Newbie Info, Everything you ever wanted to know about intakes
Rice-Rocketeer
12-15-2001, 08:43 PM
First off let me start by comparing intakes by different companies. There is a statement which is ALL INTAKES ARE THE SAME. In reality, it's a blanket statement. Technically yeah, all intakes are the same. ICEMAN won't give you any more power than AEM. The differences between them are negligable to the point where a dyno would have a hard time figuring the difference. Whether it be thermoplastic, or the long proven AEM design, the difference is minute. There are however two different things that would allow one intake system to make more power than another. One is air-filter flow rate and intake air temperature. These are the main differences from the stock system.
Second we need to compare the two style of intakes. Short ram and Cold air. The short ram is the style where the filter element is sitting in your engine bay. This is less desirable as this means that the filter will be sucking in air that has passed your 180 degree radiator, and bounced off several hot engine components before entering your engine. Then there is the Cold air system, usually shortened to CAI which stands for Cold Air Induction. This differs from the short ram in the fact that the tube is longer therefore allowing the filter element to be placed outside your engine bay where it can draw in colder ambient air. The down side here is the fact that it could suck up water from puddles as well. We'll talk more about this later on.
Now we compare different filters. The type of material most stock filters are made out of is paper. The problem with paper is the natural design of paper allows only a small portion of air thru. The upside is it's cheap to manufactuer and filters air very cleanly. Then there are cotton filters. K&N's cone-style cotton oil soaked filter is what lets your intake system to be so effecient. The amount of air it can filter and allow passage into your engine is MUCH higher than stock. This is due partly to the higher filter surface area and its well design. The oil in the cotton fibres is used to catch the smaller particles. In fact it's so effecient, that as it gets dirty it actually flows MORE (To a point of course) Other cotton filters are very good as well but K&N seems to have it down pat. In fact if you were to replace your stock filter with a K&N and remove the resonator and intake head, you'd get almost as much power as you could get from a $200 equivalent. Then we have foam. The upside to a foam filter is the HUGE amount of flow rate thanx to largly spaced area between the foam fibre's which allow for technically more power to be made. The downside is the fact it's filtering capacity is not exactly the best, letting in small particles into your engine.
And the second part is the intake charge temperature. For an engine to make the MOST amount of power, the difference between how cold the intake air is compared to how hot the exhuast temperature has to the greatest possible. So it stands to reason that having lower intake temps is really good. It's estimated that for every 10 degrees farenheit of cooler intake temps, there is a 1% horsepower increase. And there could be as much as 30-50 degree difference in temps from the air in your engine compared to the ambient air. That's why having a CAI is considered better, it collects air from the cooler surroundings. They do have several devices called heat shields that you can place over the filter element in your short ram system. The point here is to block the warmer air while the filter sucks in the cooler air. But this still doesn't compare, power-wise to the CAI system.
Now as for the major drawback to the CAI system that everyone has heard about, it can suck up water into your engine, causing a bad condition known as Hydrolock. The thing that most ppl don't know is the fact that there are two scenarios possible when you hydrolock. There's a bad one and a terminal one.
The Bad One: You drive over a puddle and the water splashes your air filter enough to the point where several teaspoons of water worth could be sucked into your engine. What happens here is the water is sucked into your cylinder, the compression stroke comes around and the lack of compressibility of the water disturbed your 4 stroke cycle. Not enough to do major damage but it will shut it down. The lack comustibility of the water creates a dead cylinder(s) and your engine panics. But it's too late because some of the water will be burned off coming out as think clouds of steam from your exhuast and the rest of the water kills the engine. Basically what you can do in this situation is remove the spark plug wires, and plugs. Turn the engine over various times so it throws up some of the water, spray some WD40 in the cylinders, replace the plugs and wires and try starting her up again. This situation shouldn't cause major damage but it will scare the hell out of you. It's happened to me, nothing major.
The Terminal Case: You drive over a few puddles deep enough so the filter element sucks up enough water to completely fill ATLEAST one cylinder. It's sucked in and as the piston comes up for the compression stroke, it slams into a wall of uncompressible water. The interia of the crash, bends the connecting rod most of the times to the point where it snaps in half and on the next revolution, the crankshaft forces the broken rod out the side of your engine block. The engine is now permanently dead. I've seen some cases where the rod doesn't completely break, it just bends. It looks real cool but at any rate, the engine still needs to be taken apart and repaired. Major $$$.
Because of these possibilities (And because of florida rainy seasons) yours truly, has decided to stick with a short ram. AEM did however recently come up with a "solution" thew problem of hydrolock. It's called the by-pass valve. Basically what it is, is you cut your intake in half and place the valve between the two halves. It contains a foam filter on it and some rubber valves. The point is when water is sucked in, it creates a pressure drop in the intake system. When this happens, the valves on this thing are forced open and air is in effect "by-passed" the normal filter and suck it up this new filter that's away from the water. When the water flows back down and the pressure returns to normal, the valves close and the system works like normal again. The downside to the by-pass valve is the turbulence it causes by interrupting the smooth air flow. In effect it takes away from the HP gained from the cold air, and makes having a CAI system about as powerful or less than a short ram.
Wanna get creative? hen ppl do creative and stupid things to increase power via the intake system they generally try to increase the power makers, air filter flow rate and air temperature. The most popular way of doing this is by creating what is called a "Ram-Air" system. Made popular by domestic for decades, what you do is place the filter element in the path of the oncoming air that rushes past the car. In general it's much colder than the ambient air AND it forces more air into the filter. On civics I've seen several creative ways of doing this. An easy way of doing this is by either cutting a hole in the bumper and letting the incoming air reach the CAI system. Or run dryer hose from the hole in the bumper to the filter on the short ram. In drag racing events, the headlight that's in front of the filter on a short ram is removed so the air can reach the filter. For street purposes they make special hoods that have an opening that lets fresh air in to either the cone filter or a stock filter box with a K&N and an opening towards the hood. As for other creations, I've also seen a stock system converted into a CAI by dropping in a K&N, removing the resonator and intake head and cut the actual resonator off so you're left with a J shaped tube that draws air from the bumper just like a CAI.
If you want to get the best out of your intake system, consider the following website http://www.teamdelsol.com/howto/coldair/diycoldair.htm
And use any of the above mentioned methods depending on your budget and style and have fun :)
Second we need to compare the two style of intakes. Short ram and Cold air. The short ram is the style where the filter element is sitting in your engine bay. This is less desirable as this means that the filter will be sucking in air that has passed your 180 degree radiator, and bounced off several hot engine components before entering your engine. Then there is the Cold air system, usually shortened to CAI which stands for Cold Air Induction. This differs from the short ram in the fact that the tube is longer therefore allowing the filter element to be placed outside your engine bay where it can draw in colder ambient air. The down side here is the fact that it could suck up water from puddles as well. We'll talk more about this later on.
Now we compare different filters. The type of material most stock filters are made out of is paper. The problem with paper is the natural design of paper allows only a small portion of air thru. The upside is it's cheap to manufactuer and filters air very cleanly. Then there are cotton filters. K&N's cone-style cotton oil soaked filter is what lets your intake system to be so effecient. The amount of air it can filter and allow passage into your engine is MUCH higher than stock. This is due partly to the higher filter surface area and its well design. The oil in the cotton fibres is used to catch the smaller particles. In fact it's so effecient, that as it gets dirty it actually flows MORE (To a point of course) Other cotton filters are very good as well but K&N seems to have it down pat. In fact if you were to replace your stock filter with a K&N and remove the resonator and intake head, you'd get almost as much power as you could get from a $200 equivalent. Then we have foam. The upside to a foam filter is the HUGE amount of flow rate thanx to largly spaced area between the foam fibre's which allow for technically more power to be made. The downside is the fact it's filtering capacity is not exactly the best, letting in small particles into your engine.
And the second part is the intake charge temperature. For an engine to make the MOST amount of power, the difference between how cold the intake air is compared to how hot the exhuast temperature has to the greatest possible. So it stands to reason that having lower intake temps is really good. It's estimated that for every 10 degrees farenheit of cooler intake temps, there is a 1% horsepower increase. And there could be as much as 30-50 degree difference in temps from the air in your engine compared to the ambient air. That's why having a CAI is considered better, it collects air from the cooler surroundings. They do have several devices called heat shields that you can place over the filter element in your short ram system. The point here is to block the warmer air while the filter sucks in the cooler air. But this still doesn't compare, power-wise to the CAI system.
Now as for the major drawback to the CAI system that everyone has heard about, it can suck up water into your engine, causing a bad condition known as Hydrolock. The thing that most ppl don't know is the fact that there are two scenarios possible when you hydrolock. There's a bad one and a terminal one.
The Bad One: You drive over a puddle and the water splashes your air filter enough to the point where several teaspoons of water worth could be sucked into your engine. What happens here is the water is sucked into your cylinder, the compression stroke comes around and the lack of compressibility of the water disturbed your 4 stroke cycle. Not enough to do major damage but it will shut it down. The lack comustibility of the water creates a dead cylinder(s) and your engine panics. But it's too late because some of the water will be burned off coming out as think clouds of steam from your exhuast and the rest of the water kills the engine. Basically what you can do in this situation is remove the spark plug wires, and plugs. Turn the engine over various times so it throws up some of the water, spray some WD40 in the cylinders, replace the plugs and wires and try starting her up again. This situation shouldn't cause major damage but it will scare the hell out of you. It's happened to me, nothing major.
The Terminal Case: You drive over a few puddles deep enough so the filter element sucks up enough water to completely fill ATLEAST one cylinder. It's sucked in and as the piston comes up for the compression stroke, it slams into a wall of uncompressible water. The interia of the crash, bends the connecting rod most of the times to the point where it snaps in half and on the next revolution, the crankshaft forces the broken rod out the side of your engine block. The engine is now permanently dead. I've seen some cases where the rod doesn't completely break, it just bends. It looks real cool but at any rate, the engine still needs to be taken apart and repaired. Major $$$.
Because of these possibilities (And because of florida rainy seasons) yours truly, has decided to stick with a short ram. AEM did however recently come up with a "solution" thew problem of hydrolock. It's called the by-pass valve. Basically what it is, is you cut your intake in half and place the valve between the two halves. It contains a foam filter on it and some rubber valves. The point is when water is sucked in, it creates a pressure drop in the intake system. When this happens, the valves on this thing are forced open and air is in effect "by-passed" the normal filter and suck it up this new filter that's away from the water. When the water flows back down and the pressure returns to normal, the valves close and the system works like normal again. The downside to the by-pass valve is the turbulence it causes by interrupting the smooth air flow. In effect it takes away from the HP gained from the cold air, and makes having a CAI system about as powerful or less than a short ram.
Wanna get creative? hen ppl do creative and stupid things to increase power via the intake system they generally try to increase the power makers, air filter flow rate and air temperature. The most popular way of doing this is by creating what is called a "Ram-Air" system. Made popular by domestic for decades, what you do is place the filter element in the path of the oncoming air that rushes past the car. In general it's much colder than the ambient air AND it forces more air into the filter. On civics I've seen several creative ways of doing this. An easy way of doing this is by either cutting a hole in the bumper and letting the incoming air reach the CAI system. Or run dryer hose from the hole in the bumper to the filter on the short ram. In drag racing events, the headlight that's in front of the filter on a short ram is removed so the air can reach the filter. For street purposes they make special hoods that have an opening that lets fresh air in to either the cone filter or a stock filter box with a K&N and an opening towards the hood. As for other creations, I've also seen a stock system converted into a CAI by dropping in a K&N, removing the resonator and intake head and cut the actual resonator off so you're left with a J shaped tube that draws air from the bumper just like a CAI.
If you want to get the best out of your intake system, consider the following website http://www.teamdelsol.com/howto/coldair/diycoldair.htm
And use any of the above mentioned methods depending on your budget and style and have fun :)
ric
12-15-2001, 11:31 PM
also to add to rice's commentary on intakes i would like share a few thoughts and fundamentals.
Q. why does it matter what kind of air my intake intake's!!
A. well for all you sagans and einstein's that were too busy wankin the crank to the sleezebags in import tuner magazines during physics and chemistry classes please allow me to brief you on what you have missed.
welp first off intake air temp is everything as previously stated by my camber problem having friend rice (he he he) but why? well mr. frontal lobe one of the by products of heat is expansion. take dry ice for example, well this is pure co2 but as it gets hotter it starts to smoke. it smokes because its being heated from the state its in and its causeing expansion and friction which turns it from its cold as hell brick form into a gaseous state that we naturally associate with co2. so if nobody clicked on your light yet just let me tell you that it applies to pretty much everything, including oxygen. so those little power increases arent truely from just colder air. air doesnt give a shit if its 20 or 200 degrees but those beautifull molecules contained inside air do, especially the one your looking for, oxygen. as it gets hotter these little bastards expand and take up more and more space, bouncing all over the place like fat people in a break dancing competition. this expansion and turbulence causes one hell of a push and shove and in the end as it gets hotter you loose cause there is less oxygen occupying a given volume of air. welp with less oxygen in your intake charge your lookin at a decreased combustion process homey (thats that thing that happens when you turn the car on). wanna say temp doesnt make a difference? welp ever hear the term "hot air rises" gee why do ya think thats so? well that hot air contains less molecules then its colder brother does making it lighter and it rises above the colder more densely charged air. ok now all you weight reduction freaks with complete carbon fiber cars are sayin damn i could save 2 grams by using hotter air, well hold up chief the bads are gonna far outway the goods so you might wanna head back to the think tank to regroup.
so lets recap the temp thing.
hot!!! may be the type of woman your looking to stick it to tonight after the club lets out but after she feels that engine beggin for air burnout out of the parking lot you aint gonna be gettin to much cause 10 to 1 she now thinks your performance is the same as your intake......SHIT
cold, may not be the style your looking for in woman but when it comes to air its all you want when it come time to blow up some petro in a controlled kinda way. but have no fear homey, that stupid bitch that dissed you at the club last week cause your ride wasnt performing all that when it was puffin hot air will be eating your hot exhaust as your new found cold air punches your weighed down car full of lap stacked bitches onto the freeway enroute to the motel. adios ice queen, if only i would have thought about having your cold ass breathe on my filter i coulda saved myself 200 bucks!!
this was intended to be more humor them help but somewhat still helpfull. im not trying to insult anyones intelligence, just make it fun to learn.
Q. why does it matter what kind of air my intake intake's!!
A. well for all you sagans and einstein's that were too busy wankin the crank to the sleezebags in import tuner magazines during physics and chemistry classes please allow me to brief you on what you have missed.
welp first off intake air temp is everything as previously stated by my camber problem having friend rice (he he he) but why? well mr. frontal lobe one of the by products of heat is expansion. take dry ice for example, well this is pure co2 but as it gets hotter it starts to smoke. it smokes because its being heated from the state its in and its causeing expansion and friction which turns it from its cold as hell brick form into a gaseous state that we naturally associate with co2. so if nobody clicked on your light yet just let me tell you that it applies to pretty much everything, including oxygen. so those little power increases arent truely from just colder air. air doesnt give a shit if its 20 or 200 degrees but those beautifull molecules contained inside air do, especially the one your looking for, oxygen. as it gets hotter these little bastards expand and take up more and more space, bouncing all over the place like fat people in a break dancing competition. this expansion and turbulence causes one hell of a push and shove and in the end as it gets hotter you loose cause there is less oxygen occupying a given volume of air. welp with less oxygen in your intake charge your lookin at a decreased combustion process homey (thats that thing that happens when you turn the car on). wanna say temp doesnt make a difference? welp ever hear the term "hot air rises" gee why do ya think thats so? well that hot air contains less molecules then its colder brother does making it lighter and it rises above the colder more densely charged air. ok now all you weight reduction freaks with complete carbon fiber cars are sayin damn i could save 2 grams by using hotter air, well hold up chief the bads are gonna far outway the goods so you might wanna head back to the think tank to regroup.
so lets recap the temp thing.
hot!!! may be the type of woman your looking to stick it to tonight after the club lets out but after she feels that engine beggin for air burnout out of the parking lot you aint gonna be gettin to much cause 10 to 1 she now thinks your performance is the same as your intake......SHIT
cold, may not be the style your looking for in woman but when it comes to air its all you want when it come time to blow up some petro in a controlled kinda way. but have no fear homey, that stupid bitch that dissed you at the club last week cause your ride wasnt performing all that when it was puffin hot air will be eating your hot exhaust as your new found cold air punches your weighed down car full of lap stacked bitches onto the freeway enroute to the motel. adios ice queen, if only i would have thought about having your cold ass breathe on my filter i coulda saved myself 200 bucks!!
this was intended to be more humor them help but somewhat still helpfull. im not trying to insult anyones intelligence, just make it fun to learn.
CivSiGuy
12-15-2001, 11:38 PM
*sniff* .. i smell FAQ
Rice-Rocketeer
12-16-2001, 01:10 PM
Originally posted by i like naked girls
also to add to rice's commentary on intakes i would like share a few thoughts and fundamentals.
First I can't believe I totally forgot to mention the air expansion thing. I was doing it at work, so sue me.
Second, Very entertaining, Three Thumbs Up :D
also to add to rice's commentary on intakes i would like share a few thoughts and fundamentals.
First I can't believe I totally forgot to mention the air expansion thing. I was doing it at work, so sue me.
Second, Very entertaining, Three Thumbs Up :D
mAtC
12-16-2001, 03:55 PM
Very impressive.
scubawrstlr
09-02-2004, 05:56 PM
Thanks a lot guys. I learned a lot.
Shaguar47
09-02-2004, 06:06 PM
Very Informative! I learned alot on my little upgrade. Thanxs!
CivicSpoon
09-02-2004, 06:25 PM
Why wasn't this made a sticky 3 years ago?
Along with the dryer hose idea, there's the cold air box for the short ram. I read in a book that it's supposed to be better than the CAI. The end of the piping where the filter is, is enclosed in a box that gets cold air from where the stock intake box is. Here's a link of a diy of sorts from a member of H-T named soopafly828: http://www.honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=949738
Along with the dryer hose idea, there's the cold air box for the short ram. I read in a book that it's supposed to be better than the CAI. The end of the piping where the filter is, is enclosed in a box that gets cold air from where the stock intake box is. Here's a link of a diy of sorts from a member of H-T named soopafly828: http://www.honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=949738
Ricochet
09-02-2004, 10:59 PM
9+ paragraphs can be very narrowed:
cai = good for non-vtec
shorty = good for high revving dohc vtec engines
This is dyno proven in the book "How To Build Honda Horsepower", where they also test different name brands, and yes, the Iceman is slightly better than an AEM. By 432984723hp? no, but all different brands affect different areas in the rpm band whether minute or not.
cai = good for non-vtec
shorty = good for high revving dohc vtec engines
This is dyno proven in the book "How To Build Honda Horsepower", where they also test different name brands, and yes, the Iceman is slightly better than an AEM. By 432984723hp? no, but all different brands affect different areas in the rpm band whether minute or not.
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