 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
 |
|
 |
||||||
PAT 4 > Issue 4: K&N Typhoon Short Ram Air Intake
Written By: David Pitlyuk
As we stated last issue, this time around we do our first performance oriented modification...the K&N Typhoon short ram air intake. For a reasonable price, this system is great. The pipes are all polished (also available in other colors), and one of the nice things we liked was an integrated MAF sensor. Rather than using your stock piece to put your MAF sensor in like some other systems, you just re-locate it into the K&N pipe. You'll see in the pics how good that looks.
Originally I was going to go with the JWT pop charger. I received the piece and ended up changing my mind, but solely for show reasons. I plan on having the car in some shows, so the appearance of the engine compartment definitely plays a big role. I was told by a few (and based on K&N's own dyno charts), that the two products before very similar and sounded similar, yet the K&N definitely looks much better in the engine compartment...at least in my opinion of course! Also, you must keep in mind that the K&N Typhoon is nearly twice the price, so I think it's a matter of personal preference. If you don't care about looks, I would personally recommend the JWT. In actuality though, we did have an issue with the K&N which we'll get to later on towards the dyno charts, so definitely read on for that.
Everything that comes with the system is shown here:
One thing I want to mention is the main difference between the warm air intake (WAI) aka JWT's, the cold air intake (CAI) aka Injen, and the K&N. With JWT's pop charger, the filter sits right in the engine compartment next to the engine. With Injen's CAI, the filter sits in the behind the grille area. With K&N, the filter sits in essentially the same place as JWT's, BUT an added extra (which makes it a short ram), is that the system includes another pipe with a scoop that sits behind the grille area (roughly where the Injen filter sits). It's definitely a very clever design, and I was eagerly awaiting to see what the dyno results would show.
Lets move on with installation. On a scale of 1 to 5 (5 being the hardest), I would give the install a rating of 2 in terms of difficulty. My reasoning behind that are as follows:
- K&N includes VERY detailed step-by-step instructions, and I highly commend them on this! You can download it here also.
- The entire install can be done with your basic tools
- The installation can easily be done without a lift, although we lifted the front of the car up with jack stands to make things easier...I would recommend the same.
With the detailed instructions that K&N provides, I would say that if you're a newbie, you should be able to tackle the project on your own and save the money paying somebody else to install. In fact, I consider myself a semi-newb when it comes to mechanics myself (I just have good people to turn to for advice/help :-) )
The absolute first thing you need to do is remove the negative cable from the battery. This will essentially prevent any check engine codes from being thrown (mainly because of the removal of the MAF sensor). In case you don't know why removing the cable will prevent this from happening, it's because the car has no power when you remove the MAF sensor, which could throw a code. When you finish the installation, the MAF sensor is re-installed, and when you put the cable back on, the computer in the car, never knows it was gone. Also, it should reset your ECU at the same time.
Here's what your stock engine compartment looks like:
Disconnect the wiring harness and unplug the MAF sensor plug:
Remove the bolt that connects the stock intake tube to the intake manifold (It's located right under the strut tower brace):
Remove the clamps on both sides of the intake tube, and pull it out:
Remove the bolt near the strut that connects the air box to the inner fender:
Remove the three plastic rivets on the bumper. I broke two of them, but after further research the best way to take them out is to pop out the middle just so it pops up (don't pull it up all way), and then pop the rest of the rivet out from underneath the entire thing, and it should come right out. Tricky, ehh?
Pull the air duct forward
Remove the stock air box, you'll have to unclip a wire in the process
Remove the hex bolt the holds the bumper cover bracket. This is a bit tricky to get to, but with some work you should be able to get it. Then just pull the bumper forward a little bit, and yank out the air duct:
Remove the one bolt that secures the MAF sensor bracket, and remove it:
This is where I raised the car on one side to help out, so you'll probably want to do that, and remove 12 bolts and 1 plastic rivet to drop down the splash guard as shown:
Remove the bolt that holds the air conditioner hard line bracket to the inner fender:
Take the included bracket and place it underneath the hole of where you just took the bolt out in the last step. Put the bolt back in, but don't tighten it all the way because you'll need to be able to move it around a bit before securing it down:
Place the K&N air box into the car, and put the mounting tab onto the rubber grommet that was on the bracket you just put in. Again, do not secure anything yet.
Once you've got everything lined up correctly, take the air box out, and tighten the bolt securing the bracket so it stays in place.
Put the air box back in using the providing hardware
Using the bolt you took off the car from the MAF sensor bracket, install the "L" bracket provided, having the long side on the airbox
Adjust the air box for best fitment, and tighten everything down.
Put the included air inlet tube into the vehicle like in the picture. Before doing so, make sure there is no debris in the tube, and if there is, rinse it out and dry it with a towel.
Secure the tube to the airbox using the provided hardware:
Install the provided bracket to the air inlet duct:
Remove the plastic insert on the top center of the grille
Slide the inlet duct into the inlet tube, and line up the bracket with the grille so it sits on one of the bars. Next slide the included cross member, and put the provided washer on the hex bolt. Then slide the molded duct bracket onto the bolt, and slide another washer and hex nut onto the bolt and tighten it. Last, re-install the plastic grille piece. Sorry for the lack of pictures on this step.
Put all the bolts and the one plastic rivet on the lower splash guard.
Re-install the bumper cover bracket using the bolts from before:
Put the plastic rivets back on the bumper.
Remove the MAF from the stock air cleaner assembly, and relocate it onto the provided intake tube. Again, make sure to check for any debris before putting the MAF on.
Install the silicone hose and 2 clamps onto the throttle body:
Put the new typhoon intake tube into the engine compartment. Slide it into the silicone hose, and secure the tube bracket to the intake manifold using the original bolt:
Tighten the bolts on the inlet tube on the front of the air box:
Install the filter into the air box using a clamp:
Re-connect the mass air flow sensor to the new tube:
Install the air box cover and secure it with the provided hardware on the bottom left side, and on the top right, use the plastic rivet you took off from earlier on. After that you're all done! Here's how it should look:
So you've done all that work, but what kind of gains are we talking about? Let's turn to what K&N got on their dyno...10.1rwhp. Pretty impressive for an intake! Keep in mind they test in 4th gear though, while the 1:1 gear ratio in the 350Z is in 5th gear. Here's their chart:
Unfortunately we weren't so lucky. Our best dyno with the intake compared to stock showed a loss of half a horsepower and a loss of 8.1 tq.
That's definitely not good at all, so the first thing I did was get a hold of K&N and get their thoughts. I sent them my dyno sheet, and there was mainly two things. The first, is if you look towards the end of the dyno curve, I had an odd fluctuation happening.
eipTuning seemed to think it was because the car was running rich. K&N's main statement was to re-dyno with a colder temperature. Even though the dyno is SAE corrected, K&N was recommending re-dyno'ing at a temperature between 60-70 degrees. If you notice from our chart, the dyno with the K&N intake, it was 83 degrees, compared to our baseline dyno where it was 73 degrees.
Now here's my main thought...If you think about it, it really doesn't make any sense for the intake to LOSE power. It's feeding more air into the system, faster. Simple as that. So the only fair thing to do is to re-dyno at a colder temperature and see if there's any difference. I'm sorry for leaving you guys right at the edge of the cliff here, but I never got a chance to do so before installing the Injen SES straight-tip exhaust (a future issue), and the Z-Xtreme grounding kit. So I won't have a dyno for this issue, but for a future issue, you will get your dyno chart (at a lower temp) and we'll try and compare the numbers and see if maybe it was an error this time around (I have a feeling something was up).
In the end, I really do FEEL like there is a power gain, it sounds great, and it looks great, so this gets my pending two thumbs up for now. For a recommendation as to where to get one, contact Jason at Performance Nissan, and make sure to tell him Dave from ActiveTuning sent you in order to get the best price.
Thanks to eipTuning for their dyno services.
That's it for this issue. So what can we expect for issue 5? I'm still juggling between a few things, so I'm going to leave it a surprise for now ;-)
|
Check out our sponsors:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
