaper than doing the spacers. Whether or not it would make a difference temp or performance wise????) I have all the air and surface temp probes to check this. i just gotta get off my ass and do it.</div>


There is a pic of where it meets the filter, but its from below(4th pic from the top) you can't realy see much at all from the top as the filter is down under the battery tray. As for some sorta collector at the front , good idea , will look into it and i've also looked at the spacers option, i take it you're talking about raising the hood?

kb5133

Pics no worky for me.

By spacer, I meant the phenolic spacer for the intake manifold and throttle body. Not the hood spacers.

SOCKS_old

can u rehost these links man.. so i can see what your talking about.. i had a really good idea for cold air and want to see if you did the same.. but yah, u cant get much better then AEM CAI.. only thing better is to run some ducting so the air can ONLY go into the AEM and not around it, by it, or w/e