Modifying your Airaid air box

[VR Baron]

Originally Posted by Toasty

I wonder how much of the power gains that the Airaid has is from the box design or the tube design?

If it's the tube, wonder if a handy person could fab up a block off-plate similar to the roto-fab/K&N instead of the box

Question for Airaid I think. Rotofab in there post about their new CAI said the bigger the box/enclosure area the better for power and flow I think. If you look at their box and statement about that they tried to curve the engine side wall out toward the engine to make the area larger.Airaid is larger toward the back and engine side and now we have added the frontal area as well.

[Toasty]

I found this interesting-- I hadn't ever seen the air intake in the front side of the grill before-- the OEM snorkel mates to (But doesn't seal to) another plastic piece that routes the air from in front of the radiator, around to the part snorkel that is attached to the oe intake, and the airaid- Roto-Fab says theirs uses that same entry point (just to the left of the headlight)

[VR Baron]

Originally Posted by Toasty

I found this interesting-- I hadn't ever seen the air intake in the front side of the grill before-- the OEM snorkel mates to (But doesn't seal to) another plastic piece that routes the air from in front of the radiator, around to the part snorkel that is attached to the oe intake, and the airaid- Roto-Fab says theirs uses that same entry point (just to the left of the headlight)

Yes, Airaid does as it has a box for the snorkel to actually attach to. I could not see if Roto- Fab did, but if it has only a two sided air box like the others I dont see how you attach the snorkel. Also with the front open to the air from below why would you need the snorkel anyway? I dont run mine with the Airaid box mod because of my heat shield and all the extra air. Also the reason we did the mod is that the snorkel didn't provide enough cool air to the engine with it.

[devildoc]

Originally Posted by Toasty

I found this interesting-- I hadn't ever seen the air intake in the front side of the grill before-- the OEM snorkel mates to (But doesn't seal to) another plastic piece that routes the air from in front of the radiator, around to the part snorkel that is attached to the oe intake, and the airaid- Roto-Fab says theirs uses that same entry point (just to the left of the headlight)

I wonder if we removed that black covering piece by the blinker if it would allow more cool air to reach the snorkel faster?

[VR Baron]

Originally Posted by devildoc

I wonder if we removed that black covering piece by the blinker if it would allow more cool air to reach the snorkel faster?

I dont know, could be we might get into some airflow dynamics we dont know about? That pc is there for airflow/directing of the air to the snorkel but how well does it work? It would appear the snorkel can at best get only cool/warm air combo the way it doesn't fully connect to the front of the car but only GM knows for sure. I only know that on the street I didn't notice a difference with or without the snorkel after the holes/shield mods.

[kga10734]

I would think that piece is there and made that way to get air to the stock snorkel but to keep out as much rain/water that enters the grille area while driving. With that in place there isn't a direct shot at the snorkel so rain would have to go in the grille, up under the top area of the front fascia and down behind that piece to get into the air box.

[Toasty]

Ordered the Airaid yesterday! Before I add holes, I an going to see if I can connect the snorkel to that piece that goes in front of the radiator

[devildoc]

BLACKBEE sent this to me in a pm - and being that it was super informative I have C&P'd it here:

Airaid shield

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Quote:
Originally Posted by devildoc
What material did you use to make a heat shield? Also, how did you raise it up on the corner? That is so good thinking to utilize to reduce the heat!

I thought I would reply here instead of to the thread, I got long windedThe only thing I could find that I could cut, form and drill easy, the big truck mud flaps made of durable black plastic, looks like the box plastic. Took 3-4 times to design and gradually improve on. Use two pcs to have a 1/4" thick shield. With the added air holes in the front of the box it is open a bit to the engine heat. It is rectangular in shape and countoured. It attaches with the screws that come with the flaps on the engine side of the air box starting in front of the air tube and going forward to the headlights and as far forward as the front part of the snorkel. It attaches at the top side of the box right at the seal and contours down and over the snorkel,to protect its inner wall from heat, then down to the frame rail and angles over the tubing there so heat cant come up from below. It kind of copied what the after market box side looks like in that area, so cool air comes in the snorkel and also is forced into the front of the box to the holes also as other units do without the snorkel.
along the bottom engine side of the box to the back edge of the box I attached a rectangle pc that extends down to the frame rail and curves over the tubing on the rail to keep hot air from coming in that way.

What I have now is one big ass box and all the cool air it can use. Air temps in the stock snorkel and coming through the front holes I made are about 8 degrees cooler with the sheild at idle. The airtube is 15-20 degrees cooler now then the engine cover. All air coming into the box "openings" is the same temp or close. Engine response is a bit better and got a bit louder also. I also sprayed the shield black to have it blend in more and looks o.k.

As to the raising of the box I noticed that the seal imprint on the hood wasn't as noticeble in that round corner closest to and pointing toward the engine. Thats where the hood liner has that upward curve away from the box top. So I figured Id shim it up to meet the hood more to make sure the seal was good. I took a pc of 3/8" gas line about 1'' long, put a bolt in it so it wont colapse. Un bolt the box and put the gas line on the mount pad inboard of the threaded rod, lowered the box back down and tightened it up. This definitely sealed the box, you should see the imprint! Doing this automatically raised the air tube also, and up off the radiator as it was lying to close before and almost touching.

End result is some of the interior boom went away, maybe hot air was getting in and messing with the air/timing causing more "drone"?

Anyway its the best I could get it and seems to work o.k., Good enough for me. Maybe picked up 2-3 hp to but who knows, it runs better. I figure closer to Ingen power so Why buy another unit for a couple of hp?

Well thats the end of my novel, hope it was good reading When you get to S.D. We might meet at a meet and you can check out my latest in backyard mechanics.

[fixxer56]

Any pictures of your work?

[PieNsky]

It has been stated that having a cold air intake and headers HP, TQ, is less than they make by themselves. In other words, you cannot combine the HP, TQ ratings. I doubt that as you reach total efficiency of the combined CAI with headers, that there would be a noticeable difference either an AiRaid or Injen.
I soon as I can afford to mate my AiRaid to my hood scoop, I'm selling my Injen.

[VR Baron]

Originally Posted by fixxer56

Any pictures of your work?

No I didn't take any, it was a work in progress and finalized it pretty much during the holidays. If you look at KGA's pictures at the start of his thread here, page 1 or2 you will see his and mine are basically the same design but he uses sheet metal he had.I used the plastic flaps as thats all I could find and easy to cut and form. This theory/design looks like all the other cai's in that area so they can function correctly, not any rocket science really, just keep the heat out best possible is all. I used a temp gauge I got at Pep boys to see what areas improved as I did the mod and where they needed help.

[VR Baron]

Originally Posted by PieNsky

It has been stated that having a cold air intake and headers HP, TQ, is less than they make by themselves. In other words, you cannot combine the HP, TQ ratings. I doubt that as you reach total efficiency of the combined CAI with headers, that there would be a noticeable difference either an AiRaid or Injen.
I soon as I can afford to mate my AiRaid to my hood scoop, I'm selling my Injen.

Your right here I think, But with all my research here and on LS1.tech.com and checking with the mfg's also I find that based on individual dyno's some get stacked #'s but most don't. Headers didn't seem to lose much combined with a catback as they seemed to have the biggest restriction to overcome and got the best gains due to that, but As the restriction in say, the exhaust stream, is lessoned(headers) the next improvement(catback) will give you less of an increase so combined it's hard to stack gains because as you said, you get more efficient.But with the intake side you should get the same gains with a cai no matter what as it isn't part of the exhaust, but that is exactly what we see
On the LS1's we had the magical airlid that gave 20 hp!, then it was 15, then 10 and finally combined with a catback usually made 7-8 tops.

Catbacks got 15-18 or even 20 on the dyno's from mfg's and even independant shops, again on the v-8. You and I dyno and get only 8-12 tops and that was with a cai or by themselves so they don't stack hp, or maybe they do, who knows. Then look at Scrmmg's own comment that he got 15 hp with all his mods at the time but didn't really jive with the nice reduction in e.t. or the mph increase minus any track or weather conditions, so how good are dynos we do for 2-3 pulls as to being accurate? Remember they are" just tools to show a direction or to tune with" according to the shops. And our engines seem to do the best on the 4-5th pull as Scrmmg found out and the best on the 3rd plus run at the track

All very interesting, and we do have fun finding it all out

[larryt1026]

so all these modifications to the airbox is to gain extra hp? if no mods were done to the airbox and the tube remains as hot as it gets during long runs...will it damage the car or the CAI in any way?

[AUS10BMX]

I didn't use the snorkel when I replaced my new V2 tube after that whole fiasco when it first came out. I didn't see where any air was getting in there since it was slammed to the back of the head-light. Im sure some air was, but not enough to really make a difference. I just cut a larger whole instead since it was fairly open in that region.