Im taking my time in getting a new Intake for my Maxima. I have a 5 speed manual tranny and im looking for the best intake for low end, off the line, and 1/4 mile runs.

The 1, 2, 3's:

1. Performance - gains in low to mid range, not to concerned with high end
2. Sound - Must sound awesome and better than my JWT Popcharger
3. Cosmetics - Must look the best out of all available.

What the best out there for me ?

 

Get the pop charger or stillen intake. They don't look pretty, have a little less low end power, but its worth it for the top end they give. If you've noticed, the maxima already has pretty good low end power, so you should go for all the top end you can get. If you can save up enough cash, get a Y pipe to go with the intake, you'll definitely start to love you car.

 

i guess i'd say injen...

 

Your description sounds like you are looking for a CAI. Don't waste your time with the stillen intake, its pretty much the same as the JWT. If you really want low and mid range power, CAI is a better choice than the Frankencar. I don't know much about the Injen, but I think it looks pretty nice.

 

go with Injen. They look Nice!!!

 

I've had a JWT popcharger combined with a Place Racing CAI upper pipe on my '99 5-speed for darn near two years.


I like it

I recommend adding "Hybrid Intake" to your poll choices

 

frankencar, there is proven performance gain... and it does not look bad at all, no doubt about.

too bad i own a BOMz CAI, i will run a dyno on it soon along with my y-pipe, or maybe wait till my catback =)

 

Budget CAI.
1) Great pearformance.
2) Sounds great (especially @ WOT).
3)Looks very much like the Injen - they even give you a chioce of 3 collar colors.
4) About the same cost as the Budget y-pipe (approx $160US shipped).

 

Given your criteria you need a CAI.

 

Well you really cant have all of those in one intake. Well IMO the Injen looks the best but the CAI is going to give you the best low end, and the CAI will probely sound the meanest. The frankencar also sounds good though and will give you nice midrange power. I would go with either the Frankencar or the place racing CAI...

 

So from reading this, the Frankedcar is the only intake that is really greate for midrange?

how much HP/TQ do you gain from one again? I read it a while back... :-/

 

why would you take place racing over Injen ...? is it becuase some people say the injen is not a true CAI ? and you are right trying to squeeze this into one intake is tough, maybe impossible.. but if someone did make an intake that met the big 3 for me ..it would melt the competition... thanks for your imput .. just looking at the poll frankencar is getting high marks from other max owners

 

 

Yeah i dont really like the fact that its not a true CAI, and its very expensive (around $230). But its does look very nice with the polished tubing, and even better if you have more red in your engine (wire loom, spark plug cover, ect). Most people that have one are happy with it but i have heard a few say that its really not that loud since located more under the engine. But if you do get the Place racing CAI you might not even feel that much of a gain in low end power since you are a 5 speed. It tends to be the autos that get more of a lag from popchargers, that why they switch to CAI's. I still say either CAI or frankencar. Both will be louder, look better, and give you a bit more of a gain. The CAI should be more on the low end and the Frankencar more in the midrange. Or maybe you should just stick with the JWT. There really is no "best" intake for a maxima, and there is always going to be a debate over which one is the best.

 

Awesome ending post man..you should send that over to vqpower, i think thats the site anyways, if you were me, would you go with frankencar ? im thinking about making that my choice and testing it out ... neither of them are to expensive, yes more than what they are actually worth but their prices arent killers like tires and rims or adding a body kit and having it fitted and painted ... what do you think smithdog ? frankencar on a 5 speed .. ?

 

Well when i get my 5 speed maxima i will be getting a Frankencar intake. Mostly because i dont want to drill a hole in my fender and would like a midrange gain rather than low or top end. Because most driving takes place in the midrange.

 

If you're looking for low-mid range get a PRCAI/BOMBZ CAI. I all the combinations possible aside from the Injen intake and would have to say that the BOMBZ/PRCAI are the best choice. With the cone intakes there's certainly a low-end loss even on my 5spd up until about 3.5k rpm. With the CAI there's a low-end/mid range gain from what I can tell, and I'm very intune w/my car. Furthermore, there's no obvious top-end loss either. But I usually don't rev my engine past 6krpm anyway. Also, the CAI sounds waaayyyy better than the hybrid/cone intakes. It's wistles at a certain throttle position and is about 2 times louder than the hybrid/cone from the outside. From the inside it's defenitely quieter than the hybrid/cone intake. It sounds like a turbo is spooling up That's my $1

Oh, I don't think that the Frankencar intake gives you the low-end loss back. It's all a myth. It just makes your car about 3 times louder, hence the buyer thinks his/her car is actually faster. No disrespect Steve.

 

I got a intake off of ebay and replaced the sh!ty air filter with a K&N. It's not the best looking one on the market but it just feels so d@mn good. OHHHHHH WEEEE!!!!

 

hey man, I just switched from JWT to Place racing. First of all, it definately fits my needs better in every category. (performance, sound, looks) I notice a difference in low end, (like 20 to end of second gear) and hopefully it will do better as it gets colder....

good luck with your choice man!

 

I love my PR CAI. I had a pop charger before and I like the CAI much better, but I guess it depends on what you’re looking for. The sound of the CAI is the best around. I think Injen makes the best looking ones, but I didn’t care as much about that since my hood is usually closed. One also has to remember what kind of power differences we’re talking about here from one to the other. Not much.

 

they are all about the same give or take 3 hp. i can't feel the difference of 3 hp...its all sounds and looks. a enzo uses an airbox just like ours...tho a bit different same princible. aftermarket intakes are just sound imo. and shiny. i like my injen. its loud, shiny, performace dunno? true CAI dunno. i have an auto so maybe on a 5 speed you notice the differences...

 

I have an Injen CAI, and it performs a lot better than the Stillen hi flow.

 

There's a reason that the two best running N/A 5-speed maxima used simple cone filter intakes. In a 5-speed you could really use any top end you can get, if you're running on 15 inch wheels you'll peel out in 1st, so low end really doesn't matter all that much, get the pop charger (I just got the stillen since it was my 1st mod and i had no idea what i was doing)

 

I got a PR/CAI and have been running it as a hybrid due to the ridiculous rain we had this summer. I prefer the CAI, it just that at highway speeds the CAI seems choked. There is not any type of ram air effect due to the filter placement. Next I'm going to try replacing the midpipe with the stock resonator and using the CAI portion suggested and explained by Dave B. In this thread. First page last post. I think i'm going to try and fashion some sort of air inlet to the fender well also. To aid in highend performance.

 

I ran a 14.4 at 99.51mph with a cut stock airbox. My trap speed is right in line with what Requim6 (99.3mph) and Nealoc (100.0mph street tires) are running with their POP/hybrids. The only difference is my 60' sucks compared to theirs.

I recently switched to the CAI while using the stock resonator. By seat of the pants feel, the setup feels very responsive at all rpms. The midrange punch is very impressive and on every gear shift there is a surge in immediate power. With the POP/hybrid, there's a slight delay and then it starts hauling. Overall, the CAI seems to fit me better and the power "feels" stronger from idle to 5000rpms (range I use the most). Keep in mind that when your racing, you spend most of your time in the midrange and very little time from 6000-7000rpms. I'll soon test my setup at the track so we'll see if my claims are justified.


Dave

 

I'm looking forward to those dynos. Because If they look good, I'm going to do that same setup that you have.

 

I never knew there was a Budget CAI. Does anyone else have any opinions about it? Any pictures?

 

I started off w/ the stillen as my first mod. Then I acquired the upperhalf of a CAI to replace the resonator and make it into a hybrid, which is really the same as frankencar. But now that I have nitrous I'm not worried about mid or top end power because that takes care of it....so maybe I'll switch to CAI for some lowend.

W/o nitrous I can leave the line quicker than other autos w/ cai and even 5spd w/ hybrid...but I have a feeling the other mods have something to do w/ it.

 

Why are people still talking about midpipe intakes this way? It has been proven time and time again (by dyno's) that the midpipe intake LOSES power over the stock air box until 4900 rpm. That style intake ONLY gives gains in the extremem high end. Also many threads have shown the reason we have that black box that the midpipe replaces, resonance tuning, it is there for a purpose

http://forums.maxima.org/showthread....6&page=1&pp=30

http://forums.maxima.org/showthread....3&page=1&pp=30

With that I will say go with the JWT filter and velocity stack (same as stillen but cheaper) or the place racing style intake and keep the resinator.

 

What about an intake like this... Since there is all this argument about the resonator and mid pipe and the low end loss and the cai not having the top end yadayada... What if you made a "CAI" out of the stock intake. If you cut a hole in the bottom of the stock airbox, and a hole directly below it in the fender well so that it draws air up from the wheel well wouldnt it be just like a CAI pretty much? Rather than just hacking the air box to draw in engine bay air.

Would someone w/ a CAI or hacked airbox already be willing to give this a shot and even dyno it? I dont have a hacked box or CAI and dont want to make holes in the fender well to test it, but I figure if its already there then maybe someone can try it out.

 

I have actually already done that. The problem is that the stock air box sits over the fender, not the space that the PRCAI goes into. I cut a hole through the bottom of the air box through the fender. It worked pretty good and was very loud, but I could not drive it like that it rain as the wheel would have splashed all kinds of water into the air box (I put a nerf ball in the hole when it rained.) Later I resealed it using the portion that I had cut out and some auto goop from lows you can get right on top of it and not tell that anyone ever messed with it.

So my next route was the hacked air box, I didn't even know that other people had tried this. I cut a hole in the lower half of the air box facing the fender. It is far enough away from the engine that I believe it would be sucking in cool air coming in from around the hood (I also made my own midpipe to compliment this.)

Next I went with a dyno tested winner, the JWT filter and velocity stack. The reason I went with this was to keep the path the air had to travel straight. I made a pipe that was positioned under the car (to catch the ton of air that flows under your car while at speed) to feed the JWT intake cool air (the best of both worlds.)

Recently I took the midpipe off and put the stock resinator back on (after hearing testimony's of other members that it slowed them down at the track, looking at the links which provide a scientific basis for why resinators provide power, and knowing that stillen and JWT kept the resonator for their intakes because they do exhaustive dyno tests to make sure a product will produce the right gains, a midpipe would have been easy to sell along with it) and have not seen any evidence that a midpipe offers gains despite asking those who were reported to have that information and starting a thread about it.

I am now joining the force and shopping for an SC as my next intake

 

I have no doubt that you're one of the better 5-speed drivers on this forum and i'm interested to see how well your new setup runs. However, until someone actually runs a better time than a 13.9 with any other intake i'll stay convinced that the pop charger setup is the best. Thats not to say that I probably won't mess around with a couple other setups just see if i can feel a power gain in different RPM ranges.

 

What kind of filter comes with the Budget CAI?