DIY air intake

archiemh

New member
thoughts on my diy cold air intake, i put a cone filter behind the grills and led silicone pipe up the the MAF sensor. seems to work extremely well but near redline the engine seems to go very smooth/quiet i think its because i used a 63mm pipe instead of 80mm which is a fair big diffrence. anyway i just wanted to know your guys thoughts. cheers
 

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If I am reading this right

You have used a 63mm pipe to replace a 80mm pipe

So you have reduced the cross sectional area by 23.3%

So you car now has asthma at high revs.
 
technically it had asthma at high revs when i was testing it out. its more of a idea at the moment and i will get the correct hose diameter. im just curious on your thoughts of it being there eg. getting direct wind. flys in the filter and its somewhat blocking the radiator.
 
archiemh said:
im just curious on your thoughts of it being there eg

I am a maintenance engineer so I would consider BMW's answer to be a good set up as standard

When they raced the S54 engine in the Z4 they managed 400 BHP thorough the standard air box

When I had my Westfield there where loads of people that said the air intake should be through the bonnet due to cold air being outside the engine bay

I did some testing with a twin temp probe one inside the engine bay and one outside

The temps where exactly the same once over 20mph, below 20mph the engine bay was warmer

It is to do with getting air into and out of the engine bay so there is an air flow, if the air can not exit the engine bay the air would warm up as it does when stopped or going slowly

The engine will pull the air in just try putting your hand over a single air inlet throttle body at tick over it will hurt if you seal the opening with your hand vacuum is a power full thing
 
PDJ said:
If I am reading this right

You have used a 63mm pipe to replace a 80mm pipe

So you have reduced the cross sectional area by 23.3%

So you car now has asthma at high revs.

It's worse than that. 21% change in diameter, but a 38% in CSA.

Beyond that, I don't think there is a massive benefit in having the filter in front of the radiator. It won't significantly reduce your IATs, but will reduce the efficiency of your cooling.

Scoop/ram air the air from that area where the air filter housing normally is. Beyond that, be very careful your maf placement is done correctly (depth into the flow and section CSA) or you will end up having issues. A friend of mine just went through that.
 
Cheers for the advice! The MAF sensor is still in its original position, and the cone filter is at the very end behind the grilles, so there shouldn't be any turbulence or airflow issues. I’ve made sure there are no sharp bends before the MAF, so that should be fine.

I’ll keep an eye on intake temps to make sure it’s not drawing in too much heat from the engine bay. Appreciate the tips, I’ll keep tweaking the setup as needed!
 
Good on you for experimenting. :thumbsup:
But honestly, that looks proper ricey. :thumbsdown:
 
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