hey fella's
so I've been reading and reading and, well reading some more, and this zoodad mod seems like a great way to go to modify the instake, HOWEVER; if your in deep water, then all your going to do is but your intake suction right under the water line, which is A: going to stop any airflow to the motor and bog it out until it dies, or B: your going to suck water right into your air box and possibly into your motor. now I understand and I see the benifits of doing this, it being easy and cheap and a good way to gain a few horse power, but to me it just doesn't seem worth it, NOW I've been thinking about this a lot becaue i've been debating on what I want to do with my own intake, and I have my own design that is actually pretty simple.

Getting rid of all the intake ducting - all that really is, is restricting flow like crazy due to the rigid bends, and the air silencers, I mean, seriously it's just really restrictive.

next, the air filter, now don't get me wrong, I'm not putting down the stock air filter, cause there's not much to it, other then replacing it with a high flow filter. how ever, I think I'm going to take it out, and cut it so that only enough fits into the air box so that it seal the slot, but yet it doesn't stick in so for that the air flow as to go thru it in order to get past it, so basically it's not going to be there.

now what i'm thinking I"m going to do, since all the ducting before the air box is gone, I'm going to take the piece that is circular and then turns into an oval when it gets to the air box, well I'm going to cut it before it turns into in over so that I still have a circle, and I'm going to get a short piece of Y intake pipe to connect to it using rubber couplers and hose clamps.

then I'm going to stick 2 filters on to the Y intake pipe for max breath ability, and possibly make a bracket to help it from sagging down, depending on how heavy it is just for security purposes.

alright almost done guys, now if you think about this, it's deleting all the baffling, air silencers, and restrictive suction flow, AND it's raising your intake suctions to directly above the motor. Parts might cost 50 dollars all together depending on the filters that you buy, and if you don't like it then just replace the ducting, or reconnect the old one using one rubber coupler, and just replace the modified stock filter that was cut, with a new stock or aftermarket filter, and you'll have your stock intake back.

now honestly the only thing that I see that doesn't have a benifit over the zoodad mod is that the suction air will not be as 'cool' as the suction coming from ducting being directly behind the grill, but in my opinion the flow, and source of suction is going to increase so much that it's going to be more then worth it, and then maybe add on a throttle body spacer and I think thats going to be a pretty good set up...

thanks for hearing me out

-Josh

 

forgot to mention, you wouldn't HAVE TO have a Y pipe with 2 filters, thats just the rout that i"m going to take, you can just as easily use one filter, and just not add the Y pipe piece, airflow prob. won't be much difference. just food for thought.

-Josh

 

All that and you will gain very little if anything at all, because the stock intake is capable of flowing far more air than the engine could ever consume unless it's heavily modified.

 

like kdoaxs said the factory intakes on the 5.4, V10, and diesels after the 7.3flow more than the motor will ever need. Aftermarket intakes are just wallet lighteners nothing more than that. keep the stock stuff and save your money

 

I'm assuming that you have a diesel if you are doing the Zoodad. It only puts a hole through a panel that is made of felt gasket material. This lets air from the grill area into the intake horn. If you are going to cover that hole with water, you are swimming in water up to the top of your wheel wells (and probably filling the cab since it's 1/2 way up your doors) and have much bigger problems than 6 square inches of a hole that you made.

As for two filters, I don't know where you'd fit them. I dumped the stock air filter (doesn't seal well in the OEM box and lets air by) and got a NAPA 6639 cone. It's a bigun' and I don't have any airflow problems. I clamped a 4" piece of exhaust pipe (about 4" long) to the stock intake tube and the new filter fits like a glove (I took the OEM airbox out and cut the support bracket for it). If you have a gasser maybe, but with two batteries under the hood, I don't see enough room to put double filters unless you get two small ones.

Just my .02

 

Well granted...Ya youd be in pretty deep water, and there is plenty of room to put one or 2 filters on a 5.4 if you do it right, which isn't hard, and it's not expensive... I just don't like the idea of having the suction cone modified to be like a ram air application, we all no we put our trucks thru tough terrain from time to time... I just don't like the idea that anything might get sucked in there... How ever I do agree with the after market filter instead of the stock flat filter, the whole filter box in my opinion is restrictive but like you guys said it does supply more then enough air flow... I guess I'm just thinking different and out side of the box is all...

 

My Zoodad hole is 4.5' off the ground. If I'm in mud/water that deep I've already screwed up...bad

Besides that, the factory hole is the same height, just offset to the drivers headlight. So your have the same water ingestion issues, just not as straight a path


I wouldn't worry about it. Even in driving monsoon rains that area stays dry on my truck

 

well what motor do you have first? if its the 7.3 the stock air box sucks and id replace it, if its the v8 or V10 then keep the stock box

 

If you do this mod i wanna see pics.

 

I did the zoodad mod and have the stock intake, and montoring the intake air temp, its always the ambient temp. I had an aftermarket "cold air intake" and it raised the intake temps high, because it was taking air in from engine compartment. I went back to the stock box. In the winter i simply made a cover that bolts over the zoodad opening so its closed. I have been through a foot of water on the road accidently, fast enough that it came up over the windshield and it never caused any problems. I also use 1/4 inch steel screen behind the grill to keep stones etc from hitting the a/c condensor and damaging it.

 

I used a piece of screen for a house rain gutter (from Home Depot) to cover my opening. That's what is referred to as the 'King Zoodad' mod.