Front grill area blocked off my mazda....

[5][Spyder]

This might be a repost, but I was looking at the air intake for the TMIC and noticed this air passage 'blocked' off by mazda. Its clear that they intended for it to be open at some point or the hole wouldn't be there....but it has the 'blank' now....does anyone know anything about this?

It might be good to take out the blank increase air into the engine bay, VERY cold air while moving right to where the stock air box is intaking. Note I am not talking about leaving piece B uninstalled, I'm talking about removing article A, and reinstalling B. If you look at it closely, even with B reinstalled, it still gets alot of air going to there from front grill.

But I worry is this blanked off for important reasons? To much water while raining? road debris? etc?

Obviously this isn't any serious power increase, but everything helps, thoughts?

 

[john blutarski]

Doesn't the B piece direct air up to the IC ducting in the hood? If so, I would leave that piece in place.

 

[User Name]

I would guess that the hole is for the N/A 3's.

 

[hilmar2k]

Seems like that would direct air right at a Cobb SRI, if you had one. Hmmmm.....

EDIT: Do you have your A's and B's mixed up? If not, I am confused. You say you are talking about leaving A installed, but A is the piece that is blocking the hole according to your third pic.

 

[ForceFed]

Seems like that would direct air right at a Cobb SRI, if you had one. Hmmmm.....

EDIT: Do you have your A's and B's mixed up? If not, I am confused. You say you are talking about leaving A installed, but A is the piece that is blocking the hole according to your third pic.

(stupid)

 

[5][Spyder]

Seems like that would direct air right at a Cobb SRI, if you had one. Hmmmm.....

EDIT: Do you have your A's and B's mixed up? If not, I am confused. You say you are talking about leaving A installed, but A is the piece that is blocking the hole according to your third pic.

Yes very sorry, typo, fixed now. Also yes to the SRI proposal, thats what I'm getting at. You could even cut out those 'cross hatch' plastic pieces in there for further airflow. There is a similar hole on the opposite side, underneath the passenger side 'B' which is NOT blocked off from mazda, so I would assume that its ok to leave the driver side one open. I bet its blocked off for noise reasons, like the bend in the tube coming up off the stock airbox, and like 90% of other airboxes that have restrictors and resonators that just quiet the intake noise for grandma.

 

[5][Spyder]

Ahh, found a pic of a normal 3 - looks like 'User Name' ^^^^ was right. Looks like the hole is for normal 3s and has a massive duct that 'cools the battery???' Can anyone explain that anyways, do the batteries actually need cooling, or is it just simply an elaborate vent, mazda sure goes to alot of trouble, even on the MS3 with the ducting from the TMIC over to the battery box. Also you would think the TMIC would increase that air temp before going to the battery dramatically.......

 

[Super Unique]

high underhood temps are deadly for car batteries. High heat accelerates chemical reaction, and especially with turbo charged cars the underhood temp can easily exceed 200 degrees, literally frying the batteries cells. high temp/high load on the battery will quickly lead to boiling cells, which causes the acid to boil, venting through the caps and depleting the fluid level within the battery. Any efforts spent on venting fresh air to the battery box is a good thing for the life expectancy of your average battery.

 

[5][Spyder]

high underhood temps are deadly for car batteries. High heat accelerates chemical reaction, and especially with turbo charged cars the underhood temp can easily exceed 200 degrees, literally frying the batteries cells. high temp/high load on the battery will quickly lead to boiling cells, which causes the acid to boil, venting through the caps and depleting the fluid level within the battery. Any efforts spent on venting fresh air to the battery box is a good thing for the life expectancy of your average battery.

Sounds reasonable for sure, nice explanation. I guess I'm just used to sealed batteries, they don't seem to have any heat tolerances, seems that every device with a sealed battery has no airflow to it, and also that they generate a large amount of heat in the first place. Batteries like the ones in computer UPS's and things like that, every time I service a large UPS or something at work, the batteries are very hot to the touch, even with exhaust fans in the UPS housings.

In that case why not just upgrade to a sealed battery, like optima red top or something, they are weight less, produce less contaminates, less chance for corrosion, etc - and also would not require the elaborate venting, in fact if the hood TMIC channel over to the battery was blocked off, I bet it would force more air through the TMIC as opposed to bleed off into the battery box.

 

[billyrohm]

Would it hurt to have the plug removed? As stated before, that could be a nice air path to a SRI.

 

[Super Unique]

sadly the optima red top has slid in quality significantly over the past 4 years. When they first came out they were awesome. Over time they have become far less quality. Still better than a stock battery.

 

[hilmar2k]

Would it hurt to have the plug removed? As stated before, that could be a nice air path to a SRI.

I can't see how it could. In fact, mine will be coming out tomorrow.

 

[5][Spyder]

Well I decided that the plug is just there, I don't think it will hurt to remove it. In fact I decided to cut out a little of the extra restriction also. I am also thinking about enlarging the hole slightly.....Although I did decide to leave the center brace, in case it provides some type of structural integrity.....

Before/After:

If you put a light source behind the hole inside the engine bay, and then close the hood at night, you can see through the grill that there is definitely a large amount of air that would get through that passage while moving......Next step COBB SRI IMO.

 

[ForceFed]

Now..IMO..you have made a place for the air that would have been going across your IC to go now.
You have effectively IMO dropped the pressure that you did have forcing the air through your IC by now allowing it to go elsewhere.

Once again..Just my opinion.

 

[5][Spyder]

Now..IMO..you have made a place for the air that would have been going across your IC to go now.
You have effectively IMO dropped the pressure that you did have forcing the air through your IC by now allowing it to go elsewhere.

Once again..Just my opinion.

Please read my first post completely, I only have that piece that routes air to the TMIC taken off for picture purposes, it is ABSOLUTELY reinstalled when done. I say this in the first description. But even with that piece installed, if you look under it, the top 2 holes in the front mazda grill feed up into the TMIC, the ones below it will feed directly into the radiator and the hole that I'm talking about being unblocked....

 

[ForceFed]

Please re-read my last post.

You have created a hole for air..that would have been FORCED to go above that hole in through your IC..now to go right past that.
You have effectively created a lower pressure against your IC which will IMO allow less air to go acroos the IC.
Now your Grill has more are to allow air through..and Air will take the path of least resistance...Which is a nic big open hole...so yes..you likely have dropped the pressure across your core.

I understand you put the "Scoop" back on.....But if for one example...YOu have say 1cu. ft. of air going into tht space ...and it is forced through that 6x2 hole...now you have made another what looks to be a 6x2 hole for some of that air entering the front grill to go...which lowers the pressure across your core?

Does that now make sense?

 

[5][Spyder]

Maybe we're both misunderstanding each other, here are some pics just to clarify my statement, here is the air routing. I am in no way messing with airflow that goes to the TMIC, it is 100% stock. As the pictures indicate, the red holes, and the yellow hole is completely separate, it is very unlikely that my small change to the airflow pathing of the air that is coming in the yellow passage will make a measureable difference to the air which going through the red passages......we're talking wind tunnel measurements here at most, nothing. The only downfall that might occur, is that some air pressure that was originally forced across the engine(water) radiator core is now being allow through that unblocked passage....a worthwhile sacrifice IMO.

 

[ForceFed]

You are in Fact messing with the "Stock" airflow by changing the amount of air you are moving through the front of the car.

YOu just dont get how airflow works.

If there is a given amount of air pushing on the front of your car with only x amount of opening to go through...It will be at xp pressure.

When you open up the airflow routing by creating more Open Area for air to flow through vsbeing pushed..you now have y sized openings which are larger. Your total Pressure is now at yp.

Now your pressure has dropped as the same amount of air that was avaiable at the front of the car before...and was being forced to go in..or around the grill area..now has even more area to go through the Grill...Which if its less of a restriction through you new opening than going through the IC..you now have less air through your IC..even if you have more through the "Grille" area.

If you dont get it this time...SOmeone else can explain it to you..My fingers are tired .

 

[ForceFed]

Now..don't get me wrong..there may be no ill effect at all ..but my point is..you have changed how the airflow is directed.

 

[5][Spyder]

Not to be rude here, but yeah, I totally get it, but the point you are making is so far gone your just making it for the sake of argument/disagreement. IMO There will be only the smallest measurable TMIC core temperature increase from opening that passage.....thats the end point, would you agree? Maybe .01 degrees at 200 mph?