Not good considering you have to do 150MPH to see it.

Perhaps I need to fab up an air box and beat this sh!t out of my TL...for the sake of science.

It's not exactly the same as the air flowing through a pipe. You can follow the pipe model AFTER you have stagnated the outside air at the inlet of the ram air structure. This is where the pressure increase happens.

The ~ 6.5% increase in power correlates to 150 MPH.

There were MARKED increases in power well below that speed, which you'd already know IF you read the articles (which you clearly have NOT).

Look at it this way:

From a dead start on a balls-to-the-wall run, that bike is clipping the 100 MPH mark in ~ 7 seconds.

So in just ~ 7 seconds, that bike is going to begin to see quantifiable gains that wouldn't exist without ram air.:wow:

The computations aren't location specific. Where the compression occurs in irrelevant, only where the envelope of compression exists. And even then, the location isn't necessary for computation.

That's all well n' good for a 10s bike. Those seat of the pants gains aren't realized in anything else. How much off yer E/T would you see if you put ram air on your 1LE? If I run 15PSI or 15.5 PSI of boost, my E/T's are fall in the same .1s range. REALLY zero difference if I run 15 compared to 15.25 PSI of boost.

OK...

But, back to the bike test.

It was seeing 10 mb of positive airbox pressure @ just 80 MPH. That's 2.6 HP.

That bike hits 80 in what - 5 seconds (in a standing start, balls-to-the-wall run).

An increase of.43PSIG is about equivalent to a 1,000 ft elevation change. I don't know about you, Skeedatl, but I can feel a difference of 1,000ft.

Not much...

But I've never been a drag racer, anyway.

I like running FROM SPEED.

I told him that earlier and posted an altitude vs. air pressure chart to back the claim.

Here it is:

http://home.flash.net/~rfm2/altitude.htm

And with ram air, the faster you go, the LOWER your altitude effectively becomes!

I can't. Pomona is like 850' or something like that and I get the same ET there as I do at a crappy sea level track like Carlsbad or even the 1/8th at Irwindale.

Not until I go to Palmdale so I see any difference at all, 3,000ft or something like that. What's that...nearly 2 PSI below normal or something like that? And even then, it's just a tenth or 2.

TRAP SPEED is more telling than ET in terms of how much HP is being produced. And if temp and humidity are similar @ both tracks, your car should post a slightly higher trap speed @ the lower elevation.

I don't doubt that "ram air" essentially has no impact on ET (or much impact on ET) in drag racing with streetable cars. The average speed of such cars through the standing start 1/4 simply isn't fast enough.

I run faster at high altitude, just I just boost it more...and less wind resistence

We both know that less wind resistance equates to lower air density (due to lower atmospheric pressure)....

So if the wind resistance is quantifiably less, so must be the air pressure.

The outside air stagnating on the front of the ram air intake increases the pressure inside the entire intake system. The location of the compressed air also comes into play in the pressure drop of the intake system. If the outside air is compressed, it is more dense and therefore the velocity of the air flow through the intake system is decreased. Density is directly proportional to the velocity, but the pressure drop is proportional to the square of the velocity. That is, if we compress the air by 2%, the pressure drop of the intake system will be decreased by 4%.

Just don't tell my motor that.

Holy buh-jeezus guys... this thread was started on 03-20-2004 @ 02:35 PM???? That's only 3 days and it's already 17 pages and 411 replies long?!?!?!

It's just an air filter! Just hold a kleenex to your nose and breathe... wolla, air filter. What a concept.

Now a supercharger behind that air filter! That's worth at least 20 pages and 500 replies.

We've all seen the commercial on Spike TV... just agree...

K&N, yeah, K&N!

Yep...

Sounds like we need to nominate Rodabaugh to the Offical Club of Ass Clownery.

That would be true if you had only a finite amount of air.

"Pressure DROP is DECREASED...."

That means a net rise in pressure (a net drop in vacuum).

I think we should ALL be able to agree at this point that "ram air" does offer SOME benefit, perhaps as low as ~ 75 MPH and that its benefit from that point will increase to the square of velocity.

I'll take Ram Air, thanks.

That has already been said...and shown in the calcucations, which is why I figured he has mistakenly used a double negative.

The location of the compression is irrelevant in terms of calculating the amount of compression...the entire system is compressed.

The only thing that matters, is that the TB "sees" the compression. IOW, you can't compress only the front of the airbox. It's either all or none. The location of the source of the force doing the compression, which is at the inlet...doesn't matter. It's irrelevant for computing the amount of compression.

Square of the multiplyer of the velocity. Double the velocity, quadruples the pressure seen in the previous velocity.

Yes...I got that...

Just think of the Ram Air system you'll be able to afford (and the money you'll still have leftover) now that you no longer "need" aluminum heads.

Maybe I'll just put that money down on one of those alien Miller cycle motors.

Nothing gained there (in terms of power)....All of the "extra" static/mechanical compression ratio goes "out the window" due to the fact that the intake valve remains opened as the piston rises from BDC. Dynamic compression ratios are comparable to what one would see in a "comparable" Otto cycle engine running the same octane gasoline.

All they gain is a mild reduction in pumping losses...I suppose that would equate to a power gain on some level, but nothing that's directly attributable to the higher static compression ratio.

Nope, it's gonna run 50:1 on Pepsi...diet Pepsi at that.

hey skeed make sure you have a reference for that or hardrivin will :tflamer: your arse....

So I take it is filthier than your paper filter. Does that mean its working better???

Don't know...

Real world testing/results I've seen produced a mix bag of conclusions....

Does't K&N also make ludicrous claims about the # of miles the filter can go before being "serviced?"

It's filthy @ 5,000 miles...

Here is is:

http://www.knfilters.com/filtercharger.htm

"Lasts up to 50,000 miles before cleaning..."

In my experience cotton looking "filthy" doesn't mean bad flow, whereas in paper it does.

Look what they claim:

http://www.knfilters.com/filtercharger.htm

"Lasts up to 50,000 miles before cleaning..."

Leave yours in for 50,000 miles without touching it and see how well it flows...:lol2:

According to Harddrivin's experiment protocol, just by looking at more dirt on the KN filter than a paper filter run the same amount of miles last year in the desert, one would have to conclude by the presence of more dirt that the KN was working better.

Hence, the words UP TO. Try leaving a paper one in there for 1/2 that, tenth that.

I've never seen a paper filter than claimed to be good for "up to 50,000 miles."

What kind of environment would allow that kind of mileage with a K&N (or any other filter)?????

The entire claim is asinine.

Not my "experiment."

In fact, that wasn't ANYONE'S experiment that I'm aware of...

I clean mine about every 15K or so I guess, but when I do pull it, it's darker, but not filthy. Should I want to I'm sure it could go easily twice that without any adverse effects. And I live in a pretty dusty environment and make fairly frequent trips to Vegas. With cotton, while it may "look" dirty, doesn't mean it's clogged; as would be the case with a paper filter. With paper I was changing the filter every oil change (5,000mi). I would pull it, hold it up to the light and you couldn't see ANY light through it; it was so nasty. So I'm going about 3x paper between cleanings and probably could go 6x paper between cleanings. If it weren't so easy to clean, I probably would go 30K between cleanings.

Most of that is attributable to the fact that the paper filter catches more dirt in the first place.:wow:

Paper is better at catching fine particulates, making it dirtier faster but the particulates that are harmful to the motor are those over 20 microns, and with that, they both filter pretty much the same in the SAE tests I've seen.

Who has actually pulled out the air filter in their TL and checked it out? I pulled mine out tonight to take a look. This thread got me curious. My impressions - The filter is higher quality than I expected. It's frame is rigid with a good seal. It fits well and easily. The filter material is much better than I expected - a thicker material that appears to be some sort of fiber impregnated paper. The filter is narrower than I expected, but it is long and has deep pleats that add up to a lot of surface area. The type of material used and surface area indicate that this filter should remove particulate well and airflow should hold up well as the filter accumulates material. The stock filter reminds me of high quality filters I have seen in other industrial applications. It was not like a cheesy FRAM filter. If anyone else has pulled theirs out, I'd be interested in what your impressions were.

The K&N's that I've had in the past were not put together as well as the filter I looked at tonight, but I have not seen the K&N for the TL yet. After examining the stock filter, I have a hard time believing that the K&N is going to offer much improvement. That's just my opinion but it's based on direct examination of the stock filter - for what that is worth.