Originally posted by KaptonContour:
Its kinda hard to see the opening in the fender from that pic.
So the notched part is just to help keep out "warm"
air? I guess you have to worrie about that more with the K&N. With my BAT snorkle setup as long as your moving you get plenty of fresh air. So I'm just trying to keep my eliment cool.
I will try and get some pics. but I'm such a slacker you never know. Also I have no idea how to post them.





Yes, I am very familar with the BAT Snorkle style filter. I know of several that have this filter assembly and are happy with it. Also, one of the more popular filter assembles, early on, was the KKM. This was also an inverse cone filter design that used a single couplent, at the inverse portion of the filter, and connected to the stock SVT air inlet port located in the fender well.

There's still one problem, with even both of these designs. These filters still draw far more warm air, then they do fresh cooler air without a heatsheild. So yes, the main goal here, as with any heatsheild, is to block all that warm air.

Now! Even given the fact that you have an inverse filter, with a snorkle attached to the filter, you are really only cooling a very small portion of the air entering your intake manifold. Look at like this - The next time you remove your filter, for cleaning, pay attention to the surface area of the outer portion of the filter media and the inverse/cone portion of the media. See the big difference in size? Of course you do. Now. Take those proportions and translate it into the amount of air coming into the intake. The portion that is bringing in the cooler, fresher air is at such a smaller proportion in relation the rest of the filter, it's not really enough to offset or cool the large amount of warm air coming in through the rest of the filter.

Now, the reason I actually decided to do make my own sheild goes back to a recent meet. Hector (LoCoZ) and I was at a Home Depot getting what else, stuff for modding our cars. Anyway, we got to talking about heatsheilds and how I needed one badly. The day before, while driving in the mountains, I had noticed that after driving through some of the slower sections - which allowed my enigne temps to rise - once in the fast sections, I had a hard time getting up to speed with some of the others there. The car would just bog out, almost completely when going uphill. Once we got to an rest area and we all took a break, I popped my hood and checked my filter. I found that it was so hot, that I could not hold it with my hand. It was just a normal case of some serious heatsoak!

So, since we were at Home Depot I wanted to take a look at some of the mailboxes there, because I know that is a common place for most to start with making a heatsheild. But once I got to looking at them, I quickly saw that afer cutting the box down, it left very little room inside where the filter would be. So I asked the question, "What good would it do, to cut down your air supply just so you can block heat?" I'm no engineer, by any stretch of the imagination (and I have one hell of a imagination!), but I know I could make something better than a mailbox or some tupperware for a heatsheild.



So, here is my proposal of how to fix these two problems.

1) Give the filter media a larger area to sit in. This will do a few things. First of all, it will give the filter a lot more breathing room as opposed to the smaller boxes made before. Also, this extra room will allow for better movement of the air around the filter media. This "should" translate into lower air temperatures surrounding the filter.

2) Removing the snorkle from the filter and moving it back to the opening in the fender, will allow the above things to take place. If you only supplied fresh air, to the same small portion of filter media, will still not be enough to cool the rest of the air down that is entering the rest of the filter. I guess I look at putting the snorkle in the end of the filter as a sort of bottle neck and I want to elimante that here. So, moving the snorkle back allows for maximum air flow to the outter filter media, which is where most of all the air entering the intake system enters anyway.


Overall, you are correct. The main goal here is to keep the element as cool as possible. Man! I'm really having fun discussing this. Let's keep it up! I've actually started thinking about something that could be made to gather more air for the snorkle/fresh air tube. Something that could be... Oh, that's another thread.

Phillip Jackson `98 Mystique LS 262K+ and counting... ATX rebuilt @ 151K "This storm has broken me, my only friend!" RIP Dime