Sorry...I haven't had a chance to respond until now. I won't specifically respond to anyone's post. I'll just state my thoughts on the subject.

The page in question is http://www.2gnt.com/www/corbin/airbox.html

That page is rather old...Moses helped with the editing.

At the time, there were few intakes on the market. Short rams were expensive and CAI's were rare and very expensive. The airbox is a compromise. It is meant to eliminate the shortcomings of the short ram and add some of the benefits of the CAI. Here is a scientific chart:

Well designed tuned CAI
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-
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Plain untuned CAI
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Short ram with airbox and bumper pick-up
-
-
-
Short ram
-
-
Hacked stock airbox
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Stock airbox

Some people live in areas where it actually rains and often have to drive through several inches of standing water. That can be a real issue with a low mounted filter (like on most CAI). So, they make CAI's that can be switched to a short ram when necessary. Many of us don't have the ability to predict the weather, so we can switch our CAI to a short ram the night before. Low mounted filters are also subject to damage from road debris. So, a CAI is not the best answer for many people.

The engine compartment can get very hot. This is especially true on cars with aftermarket headers. Those things can just dump heat into the air. A short ram or hacked stock airbox will just suck that up. You'll get some gains from freeing up the intake, but you lose some from sucking up super hot air.

So what is the answer? For many people, it is a short ram with airbox and cool air inlet. The airbox keeps the intake from sucking up the hot engine compartment air and the inlet in the bumper supplies the airbox with reasonably cool air. You will get the benefit of the freer flowing intake with near ambient air temps. The bumper is one of the highest pressure zones on the body of the car. You can expect that air will easily enter the ducting. You can't expect any real ram-air effect...it just won't happen.

You can also use plastic for the airbox. I made my second one from polypropylene and that worked well. You should try your best to seal the airbox against the hood. My second airbox was pretty well contoured and sealed well. I did mount a temperature sensor on the air filter for testing. Temperatures with the airbox were always 10-20F lower than without. Thats not earth shattering, but meaningful nonetheless.

I am a strong believer in cooler intake temperatures. I am also a strong believer in easy, cheap mods that will improve performance even by a little. As long as it helps, that is good enough.


Corbin

'95 ESI-T
HRC+FMIC+ETC...



Gimme fuel...Gimme fire...Gimme that which I desire