Removing the factory Airbox

[Black328iS]

Im told that I will get a slight power gain by removing the factory air box (until i get my CAI) . is there any truth to this? If so, how does it come out and is there any way this can damage my engine?

thanks
eric

[Jared at Pelican Parts]

Cold air kits work on the idea of cooling down the intake air.

Cold air is more dense than hot air, which means that you can stuff more air into the cylinder when air is cool.

Usually the setup goes to a K+N cone filter straight to the airflow meter than onto the engine. The problem here is that most people just put the cone filter on but don't provide any shrouding for it. The shrouding is the key. Without it, you are just going to suck hot air from under the hood into the engine, which can produce even LESS horsepower. You want to buy or fabricate a heat shield to go around the filter, insuring that cool air twill enter. On my car, I have enclosee my filter, then drilled a hole in the bottom of the panel and ducted a hose to the front brake cooling vent. This hose funnels cool air from the outside up into the shroud, then into the engine. Typically the gains arent much, maybe 5 HP at the most, I did it more for the cool intake sound. The thing sounds great when you get it into the upper RPM range.

As far as damage goes, It's a fact that nothing will filter the incoming air as well as the stock filter. The K+N's do increase flow, but that comes at the cost of less filtration. Just be prepared to clean the filter often. I usually clean it every 1000 miles.

A lot of people dont realy believe in the idea of HP gains from intake. This is moslty true of smaller displacement engines. The real gains come from big bore engines that really need that air. For instance, muscle cars from the sixties, that had "shaker" hoods or cowl induction. By placing a scoop directly in front of the carburetor, they are able to suck even more air. And in some cases, (such as the Firebird 400) they could add up to 25 HP just by the scoop.

[Black328iS]

yeah im actually looking into buy the Jim Conforti Cold Air Intake. But for right now, I was just wondering if removing the factory airbox and driving will hurt my engine or car at all.

[93325i]

Well, yeah, you won't be filtering the air going into the intake manifold.
Dust, smog, bugs, etc getting sucked right in.

[Jared at Pelican Parts]

Do NOT run the car without any filtration. You risk sucking something up there which could damge your engine.