Importance Of MAF Location on KA-T

[DevilMB3017]

I'm hoping this title will be descriptive enough for people searching...

I've come to realize the total importance of MAF location. For a long time I was running a recirculated BOV with my MAF sensor pretty much directly on my turbo air inlet. I had a lot of strange driveability problems, like a sometimes erratic idle, stalling on decel, etc - WITH the recirculated BOV.

Due to lots of other little issues with the car, I didn't ever have time or energy to bother moving the MAF...Until recently.

All my driveability problems are gone. I installed a bigger filter, and the MAF is a little over 12 inches of piping away from the turbo inlet. It seems like everything on my car changed after this. The idle is better, the vacuum has gone up, and both of that has resulted not only in better driveablity, but also fuel economy, and the feeling of power in the car. I also disconnected the recirculation fitting on my BOV, and the car doesn't stall or run rich upon decel either. It's nice having a very loud HKS SSQV.

I strongly recommend anyone that finds this thread by searching to move their MAF sensor at least 12-16 inches from your turbocharger, per pretty much everyones recommendation. I even have suggested it in the past because of the tuners at Enthalpy. But upon doing this myself, they are 1000% correct.

[WDRacing]

Thanks for posting your personal experience man. It's always good for people to read ACTUAL results vs what we may tell them is a good idea. Especially with all the conjecture floating around the internet these days.

Snap a pic and post it up so we can have a visual reference.

WD

[DevilMB3017]

Agreed 100% WD - I've even suggested this as per Enthalpy... But the results were even more then I expected.

I will post a picture when I go out to lunch. It's nice actually being able to drive my 240 to work...

[S13FX]

Also one thing I know that works if you still plan on sticking to it with the maf, is getting your self a one directional maf like one from the supra, and then you don't really have to worry about how far its positioned.

But if you do that you will need something like SAFC or some type of ecu tune to compensate for it.

[DevilMB3017]

Here ya go guys:



A mandrel bent piece of pipe, kind of like an S2K. I'm worried about heat soak too much because the fans blow on it and then it goes through the intercooler anyways.

AEM has sales on eBay sometimes. I picked up that 3x9 air filter for ~25 bucks shipped!

[WDRacing]

Why behind the hot a$$ radiator?

Makes me wanna throw up in my mouth a little

[DevilMB3017]

WD:

It's hard to see, but it's above the rad a bit. It's hitting my hood on bumps actually.

Essentially we're making sure it works. There's a couple of options I'm toying first. First is having to cut up the bumper/fender/something to get it somewhere else. Second is a heat shield to block the heat from coming off. Third is whatever you guys out there might suggest

[kouki_hmongster]

All this time i thought you knew that it had to be at least 12" away from turbo.

i thought this was turbo 101 info for all the maf guys. j/p but its good that you found this out. hope others read that dont know read this thread.

[scheffler]

I would go with the first one you sugested. Route it kinda like a cold air but not all the way to the ground if you know what i am trying to get at.

i dont think a heat shield would work out that well cause you would either need a fully enclosed sheild and then you would have to put a cut out in the hood to get air to it.

Or if you did a partial shield so you could get air into it it would still be heat soaked.

Maybe a cutout in the hood could work though might be kinda cool a full box shield and a cut out maybe.

Or you could do a blow through. I love mine dont have really any driving issues either

[DevilMB3017]

All this time i thought you knew that it had to be at least 12" away from turbo.

I did know. In fact, I suggest it other people having problems. I just had numerous other problems that took priority over this. I was just floored by how much it changed the attitude of the car.

Or you could do a blow through. I love mine dont have really any driving issues either

I've heard good and bad about blow through too, like that it can kill your MAF quicker. For as long as it's working this way, I'm going to keep it.

As for the air filter location, I'm either going to start hacking up sheet metal or the hood...I can't decide yet.

[WDRacing]

A fully enclosed shield is actually quite easy to make and the benefits are awsome. Course you'll need a small piece of pipe or dryer duct to direct air into the enclosure.

The simplest and easiest way to make a cold air partition is to roll on over to Home Depot and pick up some foam sheeting. I used the kind that we put inside our tool boxes when I was in the USAF...cause it was free...ok I stole it.

Any foam about a 1/2 to 1" thick will work fine. Simply cut it to shape and glue the pieces together. The pieces are easy to attach while the glue dries if you use simple dry wall screws. They can either stay attached or can be removed after.

This gives you virtually limitless creative design and always lends to the custom look when you pop your hood. Function and form for a cheap DIY price...teh eff bomb!!!1!!!eleven!!ing win in my book. You can also hinge the top part for ease of access...up to you.

The foam takes paint real easy as well

Now move that damn filter

[lrb_2000]

I moved my intake pipe to the same spot you did, in front of the radiator.. I noticed a huge difference.. no more back firing, idle is more consistent.. I used to have to adjust my safc as the engine warmed up and cooled down just to make it idle right.

[madd ocx]

yeah i'm having the stalling problem as well.. i'm going to extend my maf piping as per enthalpy and the good folks at ka-t.org! i will let you guys know the results!

[esahuque]

WD:

It's hard to see, but it's above the rad a bit. It's hitting my hood on bumps actually.

Essentially we're making sure it works. There's a couple of options I'm toying first. First is having to cut up the bumper/fender/something to get it somewhere else. Second is a heat shield to block the heat from coming off. Third is whatever you guys out there might suggest

option #2 worked for me, I used to have it where you do now and the fans messed with the maf readings. so i moved it here and made a shield to stop water.

[DevilMB3017]

option #2 worked for me, I used to have it where you do now and the fans messed with the maf readings. so i moved it here and made a shield to stop water.

I'm going to do something similar to this I think, when I have some time.

Thanks for the pictures, the shield looks pretty nice. I think I might try to find some of this foam stuff WD is talking about. Again, I'm really not sure...

[madd ocx]

ok i extended my maf piping here is some pics. quick question to those who have done this, how long did it take for the car to stop stalling before it ran right after the pipe extending? did you have to drive it for a while? or was it right away? here are the pics let me know what you think! this was the pipng before. here is pics of the piping now..

[coolbone28]

It should be noticeable right away. At least mine was when i extended it down into the fender. The only other problem i see with your piping is your recirc hose actually pointing towards your mafs. It would be better if it enters the piping at an angle with the flow of air.

[DevilMB3017]

I noticed an improvement right away, after I adjusted my idle and fuel pressure back down to normal

[madd ocx]

hmmm.. well at the beginning of the whole process i tried using the safc to to adjust the deaccleration. so do you think the afc setting should be set normal and let the enthalpy ecu do its thing?but here is a list of my setup:greddy turbo kitenthalpy ecu tune370cc injectorsn60 mafmegan catbackkoyo radngk spark plugs and wiresbrian crower v2 camsgreddy rs bovgodspeed front mount intercooler

[esahuque]

hmmm.. well at the beginning of the whole process i tried using the safc to to adjust the deaccleration. so do you think the afc setting should be set normal and let the enthalpy ecu do its thing?but here is a list of my setup:greddy turbo kitenthalpy ecu tune370cc injectorsn60 mafmegan catbackkoyo radngk spark plugs and wiresbrian crower v2 camsgreddy rs bovgodspeed front mount intercooler

your dec settings on your safc can make your car idle rough if not adjusted right. try turning off your dec on the safc and see if it helps any. if it did you need to redo the dec settings again.

[madd ocx]

well what i meant was when the car started stalling out i tried using the afc to adjust the deacceleration. then i tried recirculating the bov, then i did the maf piping.. but i never reset the afc or changed the settings. so i'm thinking setting it back to normal might do the trick.. this is getting really strenuous.

[hawk83]

looks good

[hawk83]

what type of turbo is that, or whats it off of?

[hawk83]

whoops nevermind, dumb question, im still workn on my readn skillz

[madd ocx]

It should be noticeable right away. At least mine was when i extended it down into the fender. The only other problem i see with your piping is your recirc hose actually pointing towards your mafs. It would be better if it enters the piping at an angle with the flow of air.

thats not the recirculation hose, the recirc hose is on the other side of the pipe you really can't see it from the pics.. the hose your seeing is the one that connects from the vavle cover, for got what its called..

[madd ocx]

okay gentlemen no more stalling! car runs okay now, thanks for all the help! maf piping does help a lot!