Ram Air intakes (prepare to be insulted)

[93turbo_animal]

I don't know of anyone that has went to a smaller filter and it would take a really small conical filter to flow less then alot of the factory flat panel filters let alone the NA old stly filter. I can read the inlet temps on my 03 and if I had the time I'd switch the stock filter back in but I don't maybe sometime I will but I'll probably just record what it is now and improve that If I can

 

[h2odrx]

I don't know the ram air sounds cool? force the air in? I do know the cold air kits on the PSD's work! you get better mileage with them. my neighbors 01 has not let him down with the cold air box. he tows goose neck with round hay bails and horse trailers loaded to the hilt and he swears by it!

 

[DeepRoots]

the tug i live on has 36 cylinders of two stroke engine running at once, little over 5500cubic inches of displacement.
Naturally aspirated.

At full throttle without the blower fans on, watch your fingers when you shut the door.....
With the fans on no problem, the door opens and shuts with no pull.
These are two 24inch fans. Does this mean those two fans push as much air as the engines consume? I highly doubt it. Do the engines smoke more with the fans on or off? nope.....

my point here is every little bit helps, and there is no reason not to use the force of air to help. Is it going to replace a turbo? hell no, does it help even if there is a turbo? hell yeah.

drew

 

[LCAM-01XA]

Here's something else to consider - as you're driving, the air under your truck (cold air) has a higher dynamic pressure than the air over the hood. Additionally, with a typical hood (no cowl or scoop) the air coming through the radiator (hot air) bottlenecks in the back of the engine bay, and is forced to fight the underside air and escape under the cab. Now, what happens if you open up a few exhaust vents in the hood? Like I mentioned, overhood air has lower dynamic pressure than underside air, so as you're driving there's a natural tendency of the overhood air to pull some of the underside air up and through the engine bay - at the same time the hot air through the radiator also has the natura tendency of going up. So by adding those hood vents we are now pulling the hot air from the radiator out of the engine bay, and replacing it with cold air from the underside of the truck, all without any power input whatsoever - if you place your air intake inlet behind the radiator shroud and before the exhaust manifolds, and slightly off to the side of the radiator, you can take advantage of this cold underside air for engine power purposes, and you will also see a drop in engine bay ambient temperatures. The trick in this whole ordeal is where to place the vents - cowl or scoop will not work because the both take dynamically pressurized overhood air shove it under the hood, thus working against what we're trying to achieve. But, have you seen a mid-'90s Pontaic Grand Prix GTP? These have small hood gills at about 1/3 of the hood length (measuring from the front edge), and this is about where you should put the vents in your hood as well (obviously will need to be larger).

And in case you're wondering - yes, I plan on doing this to my own truck, whenever I can find vents that will look good on it.

 

[Cheaper Jeeper]

I put a dual ram-air on my old NA and it made a huge difference. I took out the signal light assemblies and replaced them with rectangular galvanized scoops behind the grill. I mounted LED assemblies inside the scoops to act as marker lights.

The scoops went straight through to inside the wheelwells and fed into 4" hoses that then went up through holes cut in the fender liners to the snorkles of the air box. I say snorkleS (plural) because I added a second stock intake snorkle onto the passenger side of the airbox.

So I effectively had two 4"x10" air scoops in my front grille in the high-pressure area just above the bumper. It made a VERY noticeable improvement in acceleration, especially at highway speed. As noted above, the stock blow-molded piece terminates in a roughly 3"x8" hole poking through the front radiator support frame. So mine went from having one 24 square inch opening to pull air through to having two 40 square inch openings to pull the air in through. It effectively tripled the size of the airflow path into the airbox.

Plus it took advantage of the high-pressure ram-air effect of the vertical grill at highway speeds. I don't think an open element air cleaner could improve airflow more than that setup did - and the fact that it was all cold air from in front of the radiatior was just the cherry on top. Lastly I swapped my soupbowl lid for a flat lid.

Then I added a free-flowing 3" exhaust with a custom Y-pipe - a TRUE y-pipe instead of a T-pipe like the stock 2.25" POS, and a straight through muffler.

Next I turned up the pump one flat. By the time I was done, all 3 things together, I swear added a good 15-20 ponies to that old truck.

 

[dyoung14]

m.l.s.c.- are you trying to say that a big scoop right behind the grille right in the perfect place to get the coldest air possible rammed straight into the engine is not workin? cause if thats what your daying then i highly dissagree with that, i can be going down the road at about 55 mph and stomp on mine and it will burry the speedo in no time at all, ram-air is not my only mod, but i know that it helps, i also have dual 2.5 inch pipes with flowmaster and it runs into a single 3 inch exit, i have fuel turned up 1.5 flats give or take, timing advanced soup bowl somehow came up missing lol but im very sure ram-air intake is the best way to go, yall might not agree, but i do.

 

[dieselutheran2]

There is a very simple dyno computer on 4lo.com It is based on vehicle weight, 1/4 mile elapsed time or 1/4 mile speed. Just thinking that this would be a very simple way to track power differences. It seems fairly sensitive, as 1 second or 1mph will make a significant change. We might all be able to compare notes if we are trying different air-intake configurations.

 

[OLDBULL8]

I'm not an engineer by any mean's. For 20 year I couldn't spell engineer now I are one.

Cold air, hot air. Hot air is lighter (thinner) Cold air is thicker (heaver) therefore cold air holds more oxygen than hot air. Hot air holds less moisture. Cold air holds more moisture. Why do they use water (mist) injection on these diesel engines (cools the air ) Where does the early morning fog come from? If fog was warm it would rise up, but it's cold so it stay's down until the sun heats it up.

Does any of this make sense I are not an engineer.

 

[dyoung14]

makes sinse to me,

 

[ddec4me]

I actually have been having this debate with myself and my friends for a week now and here is what I have come up with. No I havent tested anything I am just thinking from the standpoint of my application. Ram air is designed for going fast,the faster you go the more air you push down the pipe. open element is for introducing more cooler clean air even at low speeds. I have drawn the conclusion (and this is just my opinion) that which works better depends totally on application. I use my truck most of the time off road and in the mountains,not driving fast but wanting to drive wherever I desire to drive my tank. If I am crawling down a 4x4 trail at 20 ramair will deliver plenty of fresh air,and in many cases more dirt into your airbox for you to clean out when you service your filter. With an open element properly installed and partitioned off from the engine heat as best as possible you keep the dirt at the end of the system and if done right can give you just about as much good fresh air at the turbo as the other with less chance of introcucing water,mud,dirt,small animals etc..... into the airbox. Now if I were using my truck for primarialy a tow vehicle on the highway I imagine the ramair would be more beneficial. As you can see I have put way too much thought into this lately, but it comes down to why we buy most performance based upgrades. How will this improve performance IN MY APPLICATION?

 

[Darrin Tosh]

Every Ram Air system that I have installed made a noticeable difference in performance. Especially when I installed the functional hood scoop on Big Ed, and that already had a ram air system. Once I the hood scoop was installed I was able to turn up the propane to about 2 PSI, and add a little more fuel.

The more denser, cooler air, the better that is all there is to it. I really don't see any reason to debate it.

 

[oldmisterbill]

I was going to post this in one of the many other intake threads but it likely warrants its own thread.

I think that all this ram air intake business is rather silly. The shear volume of air that engines take in is immense and no matter what kind of funnel you have at your hood, you are not going to be making a significant difference.

People also argue that these suck in cold air instead of hot under-hood air. This MIGHT apply if at or near a stop... but as soon as you get going, there is so much air rushing in from the grill and below that there is no time for the air under the hood to heat up.
On a Benz forum, one member made just an open underhood setup which could also be hooked up to a cold air intake from underneath. With or without the cold air tube, he got the same mileage results.

I would do some sort of removable setup on my truck but is far from drivable right now. So... pretty much all these claims are just that, claims. But I challenge someone with a ram/cold air intake to do a test run with their fancy intake and then just hack open the intake and leave an open element. Maybe a set ~100 mile course with a refill after each run.

Prove me wrong! I love to learn from my mistakes. But if I am right, I might save some people from all kind of troublesome fabrication of intakes for little/no benefit.

Thanks for putting up with me.

If this was so then the fan clutch would never need to go on at highway speeds.I have heard my fan go on and off many times on the interstate when I was loaded-that means that the air behind the radiator flowing back over the engine was at least around 190 degrees. If it was cooler then the thermostat on the fanclutch would not engage the fan.I'll never buy that the under hood air in not warmer then outside air. Any drop in air temp means cooler egts and more oxygen.

 

[typ4]

OK,my turn. When we go on trips with the camper and trailer or Jeep behind I see 200 degrees drop in EGT if the air tube is hooked up, wheather going down the highway at speed or climbing a big hill. The air under the hood of most of these trucks is very hot and I am putting a thermometer under there to read just this, also rad in and out, IC in and out, I am building a screen thingy like a tuner ,to read all this that will tell the tale. I want as much cool air going into the engine when pulling a load so to the front it is.

 

[dyoung14]

well i did a 0-60 test with open element today, 15.98 seconds is what i come up with on the first run and 16.14 on the second run, and i noticed i had alot more black smoke so later i will see how it does with the ram-air hooked back up.

 

[sle2115]

Fill a glass with cigarette smoke, hold it horizontal and out the window and drive down the road. I think you'll see the cig smoke gets a little swirled right at the opening of the glass, but it stays in the glass. The engine compartment functions much the same, it to some extent traps air. We researched this even on motorcycles (boss used to run drag bikes that would eat a bottle of nitrous in a quarter mile run) and you would be suprised to see how much air is contained under the tank area of a motorcyle, let alone a container such as the engine compartment.