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Geez! talk about digging up an old thread...

Anyway I thought I would make an airbox for my car.

Materials:

500 x 300 LDPE (low density poly ethelene) sheet

500 x 600 open cell 1cm thick foam

500 x 500 perspex sheet

1.5 metre rubber edging

Some contact adheasive

Home made bracket

4 self tapping screws

small nut and bolt

Method:

I made a template out of cardboard the size of the box so it would fit between the strut tower and radiator support and cut a hole in the right place for the AFM adapter to fit through. This took a few goes to get it right and there were little gaps where air could get thru but it was just a template and i was going to seal these holes with foam anyway.

Once I was happy with the result I made a copy of the template out of plastic. I then covered the plastic with foam on both sides leaving an extra 1cm of foam all around the edges to seal all the little gaps. I used contact adheasive to glue the 2 togeather.

I then put the partition in place in the engine bay and attached the air filter to the AFM adapter. See Below...

cai1.jpg

As you can see I get a lot of airflow around and under the headlight to feed the box. Enough to fit my whole hand thru.

cai2.jpg

I then made a template for the cover, and once I was happy with it I copied in in perspex.

cai4.jpg

Once it was in place I could see where the mounting holes had to go and drilled holes to suit. I also had to make a bracket on the rounded side to seal between the perspex and the foam. Once that was done I put a rubber trim around the perspex to keep it neat and screwed it togeather.

cai3.jpg

The foam is excellent as it seals perfectly and acts as an insulator

I measused the temps before and after using a jaycar indoor/outdoor temp probe.

Before

Ambient outside temp: 26deg

Temprature of probe stuck to filter: 51deg

After

Ambient outside temp: 24deg

Temprature of probe stuck to filter in airbox: 25deg

and the car is much quicker on a hot day than before. Even sitting at the lights it dosent suffer heat soak like before.

Hope this guide is useful to those wanting to make up an air box.

The whole thing cost me less than $40 to make :P

Edited by CEF11E

just out of interest has anyone set up a cold air induction using the standard air box. Reason i ask is that since getting an after market FMIC the snorkel has had to be removed. It is running a K + N panel filter but at the moment she is sucking alot of engine bay warm air :D

My main issue is trying to find some sort of adapter that will connect up to the standard entrance point of the airbox as you would know its a stupid shape :)

is the air temp probe directly attached to the airfilter or floating loose in the airbox area? if its attached to the filter directly then it will read incorrectly

I know I am a techie :D

It was placed out of the thermal stream of the pod about 5cm away :)

just out of interest has anyone set up a cold air induction using the standard air box. Reason i ask is that since getting an after market FMIC the snorkel has had to be removed. It is running a K + N panel filter but at the moment she is sucking alot of engine bay warm air :(

My main issue is trying to find some sort of adapter that will connect up to the standard entrance point of the airbox as you would know its a stupid shape :P

You can probably just modify the stock snorkel so it fits beside your cooler pipe - there are a couple of posts around showing how to do it, just need to cut a chunk out of it and glue or plastic weld a new bit in to fill the hole.

I pulled the stock airbox out of mine and put in a K&N pod, but kept the snorkel in place. I've got the bits required to build a heat shield partition that will still use the snorkel, as there doesn't seem to be a better way of getting cold air in without cutting holes.

  • 2 weeks later...

what i done was use one of those window shields to block out sun/heat, they not only stop air from going in, but its insulated! test it out yourself put shove a bit directly onto your boiling hot engine and push down with ur hand u wont feel a smidgen of heat! works better then havinga custom metal box made up, what i done was used some plywood board above my pod, cut the window shield into a few pieces, just jammed the plywood just under the side that sticks out on the inside part of the engine bay(side front left quarter panel) then i wrapped the whole thing around with the heatshield! used 4 pieces and some staples + electrical tape to make it look pretty;) lol, i have a front mount so i have the free space where the 2 pipes used to be and is now single so i used a 3 inch rubber pipe jammed it in so it takes air from down under the guard aswell into the space, also incorporated it to shield all the way over the pipe all the way onto the turbo, so none of piping going into the turbo will be hot either! next job i will be heat wrapping my cooler pipe that runs accross the front of my engine just behind the radiator! all that hot air :)

cost me <$10

and works a treat! wish i could probe the temp :) all i can do is use my fingers to try to jimmy into the non existant gaps and feels alot cooler then engine bay!

Edited by nemz
  • 1 year later...

awake ye ol' thread!!!

haha. neway i had cut out a dodgy piece of styrofoam(1cm thick) and used taht for a while.. didnt make squat diff.. so i bought me a cold airbox from ebay. only 70NZD. haha. thought id stir something up...

Im going to somehow put some ICE packs in the box when i get it.. cos it will def make an improvement. will let ya know how i go :)

  • 2 months later...
awake ye ol' thread!!!

haha. neway i had cut out a dodgy piece of styrofoam(1cm thick) and used taht for a while.. didnt make squat diff.. so i bought me a cold airbox from ebay. only 70NZD. haha. thought id stir something up...

Im going to somehow put some ICE packs in the box when i get it.. cos it will def make an improvement. will let ya know how i go :santa:

haha, i think that's a bad idea - one, they'll melt pretty quickly so the 'possible' benefit will be short lived, two, they'll probably produce condensation that will get sucked through or stuck to your filter.

everyone's talking about how easy it is to make a partition so maybe i'll actually take some initiative and do it.

i'm planning just a partition rather than a 'lidded' item cos i'm thinking in the future i might add a vent on the bonnet. bah who knows.

You mean something like this http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Custom-Black-Cold-A...1QQcmdZViewItem but without the lid??

cheap enough that i wouldnt bother with making your own.

Interesting that he implies that its legal since having anything other then the factory airbox in vic is illegal, i would like to see if this would go over an air box tho, that way its sucking air from behind the headlight not the engine bay, then it is legal.

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