Review: AAM Competition Cold Air Intakes S-Line/R-Line

Leuz

DISCLAIMER:

Hi, here's my impressions on these CAIs, after having driven for few weeks with them installed.

First thing first,


They look very good in the engine bay and the pipe on the passenger's side has AAM etched on it, fancy

Here are my impressions overall

Installation time: took me a while, mostly because of the air duct cutting... yeah I know it should be easy and quick, but I wanted to do a good job so I first cut them and then started enlarging the holes until the rubber hose was comfortably fitting with no restrictions.

2013 Bumper removal: this was quite a PITA. Having DRLs made this a challenge for someone who's never removed a bumper... I had to get the wheels and the front fenders off to easy access the DRLs, unbolt them, wrap them in bubbly plastic and tape them to the brakes. Then I could easily remove the bumper.

Feeling: these CAIs are a great choice for a DD. I currently have them on stock engine, stock exhaust and no tune (S-Line mode). They are quiet on low RPMs, but they start coming alive around 3000rpm and open up sucking air at >3500rpm. Performance wise I can only speak about butt-dyno, as I am waiting on my full exhaust+tune to actually get a new dyno, but the engine definitely feels more responsive on mid-RPMs. Of course, I've never expected miracles from a stock car with CAI, neither should you

Pros:

• Big, these pipes are big! The tubing diameter is 2.75" which by default would require a tune. This is called R-Line mode. On top of this, they come with an insert, close to the MAF sensor, to actually "restrict" the piping diameter so they don't need a tune. This is called S-Line mode.
  ( Click to show/hide )

  
  I think this is awesome, you can install them without a tune [S-Line] and when you are actually ready, you remove the restrictions [R-Line], tune your car and BAM, Air Flow FTW!
• Rubber hoses go through the cut air ducts, this way it's easier to adjust the fitting and, guess what, you have rubber over A/C lines! This comes with a price though, and you have to enlarge the holes a lot!
• You can butt-feel the gains.
• AAM offers an awesome customer support, Khoi@AAM is very active on this forum and always offering help and support (also with my ranting about G3 Vs AAM), sorry about that Khoi

Cons:

• Installation instructions. Available at their website, instructions are not very descriptive and IMHO skip a lot of steps, some of which important like cutting the air ducts on the driver's side, which is a slightly different approach because of the infamous A/C lines, removing the crash bar, dealing with the cable running in front of the bumper. I *HIGHLY* recommend to follow and integrate those with ak370z's DIY on Stillen G3's installation here: DIY: Finally Installed The STILLEN G3 Intake today! Lots of Pics inside (AK370Z)
  Anyway, here's a picture of the cutting done on the driver's side
  ( Click to show/hide )

  
• Clearance. Were you seriously expecting 2.75'' pipes to have good clearance? C'mon... - On the passanger's side there is 1/4 inch between the main pipe and the crash bar. On the front, there's a metal bar on which a cable is running along where the bumper gets clipped to that has 3 bolts; the central one will go back in, the 2 bolts on the side will not fit anymore because they are too long, so I had to ziptie instead. I also had to wrap some rubber on the final metal pipe to avoid rattles against some metal supports. (did anybody actually understand any of this?...).
• If I have to be extremely picky (did anyone say freak?), the kit came with a wrong smaller metal clamp that wasn't fitting. Not really a big deal as I re-used the ones from the stock intakes... but still... - Update: Khoi offered to ship me a new clamp of the right size, now, that's what I call Customer Support!

Conclusions: I like these and I enjoyed dealing with AAM. If you are searching for an alternative to the pricey and obvious and hyper-branded Stillen G3s, these CAI are to me the perfect alternative. Highly recommended.

__________________
2013 PW 370Z Touring+Sport, NAV
Tint 35% side, 18% back | RJM clutch pedal | ZSpeed SS lines | Stillen Gen3 CAI | Fast Intentions HFC and TDX 12'' CF CBE | UpRev

God-Speed

Thanks for the good write up!!

Sales@AAMComp

Thanks again for the honest review Leo. I'm sending out your missing clamp and tshirt today Sorry we ran out of mediums, but I got a large for you. Don't worry I wear medium, our large is on the smaller side anyways (after you give it a few washes! haha)

__________________

Tyler Day, Technical Sales
TylerD@aamcompetition.com
301-497-9214 Direct
AAM Competition | YouTube channel | LIKE us on Facebook!

Sales@AAMComp

Unofficially released; these WILL work on g37's as well. Yes other manufacturers may have different parts/part numbers between the 370z/g37, ours doesn't! However we have not yet made or designed a hydro shield for the filters (g37's have a grill in their bumper and may need some protection for the filters while driving in extremely heavy rain) The good news is everything lines up here's a sneak peak on one of our sponsored g37, powder coated flat black

__________________

Tyler Day, Technical Sales
TylerD@aamcompetition.com
301-497-9214 Direct
AAM Competition | YouTube channel | LIKE us on Facebook!

XwChriswX

Had a chance to dyno yet with them on to see gains??

__________________

Bonnie - Stage 2, Audio build coming this fall!
R.I.P. Abby 3/29/10 - 3/30/14

XwChriswX

I know someone who has them...

__________________

Bonnie - Stage 2, Audio build coming this fall!
R.I.P. Abby 3/29/10 - 3/30/14

XwChriswX

This guy.

<----

__________________

Bonnie - Stage 2, Audio build coming this fall!
R.I.P. Abby 3/29/10 - 3/30/14

Sales@AAMComp

waiting on the lower 90 degree bend from our supplier, they're due in the end of June, taking forever but once they're in we're bringing z stig's car to install and do a before/after dyno

__________________

Tyler Day, Technical Sales
TylerD@aamcompetition.com
301-497-9214 Direct
AAM Competition | YouTube channel | LIKE us on Facebook!

David Parra

Whats the price shipped to 91744

juld0zer

since it's sold as a "cold air intake", OP do you have access to an OBD2 scanner that can display live intake air temperatures?

i have some baseline data for both the stock airboxes with cool air ducts vs the Stillen G3 which in my experience reduced IAT by 1*c in similar conditions. Although small, the reduction is enough to qualify it as a CAI, relative to the baseline - ie stock intakes.

My Stillen G3 install took about 6hrs. most of it was tidying up the install and getting stuff to fit. The 2 bolts you had to replace with zip ties, i had to replace the left hand side one with a zip tie. by nature of the Stillen's sloppy fit, i did not have to replace the RHS bolt

RanRich

Does anyone else have these? I like how the piping is symmetrical and sits higher in the bay, farther from the exhaust manifolds as compared to the G3 and Z1 kits. Would be really interested in going this route in the future if people are satisfied with it!

__________________
AAM | Dynosty | Ecutek | Eibach | Hawk | H&R | Nismo | Stillen | Stoptech | Z1

smooth

I have had this set up for about 2 years now. I only had 1 hick up. And to be honest I have been to busy to investigate to see was the true of the problem was. I have not had the car tuned yet just a few bolt on and at the Z nationals 2 years ago I dynoed 319. I don't know if that's was good or bad.

bushyguy

I installed these intakes around the end of May this season, also did the FI TDX exhaust + FI HFC.

Took the car in for an ECUTek tune here in Utah (FNP Tuning) and can tell you the car is a little more picky about the MAF readings due to the larger internal diameter.

I'll also tell you that it was totally worth it; I'm at 3400 ft elevation so the more airflow the better. Car put down 289 rwhp on a mustang dyno and runs beautifully.

RanRich

I put the same numbers down untuned in KC with a catback only. Altitude is a real killer.

What do you mean when you say the MAFs are picky? Hiccups on WOT?

__________________
AAM | Dynosty | Ecutek | Eibach | Hawk | H&R | Nismo | Stillen | Stoptech | Z1

bushyguy

Yeah, altitude has its draw backs but canyon runs in October quite enjoyable.

It was actually going into the throttle out of first gear that was the problem. Under 2.5k, there was noticeable hesitation because the ECU thought it was getting too much air; lucky my tuner is a stud and fixed the issue without any grief.

WOT > 2.5k RPM and the car would sing. Basically the car would get super pissed off if I drove it conservatively.

No issues to speak of currently.