Interesting info on air intake temps (Y33)

[bullittandy]

I had the air intake scoop off my 99 Q45 the other day for some work and drove it around for a bit with it off. For those that don't know the 97+ cars have a plastic scoop that sits on top of the radiator and feeds air to airbox. The sound was great with the air intake off, a little bit of a growl on full throttle but silent when cruising. I kind of liked it and thought I'd check what kind of air intake temp increase their would be with it removed.

Stock air intake in place the intake air temperature measured about 15-20 degress hotter than ambient while cruising through my neighborhood and 5 degrees hotter than ambient after 3 minutes on highway.

Air intake removed so that the airbox was taking engine compartment air from directly behind driver headlight. 30-35 degrees hotter than ambient cruising in neighborhood and 10-15 hotter on highway.

A fairly significant difference but what was most noteworthy was the speed at which the temp changed. With the stock air intake in place the temp increased very slowly at low speeds and dropped very quickly once on the highway. Compared to the air intake removed when it took about 3 times longer to lower the temp on the highway and AS SOON as I got off the highway the air intake temp shot up.

Now, if I could lose the stock intake but create a zone of fresh air.......

[Victor]

Thats probably the reason my car performs better since I took the K&N air intake and cone filter the previous owner of my J30T had installed off and replaced it with the original factory airfilter box and filter that hooks up to a duct leading out of the engine compartment instead of using engine compartment air like the K&N does. On a hot day on a long trip the engine compartment can get unbelievably hot.

[paranoidjack]

On cars of this class, I think it's safe to say the engineers did a pretty good job.

Unlike my prelude, which has a thousand ills from the factory.