Hello Org. Just wanted to let you know about a potential product that will be on the market very soon. I am working with a company called NextGear (http://www.nextgearinc.com) to test an intake manifold gasket for the VQ35DE. These gaskets will replace the below gaskets circled in red. To quote their website:



We will be doing before and after dynos to prove any gains with this product. Thanks for your time.

 

This works wonders for vehicles like the Acura RSX-S. I will be willing to test any product that comes from this research (even if I have to pay for the product to do so). Keep us informed...

 

What do you think will be the horsepower gain??

this looks like a good product

 

^ Read

5% horsepower 10 % torque

 

just attaching myself to this thread. pretty interested....update us as it continues...

 

The gains will most likely be 5-7 WHP maximum, but the engine will run better and cooler (and love you for it). This is something that could truly effect the way the engine lasts as well. Heat dissapation is a huge thing when it comes to engine longevity...

 

interesting........

 

I have heard many things about throttle body spacers but never intake manifold spacers. i wonder how hard it would be to adapt this for the VQ30de-k

 

It also depends on what the spacer is going to be made from. Obviously metal would not be as good as composite material.

TB spacers don't do jack, by the way. The reason why they do nothing is b/c they are in front of the upper intake plenum/runners. Tell me how anything placed in front of the upper plenum could do anything at all except waste space...

 

Hmm heat dissapation. Now I agree that keeping the intake manifold is good. No question there.

But if you install these things, aren't you actually hindering heat dissapation? ie.. now the cooling system has that much more heat to take care of. I know the cooling systems on maximas have always been excellent and should have NO problems.

 

the TB spacers are designed to lengthen the intake tract behind the TB, not to reduce heat or anything on the incoming air.
they work on some cars, they don't work on others. you never know until you try it.

 

I was thinking the same thing. If these are essentially blocking the heat from spreading into the intake manifold won't that be more heat for the engine to take care of?

 

No, you're thinking about it kinda backwards. Think of it more like this...

You have two metal objects in close proximity (under 1/4" apart), with differeing temperatures. The more you use them, they more they bleed heat back and forth to each other (mostly due to their proximity). This is basically heat soak, but due to how close the objects are to each other (and due to the fact that metal conducts and retains heat better than any composite materials), and not b/c of heated cooling fluids and the like. Now, you place a non-conductive (for heat) material between them and open up the gap a little between said objects. This allows the two objects to no longer be thermally linked over a given amount of time and work (you've changed the proximity). These objects can now cool themselves off (as they were meant to) without interference from each other. They "vent" or bleed off their heat to atmosphere instead of feeding each other heat. That's how it works.

That's layman's terms, but if you want to get more technical, I can either publish a document or let you read the RSX boards. I probably don't have time to publish a document, seeing as I'm going out of town...

Anyway, enough rambling. Hope this helps...

 

Suscribing to keep myself updated
-J

 

Sounds like a nice mod if it does what it claims. How much do these things normally cost? Sounds like it should be pretty cheap. Keep us updated please.

 

i'm sorry, but this sounds like a load of marketing BS to me... the whole CAI debate all over again.. I'll believe it when I see the numbers. However IF these do more than just insulate from heat soak and space out the lower manifold, I suppose there could be a gain there from changing the harmonics of the IM. But only in so much as shifting power from one end of the RPM spectrum to the other.

I'm still rooting for this to work though. I'd just rather have a real intake manifold replacement.

 

Isn't that the reason that the intake manifoild is plastic?

 

I saw this thread and thought I might add this.

Phenolic Gaskets

Long story short they already tried to make these for a 4th gen but found out that the stock 4th gen intake manifold gaskets are really good from the factory. Outlaw Engineering decided not to make them seeing as it wouldnt be worth the money. If the VQ35 gaskets are like the 4th gen gaskets then theres probally no gains to be had.

 

My guess is that there will be no gain to 1-2 whp MAX, which is well within the +/- repeatability accuracy of the dyno. They WILL keep the intake cooler, but that rarely translates into recordable performance gains. Now if you were to coat the inside with a friction reducing coating and the outside with a thermal barrier and then plum a dedicated cold air source, then you may get a 5-7 hp repeatably dyno number. If you then install a 180 degree Robert Shaw or equivalient thermostat and some timing and fuel via custom tuning (good gas as well) you could get yourself a nice 15-25 hp gain. These may prove a better mate to a turbo car where heat is a bigger factor. I will be interested to hear your results! Keep us posted!

 

Chinkzilla, I will agree with you on it sounding like marketing BS to me. I was skeptical at first till he started showing TRUE HP gains on some 4 cyl Honda engines. Most if not all of the gaskets NextGear has made in the past have been for 4 cyls, but they are trying to expand into 6 cyls.

98SEBlackMax, I thank you for this link. I have yet to see any type of thermal heat soak block products mentioned here on the Org (granted I only peruse the 5th gen group). I am glad to see this has been tried before. These gaskets are NOT phenolic. I will hold of on the material release till after the testing. All I will say is the thermal conductivity of this product is very low. I will look up its properties later on.

Tommy Boy, I have to agree with you, I am also skeptical of the potential gains. But, for the sake of the Org and experimentation, I am going to take on the challenge and be a guinea pig test subject for it. With the before and after dyno, it will prove either this does work, or it doesn’t work. (but at least we will know). I love a product that will give us a true $7.85 per horsepower gain, so I will try it. Otherwise, I would hate for us to waste our money.