re: Cold Air Intakes/ + dyno numbers

[alex.fadeev@xxxxxxxxxxx]

jkerouac@domain.elided wrote:
> re: Cold Air Intakes
> 
> Cold Air intake snouts as sold by many tuners are misnamed.
> They are not cold air intakes as much as they are 'not as hot' 
> air intakes.

JK,
Please be more specific:
1. Whose CAI systems are you referring to.
2. 'not as hot' as what? Stock air box picks up the ambient air through 
the front bumper/kidney grills. 

> What they do is decrease the amount of hot ambient air from the 
> radiator that gets to the intake. This is accomplished by a snout
> that:
> +  picks up air lower and further away from the radiator
> +  may include a separating partition to block hot radiator airflow 
> to the intake opening.

The condenser/radiator combo block only a small portion of the air 
entering through the nose of the car. 
Neither stock, nor euro nor proper aftermarket CAI setups (Dinan, ECIS, 
JimC) feed on the radiator air.
All of the above use partitions/boxes/hoses to avoid sucking in 
radiator/engine heated air.

> The mechanical fan is a big contributor towards hot ambient radiator 
> air being directed outward to the inlet of the air intake. 

Please define where you think the 'inlet of the air intake' is located.
Short of a clarification, the above implication is entirely baseless. 

> It is easily removed, improves throttle response, and costs nothing.

And does nothing.
Until the battery power is drawn down to run the electric fan. At which 
point the multiple stage alternator kicks in to recharge the battery in 
honest and draws the power DOWN from your engine's output.

> Snout alternatives:
> The tuners who show dyno charts always use the stock factory airbox 
> and counter-aerodynamic shaped accordion intake tube from the radiator
> support.
> 
> The accordion zigzag tube, due to its mounting position, actually 
> picks up heat from the radiator.

Sorry, but that's complete nonsense.
JimC and ECIS intakes both use the same mounting position on the E36 nose 
holes to the side of the radiator as the stock/euro airbox intake 
plumbing. All of the above block the radiator/engine air from polluting 
their air pool.

> But can the factory airbox be improved at zero cost?  You bet it can.
> Inside that airbox is what BMW calls an "intake noise silencer". It is
> an airhorn that considerably restricts the intake airflow.  It is the
> most commonly removed 'cheater' item in stock class competitions.

This is complete BS.
Removing the plastic 'horn' does nothing but create turbulence in the 
stock/euro box and a). make them noisier; b). confuse HFM by feeding it 
turbulent air.
A guys on the E30 digest recently did a filter test that also covered 
removing the 'horn'. Here are the results: 
http://www.bolhuijo.com/airflowtest/index.html

> Here's the results of a dyno testing day that Bay Bimmerz conducted
> recently.  It was hot and all numbers were on the low side compared to
> known cars and benchmarks.  So your exact dyno numbers may vary, however
> your results relative to other modification will tell you the value of
> what you have done.
> 
> [...] List of meaningless out of the blue dyno numbers. Zero 
before/after
> comparisons. [...]
> 
> So it seems I can argue a valid case for the factory airbox as altered
> above, with the freebie remap from BMW, as an equivalent for $750. 
wortih
> of hardware and remapping from Dinan, and as superior in acrual 
performance.

Dude,
You can argue anything you like.
The only facts in your argument are that your assumption is seriously 
flawed, your testing is invalid and your conclusions are far fetched.

Sorry and have a nice day,

alex f

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