Is it really worth putting a Cold Air Intake on 370z and what HP gains

Originally Posted by gsxr750

I 'm using the motor trend nismo to the base model comparisin , to show what little effect a marginal HP increase, in this case none.

Dyno runs are one thing to show performance and I would agree that a 50-100 hp increase would definitly be felt by the driver, but with the marginal 5-10HP from an intake kit, it may not even provide any better numbers than stock if it were tested on the street for 0-60 , 1/4 mile and top end. Test results may even prove worse.

Another thing to point out is that once a modification has been made to the exhaust or intake, the engine requires a new engine map to installed by either a laptop with a proven map for your specific geographical location or a manually adjusted map, calibrated with a dyno and a laptop. In order to take full advantage of the mods.

I know the ECM will relearn itself, as you drive it , but it will not optimize for the best peformance possible, when compared to a dyno/mapping adjustment.

Originally Posted by gsxr750

I 'm using the motor trend nismo to the base model comparisin , to show what little effect a marginal HP increase, in this case none.

Dyno runs are one thing to show performance and I would agree that a 50-100 hp increase would definitly be felt by the driver, but with the marginal 5-10HP from an intake kit, it may not even provide any better numbers than stock if it were tested on the street for 0-60 , 1/4 mile and top end. Test results may even prove worse.

Another thing to point out is that once a modification has been made to the exhaust or intake, the engine requires a new engine map to installed by either a laptop with a proven map for your specific geographical location or a manually adjusted map, calibrated with a dyno and a laptop. In order to take full advantage of the mods.

I know the ECM will relearn itself, as you drive it , but it will not optimize for the best peformance possible, when compared to a dyno/mapping adjustment.

Originally Posted by chuckd05

with all the money i put into my Z

CAI, Long tube headers, the G3 CAI, 4.08 final drive, uprev tune... costing me close to 4k id imagine, i wish i didnt spend a penny and purchased a SCer or Turbo, I would of still had the car...

but if you are modding it, i say test pipes and tune are the two things that help the most

Originally Posted by brucelidat

I agree, both SC and TT cost way more than 4k. What happened to your Z and why would having FI cause you to still have it?

Originally Posted by brucelidat

I agree, both SC and TT cost way more than 4k. What happened to your Z and why would having FI cause you to still have it?

Originally Posted by FL 4Motion

iirc, he sold it and got a 135i, so easier to pull whp out of a factory FI'd car.

Originally Posted by gsxr750

Remember your comparing 1000cc gas powered AIR PUMP to a 5700cc AIR PUMP, which one engine would produce a dirty air filter or restricted air filter, if both engines are stationary using the same airfilter and run in identical outside air conditions and run at the same rpm. Logic would tell you the 5700cc engine would need the airfilter replaced sooner than the 1000cc engine.

Originally Posted by gsxr750

Another thing to point out is that once a modification has been made to the exhaust or intake, the engine requires a new engine map to installed by either a laptop with a proven map for your specific geographical location or a manually adjusted map, calibrated with a dyno and a laptop. In order to take full advantage of the mods.

Originally Posted by Cmike2780

Moot arguement. HP numbers are for bragging rights anyways. I'd buy a CAI because of the sound and it looks shiny under the hood. Same goes for the exhaust. If I gain a few ponies, awesome! If not, still awesome because it sounds cool.

As far as reusable filter filtration and dirt going into the engine, the amount is negligible over paper filters. Each type has it's pro's and cons. The oem paper work great as long as you replace them on schedule and don't allow them to get excessively dirty. They tend to be loose effectiveness abruptly near the end of their life. It's a no brainer to just keep using these if you don't really care about a few more hp's and that's fine. Part of the fun of modifying though, is to pick up every hp you can. It's a trade off that some are willing to risk, while others, such as the OP aren't. To each his own.

Originally Posted by gsxr750

On to the question, do you really think the cold air intakes are really worth the money and do you really get real world HP gains.

One thing a lot of ppl. don't know about these external air filter systems is that while they do flow more air they also tend to let more dirt into your engine. I come from a sport bike background and early sports cars for 30yrs.

What we found out about oiled air filters is that while they may work good when new, after about a year of use on the vehicle they became very dirty and when we cleaned them, we were never able to get them completely clean. What we found was that there was a lot of dirt or grit inside the air filter and we were never able to get rid of it.

If we reinstalled the oiled air filter this dirt would have been sucked directly into the engine. Note we correctly cleaned it from the inside out, as not to allow any dirt into the inside of the air filter.

To play it safe we went back to a stock disposable paper airfilter element.

What a lot of ppl. forget is that the airfilter is meant to protect the engine from dirt and its best to install a new airfilter every few thousands of miles.

Another interesting note is that the use of external air filters style on sport bikes were abandoned, about 15yrs. ago after it was found that they really didn't provide any real hp gains over use of the stock air box and filter.

This was due to the fact that big 4 jap bike manufactures put so much design effort into the tunned intake air tracks on most sport bikes, that most after market air filters actually reduced HP when used.

While a lot of ppl still buy these external and internal oiled filter types on sport bikes, they do so because they really don't know how they work in real life driving environment.

Originally Posted by CBRich

Not necessarily true.



Also, not true.

We get it. You don't like aftermarket intakes. You don't think they make enough power. You drove motorcycles. Your warranty will get blowed up if you get an intake. Yeesh! If you don't want one don't buy one.

Sidenote: I also agree that it seems you are trying to force your opinion on others. And you are stating a lot of opinion as fact which is terribly annoying.