andy-gts

I am wanting to make a new intake for the car and would like your input...

During tuning ,with 95degree F outside temps, the intake air temp while cruising at 70 mph was 83Degree centigrade....the air box and horns are made of aluminum and seem to be a good heat sink...I suspect that the rush of air in those airhorns is not exceedingly fast at 2200 rpm and the air has time to adsorb more heat from the aluminum intake sitting on the heads. so

is carbon fiber the best material to prevent adsorbing heat or should I just wrap with gold tape everywhere and see how it does. of note the current airbox touches the hood and really with the airhorns does not allow much airflow around the intake and out the back of the hood and or down and out the bottom. the exhaust headers are ceramic coated devek level 2.

carbon fiber vs gold tape vs abs


your thoughts are very much appreciated...

will post pics but havent figured out how to make my photos file size smaller for posting

Rob Edwards

Andy, you can e-mail me pics and I'll host them and send the links back to you. redwards at uci.edu

andy-gts

I think I figured out how to resize. here is a pic of the intake...


If I make this out of carbon fiber I was thinking or rounding the corners and bringing the airhorns forward and blending the horns into the box gradually starting at the front of the airbos and blending to the back with a gradual taper.

I can easily raise the crossbar to 2\3rds the difference to the top of the air box as it is right now and leave a lot of room for the air tube blending starting right up front. just have to drop the fuel line alittle if I want to just ram the air in the front of the box. what do you think?

Mike Simard

I wound up moving my air intake sensor out of the engine compartment. Even with all CF box and trumpets, the recorded air temperature was never believable. Now it sits in the cowl cubby and reports accurate temps.

I have plugs ready for my 'new' airbox design. You can borrow them if you want to mold a box. They're all waxed and ready but I don't have time.

andy-gts

do you get your air at the cowl for cooler air?....neat idea. maybe there is room there to put an intake.

Mike ,

I was thinking of just doing a clay mock up and then make a mold of this...my only problem is the horns would have to be made seperate from the body if I do it in carbon fiber, but with abs I might be able to find an injection molder to make it a one piece design.

andy-gts

Oh , duh, I see , you have already done this and made a cf airbox ....YES by all means ...if I can borrow this I will mold my own....very cool....

thanks, I will pm you

do you have any pics of the airbox..?

Mike Simard

Here's the new airbox plugs. It will have inlets going into the rear sides as you do now. This is the design I've wanted for some time but it's been wasting away at a composite shop that didn't ever do anything and now here at my metalworking shop where it's not doing anything. I did put serious work into these plugs and they're durable enough to mold directly or use in making a mold.
The advantage in making a mold is that the outside would be pretty but using them as is in the form of plugs as they are is just fine.

I still like the AIT sensor being somewhere else. Even with the best airbox, the area around a sensor that's near a surface seem to not see any air and record ambient part temps for quite some time after starting. In theory you could mount the AIT away from the edges or into an inlet but there's no reason for that. Measuring outside air is what you want to do.

andy-gts

wow,
very nice .

I could try and vacuum mold some carbon fiber after I make a female mold off it and see how it looks . then send it back and if you like it make some more....if you are still ok with it , send it and I will give it a try.

too cool...thanks Mike

andy

GregBBRD

Mike makes an interesting/good point, here, Andy.

The intake air tenperature sender is located in the base of the intake manifold and could be 'inaccurate" solely because of location/heat soaking from the manifold. Regardless, it is impossible to think that the aluminum intake box, hooked onto the aluminum throttle bodies, isn't a major heat sink.

It would be a good idea to "move" the sender into the path of the airflow, when you make the new airbox.

77tony

Andy, If you do decide to use real gold on some of those components under the hood, along with the GB stroker motor, I will then have another reason to steal your car. 77Tony

Ed MD

Carbon fiber won't insulate the intakes from the internal temps. The Indy car that runs with us at track days has carbon fiber shells and engine covers but the intakes are covered with gold foil. Its the best heat reflector there is, that's why its used in the space program. I covered my intakes with gold foil that has adhesive backing. Easy to apply, what takes time is cutting patterns for different shapes.
Ed

John Speake

On the race car with ITBs we put the IAT in the nose of the car. What type of sensor are you using, Andy and Mike ? We use one that is 90% plastic.

andy-gts

John,
the air intake sensor has a brass ferule and is screwed into the side of the rectangular intake box. you can see it in the original photo between the two aluminum pipes attached to the air box on left.

John Speake

Most IATs by Bosch have a similar temp/resistance law, we use this one, it is all plastic body.. I can send you the datasheet if you're interested.

Z

That intake air temperature sensor and the way it's mounted are basically worthless. For your sake, I hope you're not trying to use that for the intake air temperature signal used by the engine management system.

You need a real intake air temperature sensor, like the one John posted a picture of, and that's properly mounted. What you've got is in no way what anybody should be using to feed an intake air temperature signal to an engine management system, unless it's maybe to very roughly control something like a radiator fan.