designing a new intake
 

now that it's getting colder, and I have a little money to play with, I'm planing on redesigning my intake. The stock intake has two air boxes before that filter. I'm really not sure what the purpose of these are, it kind of seems like it's to "fill up" the engine compartment to make it look good for customers. One box quite large, looks like about .750 gallons. I've pulled this mess out before, and everything seems to work just fine & millage was the same. So i could use this as part of the system if it has benefits, but it's plastic....
I was thinking i would move the air filter out (maybe swap it for a cone) and run the intake air over an exhaust pipe to heat is before going over the throttle.

My mane questions and concerns are;
dose the air box system have benefits
How hot is beneficial, it's there an ideal temp
And At what temp will i mess up my MAP sensor (and other stuff in my intake manifold)

my understanding on the boxes on the intake path is that it is to remove noise (like a muffler on your intake). I used to have a dodge truck. I put a CAI on it and the noise level went up tremendously. when the butterfly would open, it would whistle really loudly and at a certain throttle position, there would be a constant hiss as the air passed over the butterfly plate. I actually kinda liked it.

many things that are on cars now deal with comfort level and not necessarily efficiency. not too many people like the loud intakes though they are less restrictive.

as far as the WAI, I have heard that a good target temp is 180 degrees and not much above that. I have a descent setup (pics in my garage). mine has it 179 degrees that I have seen during the summer and stays within the triple digits during the winter (barely). I would rather have something that I don't have to tweak constantly but that is just me.

Bad idea.
https://blog.autospeed.com/2003/11/30...-into-intakes/

tjts,
thanks for the link it was quite helpful, I don't understand your "bad idea" comment. The info i got out of that page very much agreed with what BEEF had to say. I really don't care about noise. I do care about mileage (not power, but a cold air dash switch would be cool) and i care about sucking up a puddle...

I'm going to do some brain storming, and dig up some parts and try to find one of those grill thermometers with a long wire (hopefully on clearance)

If i can find my camera i'll post some of the proses

your vehicle is a '99 you could easily use a scangauge to tell the temp (along with other things) they are expensive at $170 but according to wasabi owner, some people may be getting rid of their cheaper if you are interested.

https://www.gassavers.org/showthread.php?t=11525 check out his post on this thread (he is the one with the pink smart, hard to miss)

Beef,
i read that thread and have been looking at products of that nature. I really want one that dose data logging, which run more like 350.00. I can't afford that any time soon, or 170 for that matter, so the $8 alternatives look good to me. Also extra gauges and switches look really cool

If you're willing to use a laptop with it, an ELM327-based unit ought to come in a lot cheaper and allow both logging and live data (but you'll only be able to log and display it on the laptop).

what some people have done for intake air temp is to use a remote outside thermometer and just drop the transmitter in the airbox. I think those are pretty cheap. that way you can mount the receiver wherever you want.

it is at least an idea.

I found a indoor outdoor thermometer for $8 that reads outdoor temps up to 158F (strange number to top out at). I was thinking one of those digital meat thermometer with a wire as they can read much higher temps (at lest 210, hope your food wouldn't need more), but the price cord length and the price difference makes the choice clear, i may upgrade with warmer weather... but i should have something to plug into my computer by then.

the ELM327 units look great! and i can afford one now, but i should wait for the next pay check. I found just the chips for sale too, for an even greater savings. I don't know if i'm qualified for that project. I'll need to look into it some more. I'm sure i could find some info on doing this. I'm fine with the soldering end of things (if i find a diagram), but when it gets to the software I don't know what i'm doing at all.

For the ELM327, the kits ought to be easy enough. Starting with just a chip and making your own PCB and getting all the components together might be tough. The software is easy...you don't write your own, you just use any of maybe a dozen free programs that work with it.

Don't buy a $30 Chinese fake ELM327 unit on eBay unless you're into gambling. I've heard of people having good results but mine barely works with one of my vehicles, doesn't work with the others, and barely works with one piece of software...it's so useless that it's collecting dust. Maybe someday I'll see if it uses the same PCB layout and components as a good one and order a real ELM327 chip for it.

Moment of trivia:
158f is 70C, which would explain the oddest of the thermometer.
Same with max tire pressures; 44 and 51psi is 3 and 3.5 bar.

trollbait,
good call. Something seemed familiar about that number, but I didn't put it together.

holycow,
sounds like soled advice. Do you know of any free software for a palm. This seems like a way to upgrade the system to something i would use everyday.
I'm off to work, I just blocked off my radiator with some cardboard (with some slits on the side with the fan) so I want to give myself some extra time just in case. ...

I think I remember seeing ELM327 software for the Palm, but I don't remember if it was free.

Usually datasheets for chips give you a sample circuit you can follow. If you just copy that circuit they normally work perfect. I did that with my digital volume control chips.

Well this thread ran off topic and got forgotten, much like my intake project :)
I took off the silly plastic intake thing. Now it make more nose, and I don't really care.

I found a cooking thermometer at Ocean State Job Lot (a close out store). It's just like a indoor out door therm. but it reads from 32-300F with no "indoor" read out. Plus you can set a alarm temp (could be a good way to let myself know my air filter is on fire)

I haven't made any steps in making a WAI. as i've likely mentioned i working with a Horizontal 4 engine, which exhausts from the bottom, and draws air from the top. This got me thinking about bringing the exhaust to the intake. Say a .250" pipe from just behind the cat. up to a little radiator where the intakes pulls from.

Then it hit me, why not blow a little exhaust into the intake. I've looked for some info on people doing this, but came up with very little (a few patents).
Exhaust in the intake would be like having a smaller cylinder, and if taken pre-cat. it would have a little fuel in it too. No computer mods would be necessary if put in after the MAP sensor.
Lots of pressure regulators, computer controlled cooling fans and valves would likely be necessary to get the best results, but something should be possible with out.

Any thoughts on this topic would be great.
Also any knowledge about high temp gate and or pin valves that are readily available would be of much use.
oh, and dose anyone have a stick welder i could use?

That idea sounds like existing EGR systems. You might find it easier to modify an EGR system than to create it from scratch.

good point, it may be easy to "beef up" that existing system. I need to spend some time taking my car apart and putting it back together. It's just been to cold to do that with out anything needing repair. In fact i've been putting off things that do need repair; brakes, timing belt, tran. fluid change, body work.....

In my car I let the intake suck air that's been through the radiator. A lot easier than running ducting to the exhaust area. I get a gain of 35-40 deg. F. Not as much as with setups that pull air past the exhaust manifold but I like it for now.

In my car blocking the lower openings and leaving the uppers open worked best for intake heating. ymmv of course.

Yeah, but if you made your air intake pull from the radiator through metal tubing that was attached to engine block it would drastically heat up the air. Simple metal banding clips attached to key points on the block or bolts that hold the metal tube to the engine will result in hot spots that can warm up the air.

Yeah, you just described EGR. I was working on a system in my last car so that anything above 20% throttle was fully controlled by the amount of exhaust gas introduced into the intake.

I started running into issues quickly though, the ECU and transmission don't agree when it comes to running the engine WOT while cruising so the car needed the gasses introduced after the throttle body. Not a big deal except you then need a microcontroller and servo controlling the exhaust gas inlet based on what you were demanding from the car and it became a bigger project than I had time for.

Also, you can't do this with a factory speed density system. Only mass flow unless you go to MegaSquirt or something.

On the Tracker I also had EGR check failures from the ECU because it would open then close the EGR valve at highway speeds and check for a change in the MAP sensor while verifying that the pressure should stay the same because of a constant flow by the air flow meter. With no (little since I used the brake booster inlet for testing) manifold vacuum at highway speeds it couldn't verify EGR and threw a code.

It's a great idea though. My Durango could probably see a huge increase in highway fuel economy from a system like this since I run 8-10% throttle at 65 and don't have factory EGR.

The EGR air will be heated but the rest of the air won't be. Enough EGR to have a large percentage of heated air and the engine won't run well. EGR is typically sooty and will dirty up everything after a short time making the engine run worse.

Drastic is what won't happen with air from the radiator. Not much heat available there and it takes a long time before heat comes available. When the factory wants a WAI they take it from the exhaust. Lots of heat is available and very soon after start up. A few models use a mini heater core in the air box.