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wanted to mod my 98 firebird v6. from what i see the cold air intake goes under the car. my question is will it suck up water and the other question is do i have to put it under my car
cold air intake
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Doesn't seem like there are many 3.8L V6 owners here helping out any more. I'll take a stab at it.
Are you looking at a specific kit? If so, post a link.
There are CAI's that use the stock airbox, opening up the bottom of the box, and adding a piece of ductwork picking up air from in front of the radiator. They won't pick up water. There are others that use tubes to route the air from a filter in the left front fender, or even from inside the engine compartment (which is not "cold air").
If the filter ends up inside the fender, BELOW the sheet metal baffle in the engine compartment, were there is cooler air, it is typically located above the plastic filler panel (behind the front bumper bottom) that isolates the inner fender from the roadway (where the water is). In normal driving the filter will not pick up water. If you drive through deep enough water (flood stage) is could pick up water. I ran a filter located in the left front fender on my LT1 V8 for about 5 years and never had a problem with water.
Are you looking at a specific kit? If so, post a link.
There are CAI's that use the stock airbox, opening up the bottom of the box, and adding a piece of ductwork picking up air from in front of the radiator. They won't pick up water. There are others that use tubes to route the air from a filter in the left front fender, or even from inside the engine compartment (which is not "cold air").
If the filter ends up inside the fender, BELOW the sheet metal baffle in the engine compartment, were there is cooler air, it is typically located above the plastic filler panel (behind the front bumper bottom) that isolates the inner fender from the roadway (where the water is). In normal driving the filter will not pick up water. If you drive through deep enough water (flood stage) is could pick up water. I ran a filter located in the left front fender on my LT1 V8 for about 5 years and never had a problem with water.
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I also have a 1998 Pontiac Firebird 3.8l with the angled throttle body intake. What I decided to do to avoid those cold air intakes which might suck up water would be to just 3D print a new air lid since they don't make any for our year car. I'm still in the works of hollowing it out in the program but if you're interested I'll keep you updated. That's just my .02 since I didn't want to have to deal with any CAI's that could potentially render my car useless in rainy weather.
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alright thanks guys! and kire does that have any effect on horse power or sound or anything?
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I was told that the little fins on the inside of the lid helped muffle sound a bit and I'm also going to be running simulations of my current re-designed air lid's airflow compared to the stock configuration. From what I was told it should help with the sound but the main reason I got it was because I got a RAM air hood lid for the looks but I'm going to make it functional which should bring more air to the air box so I'm not sure your horsepower increase will be as drastic as mine. I currently have my Firebird in pieces right now as I waiting for new pacesetter headers to put the transmission in so soon afterwards I'll have it dyno'd to see what kind of power it will make.
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and thanks kira if you end up figuring it out lmk! that would be huge
Doing the free ram air mod under in the technical articles and replacing the silencer with a 4" Pcv coupler works just as well. You will need to file the inside of the coupler to remove lip. Also recommend shaving the fins off the inside of your air box lid. You will notice a substantial difference in the sound.
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Thank you for the info! Thankfully mine never came with that silencer in the intake piping but it does have a huge hole in it
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I can assure you with absolute certainty that you will not see the "higher explosive horsepower output" that is indicated in the link you shared in a subsequent post.
The only way you will ever know if there is any HP gain (or possibly even loss) at all is to run baseline series of 1/8- or 1/4-mile passes with the stock intake, and repeating the same test, under the same atmospheric conditions (temperature, barometric pressure, and humidity). The HP gain could be estimated from reliable empirical formulae.
In any case, I suspect the gains will be small.
interesting thread, following
I've done a few cold air intakes on various cars/engines, and believe they are one of those modifications that if done right, that is, to actually grab cooler air than the factory air box was getting, there may be a slight improvement, maybe not enough to even feel. One cold air intake I did came with a larger pipe that the MAF sensor screwed into so I had to re-figure the MAF curve. It ended up being about 25% change than the old MAF curve, but then the new pipe was about 25% bigger diameter so that made sense. In the end, I think it can't hurt to do a CAI, if you do it right, but it may not help a whole lot either. Maybe on a dyno, or running the quarter, you may be able to see "some" increase, but not really enough to make a big change in the way the engine feels when you drive it. I suppose if the factory intake set up was really restrictive, then you could notice more. Some CAI kits come with a tune you need to load as well. I always wondered how much of the increase is from the cold air itself, and how much is from the tune?
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You raise a very good point Joe. What is this cold air kit going to do to MAF calibration?
In the system linked in post #7 - just think what effect the sharp 90-degree bend, right in front of the throttle body, which contains the "stab-in" MAF sensor, will screw up the calibration. Compare that to the factory setup which routes the air flow out of the symmetrical air box in a fairly straight line, from the silencer into the throttle body. Then consider the pressure losses with the two 90-degree bends, and the length of the tubing. IMHO, that system is pure "optics". The LS1 V8 guys get small gains out of simply enlarging the size of the opening in the base of the stock airbox. Others make kits that add ducting below the stock airbox to pick up the higher pressure air in front of the air dam, and direct it through the enlarged opening in the base of the box.
The source of that linked system "Performance Chip Tuning" appears to sell some "tuning" products that have ridiculous claims - big HP (+40), torque (+32 #-ft), and MPG (+4 MPG) increases from expensive devices you plug into the OBD-2 port. They claim they can "tune" S/C and turbo installs with this stuff. Smoke and mirrors.
In the system linked in post #7 - just think what effect the sharp 90-degree bend, right in front of the throttle body, which contains the "stab-in" MAF sensor, will screw up the calibration. Compare that to the factory setup which routes the air flow out of the symmetrical air box in a fairly straight line, from the silencer into the throttle body. Then consider the pressure losses with the two 90-degree bends, and the length of the tubing. IMHO, that system is pure "optics". The LS1 V8 guys get small gains out of simply enlarging the size of the opening in the base of the stock airbox. Others make kits that add ducting below the stock airbox to pick up the higher pressure air in front of the air dam, and direct it through the enlarged opening in the base of the box.
The source of that linked system "Performance Chip Tuning" appears to sell some "tuning" products that have ridiculous claims - big HP (+40), torque (+32 #-ft), and MPG (+4 MPG) increases from expensive devices you plug into the OBD-2 port. They claim they can "tune" S/C and turbo installs with this stuff. Smoke and mirrors.
I enlarged the outlet from the air box slightly by using a heat gun and rolling a deep well socket around the edges just for grins. Kind of doubt the 3800 needs more air but it sounds cool. Kind of like flipping the air cleaner lid back in the day
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I've done this for LS1 cars.... works fine.
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Hello I am new I this post, I just installed a cold air intake from ebay Chromeintakes And it goes in the left side in front of tire and I’d boxed in really nice. I was concerned about water getting into the filter but so far is been good. My car does seem to be more responsive and runs better. I have a 2002 firebird v6 3.8
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