http://www.ramairbox.com/
http://www.ramairbox.com/install.html

I was just wondering if anyone has ever used this before? Seems to me it would be better than the open face crome breather sucking in hot air from under the hood. I'm in Tx.(right smack in the middle)The air under the hood can be cooler than the air outside sometimes, or at least it feels that way!! Just looking for some info, comments, or any feedback in general.


Chuck

 

Chuck,
Sometimes these things can do more harm than good. It all depends on the arrangement and the condition of operation; (spedd, air temp, etc.)
I had a friend with an old fairlane. It had an air cleaner similar to this. At about 128MPH the motor would start to break up. It turned out that forcing that much air into the cleaner disrupted the flow into the carb.
Personally, I'm going to buy one for my truck. Do you know if they got one for a Dual quad setup? I really like the cowl induction setup.
KingFisher

 

They might? There was one that was long like the old shaker intakes. I was thinking of one for my 78 Ext. Cab (460 with header)work truck/toy. It will never see speeds over 100mph! Did I say 100? I meant 70mph, 65mph at night. Now my 93 Probe GT on the other hand??
Oh, the same, 70 and 65.

Chuck

 

I looked at their performance/requirements chart and while that might be all well and good I spend very little time up around the 5000 rpm range with my 400 V-8. Unless you're well built and spend a lot of time racing I would find better ways to part with $118.00 plus shipping and handling.

 

Actually, the air under the hood is always hotter than outside. I live in Kansas, feels like central Texas at times.

Rather than spending big bucks on some aftermarket piece, just get a few std parts out of the scrapyard and modify them.

Throw away those fancy chrome air filters! They don't do any good except look purdy on a trailer queen. Get yourself a big GM 454 truck air box with the big 12" OD x 5-1/2" tall filter and stick a K&N E1420 in. If you haven't got space for that there is a chrysler 440 motor home unit that is 3.5" tall or other shorter GM units. Ford constipated their engines horribly in the intake air department as a poor man's rev control. Install dual Ford Air box snorkels with vacuum motors and a modified thermostatic vacuum switch to regulate the incoming air at about 75F. Tee the switch to both vacuum motors. Build or use hot air boxes around the headers or manifold on at least one side and block the other hot air intake if unused. Pipe in fresh air ducts from the radiator support as smooth and large as possible.

This will solve a lot of winter AND summer engine problems!

 

Torque1st - Do you have any pictures of this type of setup? Would like to see it.
I've always thought my Little 302 doesn't breathe well...
Cheers,

 

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 24-Aug-02 AT 01:29 AM (EST)]Yeah Torque1st, I would like to see that too. I'm sure my truck would like breathing 110 degrees air from outside the hood rather than the hot air under the hood.

Chuck

 

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 24-Aug-02 AT 01:47 AM (EST)]There is somebody on these boards that sent me pictures of a set-up using a ram-air box, but I am having trouble finding his screen name. He does have a cool looking setup though.

Hey Torque1st!! Where are you in Kansas? I too live in Kansas.


Brian

Went and looked at your gallery. We are practically neighbors. I live in Bucyrus.

 

I live in Merriam KS, Shawnee Mission Area.

That hot air under the hood is 158F+ according to some measurements I made. That is as far as the sensor I was using would go, I have a new sensor that will go to 300F now. The air gets heated by the radiator and all of that nice heat off the manifolds. It is real hot when you aren't moving much like in heavy traffic.

I don't have any pictures... Yet!

You need two Ford vacuum motor type snorkels. Then graft them onto a GMC or Dodge box by enlarhing the holes and pop rivets. I used some big fancy looking snowmobile track rivets I found at my local ACE hardware store. The trick part is the tuning of the thermal vacuum switch. You have to take a torch to release the loctite placed on the little metal tube with screw threads. You will need to turn it outwards to make it work at 75F. You will also need one of those indoor/outdoor thermometers to get the temp set right, or some other method of reading the temp inside the airbox. Unless you have a airconditioned area to run the truck in it is probably impossible to get the heated air part calibrated at this time of year. So just block the air motor open. Get standard rectangular to round replacement air cleaner tubes from the parts store and run them to the radiator support. The pass side can go to the original plastic manifold. the other side will need to go to a hvac sheet metal transition thru a hole cut in the rad support. Ford had it half right in their original design, they just did not put in a large enuf filter element and only one snorkel.

I am using a 383 Dodge box right now so it fits my Edelbrock carb real well. I just had that one handy. I need to go out looking for a 440 motorhome box or the GM box. If I remember right the difference between a 383 box and a 440 box is the depth of the lid so it would hold a taller filter. If that is true I wont have to take the snorkel of the box I have now. I only have the pass side snorkel on it now. I didn't want to cut into my rad support b4 I started my truck rebuild and had a better idea where everything was going to go. I have a second snorkel waiting for my rebuild. I found the different applications for the taller/larger filters by going "backwards" thru a K&N filter catalog looking at filter dimensions. My thermal vac switch was calibrated the winter b4 last and it has worked well, no carb icing problems. I also do not run exhaust thru my intake manifold to keep the intake charge cooler. If you replace your manifold keep the sheet metal valley pan and cut it to fit with the new intake gaskets, it will keep the hot oil off the underside of the manifold also.

 

the gentleman's name you guys are looking for is FE427TP he has this set up on his truck and a pic of it in his signature (sp)