I posted this as a reply to another post but I wanted to see what more people thought so here it is again.

Okay, I know a lot of you have sworn by the cold air intakes and stuff but I have to post a little bit of info I found out on my own max (92GXE). What I did was go to Wally world (thats Wal Mart for the uninformed) and bought a tempature guage with a sensor at the end of 10 feet of wire. I put the sensor end into my K&N popcharger that was a stock replacement. I do NOT have a CAI.

Anyway on average when the outside air was around 60 degrees the average tempature going into the engine is about the same. The air inside the bay does not really heat up until you turn off the engine and the car sits. Thats when the temp gets up around 90 or so. When you start driving again things will cool back down.

When on the freeway temps will range from 40+ to around 50+. I put this thing in after summer (In Cali) so I don't know what things will do then.

So I'm saying that unless you do a lot of stop and go the cold air intake might not be worth it. Especially after all of the bends the air has to take before getting to the engine.

BTW now that I think about it when they dyno test a car it is sitting still and the engine is running hard. This will heat things up because of no wind flow. So when you dyno test a CAI it probably will help because it will have cooler air.

So has anyone ran a temp prope into there CAI?

 

IMHO
1st, you understand that cold dense air is better?
2nd, lets say you have a pop charger, now if you punch the gas the incoming air has to first travel through the filter thus creating resistance regardless of how free flowing your intake is, on a CAI the fact that its 30" long is very benificial. when you punch it , the air your engine sees first is the cold air that is sitting in that 30" of tubing.without having any filter restricitons, The fact that the CAI is that long also helps to create a ram air as the air coming in after is forcing the air in the tube into the engine.your stock airbox has this "ballast" if you will already, it acts like a reserve and sucks in more air then would be able to just be stuffed through a filter. but once again the tubing on a CAI is not heat conductive like the plastic airbox. the stock reserve will get hot lets say if ur at a light, where the CAI wont so when you gas it the first air it sees is that cold dense air, not so with stock or pop charger.
3rd, engines get hot as they run longer (DUH). after being on the freeway for 10 min in 90 degree weather i can notice a difference in acceleration (decrease)and exhaust sound (increase, as engine gets hot sounds alot better) now any air in that engine bay is going to be hot no matter if ur moving or not and anythign but a CAI is sucking that internal air and not cold air fromt the fender. now a pop charger is just making up for that lack of dense air by just sucking in more, not nearly as efficiant or powerful as teh CAI and going back to physical science u can fit more cold air into something then hot air, fill a box with hot air and one with cold and the one with cold will have "more air" in it, because its denser air and thus creating more power and i have already taken up too much space so im going to stop now lol
can anyone else agree with anything ive just said??

 

You said that air in the engine bay guts hotter the longer it is running like on the freeway. This is wrong, I have measured the temps going on a trip to San Francisco which is about a three hour drive. The temp on average of about 50 - 60 degrees when out side air is in the same range. At higher speeds the air in the engine bay gets closer to the outside air because fresh air is blowing in faster replacing hot air.

Your statements about the longer tubing being a benifit sounds plausible except for a few facts.

One. mettle is just as conductive if not more then plastic as far as heat transfer. (What would you rather pick up a piece of mettle thats been sitting in the sun or a piece of plastic?)

Second. How is a CAI going to create ram air effect? Its gotta SUCK that air in over 30 inches of length with all of those bends.

Third. This cold air reserve that you say the extra length provides could it be true? The air is CONTUALY being sucked in. The air isn't in the intake for at most a few seconds. This is not enough time to heat the air up.

Like I said if anyone puts a temp sensor on their CAI I would be interested in what the numbers are. Outside air verses the air being sucked in.

 

the engine bay while moving aint going to be hot cause air is moving through it of course, but engine temp is high. now mabye on the freeway when its 60 degrees out the engine bays cool but on a 90 degree day its not. plus unless you drive without stopping your engine bay will heat up, bringing cold air form somewhere liek the fender is ideal.now regular intakes MAY suck cool air when its 60 outside and your crusing down a freeway , but under MOST circumstances engine temp is hotter then outside, the place racing CAI is powdercoated and does not conduct heat as much as the high impact plastic used on stock boxes, and is sucking cold air in always.
now as far as the ram air, when your stopped and at idle its not sucking in much air at all, now when you stomp on the gas its going to suck the resevour air be4 its going to suck it through the filter, if that air is free flowing and cold well u got more power.
now not to doubt your temp sensor and readings, im not sure how scientific it was, but the air your car is sucking in wiht a pop charger is hotter then CAI 90% of the time. ive read numerous articles in import magazines where temp testing was done and i have yet to hear of the scenario you have described.

 

The CAI is the best intake for our cars. Because for 1 it increases lowend and midrange torque. It *might* make alittle less topend power than the SI/POP intake but the CAI has more overall torque. Put it this way, about 2 years ago I raced a 3rd gen VG auto with SI/dinan ECU vs my K&N panel and timing advance. We were dead even from 20-75mph rollon, his car is faster off the line because of the ECU. At the time my car was running 17.2's at 78mph on the strip. With the CAI I ran 16.7-16.9's with 80-81mph traps and got 1-3mpg better too.