Smoothing the airbox

[Aky]

Has anyone heard of doing this? I've seen a few threads on MKIVS.NET and they seem to rate it over a CAI etc.

Just wondered your guys thoughts before having a go myself.

For anyone that is unware you basically remove all the fins that filter the air on the inside of the airbox & then put a larger air intake pipe and place this down to the front of the car to suck in cool air.

Any info would be appreciated.

 

[dultanur]

a couple of my friends have done this, as expected theres no detectable difference. i think it would help, although i couldn't find a route for the cold air pipe, due to the intercooler pipes that block the space below the battery. if you find a way, please tell me

 

[james0808]

I did it on my golf,No difference.

 

[jcb]

just posted about this in another question.
look on VW Vortex, guy in US has airflow figures for OEM, Aftermarket panel and smoothed airbox.
He shows that aftermarket panels and cones (without huge RAM systems) don't flow any better than standard.
best one he did was a ducted (rather than RAM) OEM airbox with all the internal vanes removed and sanded down.

I did mine when I went back to an airbox from a POS stainless cone filter.
sounds more refined (i have a miltek on it anyway!) and appears to have a slightly better throttle response (likely to be placebo effect though!), can hear it slightly more but nothing like a cone.

 

[jcb]

http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=666711&page=1

post is here. pics don;t work anymore. email teh guy if you want to see them

 

[Aky]

Here is pics on a TDI 150 - so it must be very similar. The only problems as identified above would be getting past the I/C hose. The TDI150 has a FMIC.

http://uk-mkivs.net/forums/thread/414730.aspx

 

[ChriS3]

Its a lot of work for something that you can only prove a gain with by running airflow figures. Running a cold airfeed into the box is one thing (see Ess_Three's threads), but cutting off all the internal support structure is just daft.