SRT-11

Well I didn't do it yet, but I sure am interested, would electropolishing the IM free up a few HP? It'd look cool for sure...

01tl4tl

put a lightweight pulley on it and clean the rough edges off the ports instead-

type-s09

do this and buy the intake runners from p2r

don5504

Sounds like something that would come at the end of modding. Because I am thinking the performance/dollar isn't that great on something like this. Sort of like porting and polishing your heads and exhaust manifolds to optimize flow and 3 or 5 angle valve jobs and stuff like that.

D

flydog

Making an intake smooth on the inside does not necessarily mean it will produce more power. There is a lot more to fluid dynamics than just making the inside of air conduits smooth. Otherwise NASA, and for that matter Acura, wouldn't need any engineers on their payroll, they could just buy a polishing machine and be done with it. Without a flow bench and dyno testing, you might as well be pissing up a rope as far as making any gains. And you may end up making it worse.

BLACKURA_NY

iTrader: (6)

^^ good words

SRT-11

odd. I would naturally assume that by reducing the frictional losses inside the runners you make the air transfer process more efficient....

flydog

Just doesn't work like that. Air is a gas. Its not like sliding sandpaper over wood. Friction does slow down the airflow to some extent, but not evenly through the cross secton of the duct. So what happens when you change the surfaces of a duct wall is you create air flowing at different speeds within the duct, which creates turbulent flow.

Bends in a duct also create problems because air is incompressible. So below a certain speed the air has to speed up around the outside of the bend because it has a longer way to travel and it has to keep up with the air on the inside radius.

Some turbulence is actually good going, but without dyno testing and a flow bench it is impossible to make the necesary tweaks to make it work. My guess is that Honda has already spent thousands of hours flow testing these intakes.

THE SLEEPER

It WILL look cool and the placebo effect is killer!! BIG time seat of the pants!!

Tripnbeats

if u look inside the plenum u will notice that the channels the air travels through are polished and nicely ported in the areas the air needs to run into. highly doubt more polishing would be needed.

ankur914

+1
This is why a golf ball has dimples (and lexus dimples the underbody of their cars)....to create turbulance...It can travel farther than a smooth one...who woulda thunkit.

SRT-11

Some of this I agree with, and some is rediculous.

Air is incompressible? Are you serious? Air is very much compressible, and it's compressibility is dependant (as atomsphere) upon the temperature, relative humidity, and ambient pressure (altitude)

You're postulating that by removing the rough/abrasive/etc surficial casting inconsistencies in the intake manifold that honda "designed" to be there (note this thing sure appears to be a sand cast piece of metal, it sure wasn't CNC'd or 5-Axis'd or anything like that) that you would introduce power-robbing eddys and undesirable vortices and such? At the intake flow volumes common to a 3.2 liter engine?

My thought (not that I'm smarter than anyone else, I'm no genius but I do have a masters degree in engineering so I'm not a dummy either) would be that the slight internal volumetric increase of the runners caused by the electropolishing (it acually evens out the surface, and may remove a few mils of material in the process) coupled with the decreased frictional coefficient would "ease" the air's transfer into the engine.

Your thoughts sound somewhat logical, but I need clarification!!

don5504

If it has bumps or dimples on the inside that is not designed for optimal flow but just a byproduct of the casting process smoothing things out could certainly improve flow. And certain parts are manufacturered that way to possess those dimples to improve air flow so removing them would be counter productive.

D

screaminz28

iTrader: (1)

There is a company that used to be pretty popular for this, Extrude hone. They basically pushed an abraisive sludge through the intake to make it larger and smoother. I know it was popular with DSMers back in the day. I think most of the benefits came from the increased size rather than the smoothness, but I do think that is one of the things they tout as a benefit.

I know that turbulence can be good in port design of the cyinder head, but I've never read too much of it being a detriment in regards to the intake manifold.

flydog

I seriously doubt you have an engineering degree (unless you mean the kind of engineer that blows the train horn) because the fact that air is incompressible below Mach .3 is year 1 stuff. And from your posts, you clearly do not have a clue as to the theory of fluid mechanics or what incompressible even means. So between the two of us I am guessing I am the only one with an engineering degree. But I dont have time or desire to give you a physics or aerodynamics lessons. Take a trip to Wikipedia and see if you can get yourself caught up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressible_flow

Your assumptions, though reasonable from a layperson's point of view, are wholly inaccurate according to the laws of nature. But if you want to bust out your Dremel and go to town on your intake, knock yourself out.

SRT-11

First off, you don't have to be a douchebag.

Second, I do have an engineering degree (UCF '05), I have my E.I., and will have my P.E. in October 2009. The fact that it's in civil engineering would explain my lack of knowledge of the topic at had, as Darcy Weisbach doesn't apply (although I think the equation for Mach speed is a derivative of Bernoulli's equation). I have a decent grasp of hydraulics & (incompressible) fluid dynamics but I have little to no experience with the principles & dynamics of gasses. I'm just now getting into turbomachinery because the company I work for picked up a cool product line of ultra high speed blowers that utilizes air bearings so they're lubricant-free but that's neither here nor there.

Thirdly, who the hell mentioned a dremel? I said electropolished, take a trip to wikipedia and do your best to get caught up there, champ.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electropolish

Anyway "FlyDog" it's mother-teresa-level kind of you that someone (of your mind-blowing level of education) can school us all with your unsubstantiated claims (which may actually be accurate, much to our dismay you only had time to be a douche- not enough time to actually explain the theory behind your statements). PLEASE tell me which first year, 1000 level engineering class teaches these gems of wisdom, I'll fedex you a cookie.

don5504

Soooo who's daddy can beat up who's daddy?

D

BLACKURA_NY

iTrader: (6)

too much testosterone in here

my it wont decrease power... but i dont think it would increase unless matched with some more internal work.... i too, am no genuis, but my mechanic who builds mustangs all day long, agreed...

even if purchasing the P2R runners, you wouldnt see a noticeable or worth while gain, because something about the size of the runners not matching up with the cylinder sleeves or something ?? i dunno... i personally think that kind of work is risky, because if you do some how alter the air flow in a negative way, theres no reversing it.. just replacing it

SRT-11

That's an excellent point...

I came up with this (brain fart of an) idea when thinking about other parts of the air delivery system that people polish or increase the size of, and was hoping that the same theory that restriction & friction were bad applied here, but clearly that may not be correct. poo on this thread.

Tripnbeats

Ca Ca Poo Poo!

flydog

Call UCF and get a refund.

Ken240sx

How about we all just face the fact that it's not going to help much on a fairly stock or mildly modded engine, regardless. The amounts of air needed are met just fine with the stock manifold for quite a bit of horsepower. The only thing you would gain is top end torque if it worked anyway. Just like putting in larger runners or a larger TB. The best thing you can really do for the airflow to make it more efficient getting from the TB into the head is port matching. When airflow hits sharp or blunt edges where it's transferring from Tb to Plenum, Plenum to Runners, and Runners to the Head, you're not getting a smooth transition. Without modifying the original flow characteristics of the mani you can still free up HP by making the transitions in these problem areas more efficient by grinding them down to the point where they are closer to the same size and the transition is smoothed out. Pretty much if the holes going from the plenum to the runners are 1.1" in diameter and the runners ID is 1" it would be beneficial to grind out the holes in the runners to 1.1". Forget micro polishing the inside of the manifold at this point in time. The cost effectiveness is probably not very good. You'll only be extracting a couple hp up top with all that effort and money(I don't know how much it costs, nor do I care to look it up lol). You're better off making sure your car is always running in tip top condition by making sure you're up to date with tune-ups and oil changes. So many people don't take care of their engines as well as they should but they dump money into bolt ons that might give them a couple hp...when they're loosing hp in other places due to lack of maintenance.

SRT-11

Wow, that was clever. No douche-baggery there. Can you not post on this forum anymore? Ever?

Thx big guy.

SRT-11

Ken, this is the answer I was looking for to begin with, I appreciate the input!