Butt-dynos are notoriously unreliable. I agree that in stop-and-go driving, or even in dyno testing, a true CAI will likely make more power (and this has been tested on dynos). For my driving, which is almost entirely expressway with this car, I can't imagine it makes much difference, and the SRI should have a little better throttle response due to the shorter intake path. Personally, I won't ever put a real CAI on any of my cars again, unless it has a water filter as the K&N ones do. I don't need to spend $600 replacing a MAF sensor again. My new CorkSport SRI is gorgeous and high quality.
Intakes!
- Thread starter fufanu180
- Start date
Mazdafreak67
Member
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- '06 Mazda MX-5, 6-spd
In case anyone is questioning why replacing the factory intake on the Mazda3 2.3L engine makes such a big difference, just take a gander at what the air has to fight through before it reaches your intake manifold.
Not only is it a hell of a restriction (obviously to reduce noise) but the entire contraption weighs over 10 lbs.
The second photo shows it next to my MX-5 just for some perspective of how massive it is.
Not only is it a hell of a restriction (obviously to reduce noise) but the entire contraption weighs over 10 lbs.
The second photo shows it next to my MX-5 just for some perspective of how massive it is.
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Sometimes I think about how it costs Mazda thousands of dollars just to design the intake portion of the car and then we replace it with a $200 pipe.
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- 2008 Mazda5 Touring
Has anyone tried running with the lower section just removed?
A lot of people have. It gives your car a more growl but no performance gains.
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- Protege
Well I dont have a 3 I got a 99protege I was fortunate enough to get my hands on a Injen CAI for the 1.6 which you cant find anymore, but any ways I love it. like everyone said your not gonna get a whole lot of HP from an Intake unless ur running turbos, I had a buddy who had the SRI on his 01 1.6 he lost every time. I mean its really up to you I like the CAI because you get just that cooler air, and better air flow, with the SRI you get the hot air from under the hood which would you rather have. Now the only downside I think to the CAI is that you could suck in water if going through water, obviously you wont have that problem with the SRI
L3vzoomzooom
Member
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- 2007 MZ3 Sedan
I love my Ingen intake for my 3
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- Protege
Can I get an AMEN.... I mean Injen
Mazdafreak67
Member
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- '06 Mazda MX-5, 6-spd
It's definitely the sound
It's definitely to reduce sound. At WOT, once the engine hits 2,500~3K rpm, the sound out of either the SRI or CAI intake is actually louder than the exhaust. (Let me clarify that.... factory exhaust.) Personally, I love the resonance sound made by an aluminum CAI, but I imagine the "masses" may not agree. Thus, all of the baffles and bends.
It's definitely to reduce sound. At WOT, once the engine hits 2,500~3K rpm, the sound out of either the SRI or CAI intake is actually louder than the exhaust. (Let me clarify that.... factory exhaust.) Personally, I love the resonance sound made by an aluminum CAI, but I imagine the "masses" may not agree. Thus, all of the baffles and bends.
Mazdafreak67
Member
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- '06 Mazda MX-5, 6-spd
Very nice, Stephen. So what's your take on the performance gain from the intake?
It feels fine. Also, my exhaust does not sound like a ricer!! I had the flash done almost two weeks ago and I can tell there is a little more gain in power.
My next addition will be a Borla Cat Back exhaust. I want to make sure my vehicle will not sound like one of those ricers.
I also use Synthetic Mobil 1 oil. It's nice only needing to change my oil every 10k miles. I also use Citgo Medium fuel or Shell Supreme fuel in my vehicle. All the good stuff.
My next addition will be a Borla Cat Back exhaust. I want to make sure my vehicle will not sound like one of those ricers.
I also use Synthetic Mobil 1 oil. It's nice only needing to change my oil every 10k miles. I also use Citgo Medium fuel or Shell Supreme fuel in my vehicle. All the good stuff.
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I agree I love the sound my sri makes. Also when I put my sri back on when I needed to get some warranty work done my exhaust tone went down, so it make just be me but I do think a aftermarket intake has something to do with exhaust tone and performance.
christiansMSP
Member
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- 2003 MSP
if u get a sri make a heat shield!
Could have something to do with more velocity in the intake system. Faster air in faster air out.
Mazdafreak67
Member
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- '06 Mazda MX-5, 6-spd
Alright,
I have some field testing to back up my butt-dyno testing.
Over the weekend I temporarily put the factory intake back on and ran some acceleration tests. Luckily I live in an area where farmland and their associated straight (nearly unused) sections of road are within a couple of miles of the house.
Anyways, I decided to run some 30-80 MPH acceleration tests. This meant starting in second and slowly accelerating to 30 then starting the timer and punching the gas simultaneously. Shifting to 3rd at the redline and running full throttle to 80.
I ran 3 tests and they were all very close in time (less than 0.1 sec variation) with the average being 10.7 seconds. This number really isn't important, other than it sets a baseline that I need to drive exactly the same with the CAI. All we're concerned with is the time difference.
I went back home and swapped the CAI back in and ran the same tests.
Again all 3 runs were within 0.1 seconds and they averaged 10.3 seconds.
Since acceleration-to-speed time is directly proportional to the average HP over that time, the ratio of the two times will provide a fairly accurate average HP gain.
Since the acceleration test required a 2nd to 3rd gear shift, I subtracted 0.5 seconds from both times since there's no acceleration during the shift, and used the reduced times to calculate the actual acceleration time ratio. That's 10.2 seconds (stock) vs. 9.8 seconds (CAI).
So the results are a 4.1% average power gain in the 30-80 MPH range, which converts to 6.5 HP average HP gain assuming 160 HP for the stock engine.
Fortunately this confirms that my butt-dyno is still properly calibrated as my previous post said it felt like a 6-8 HP gain.
What I still ought to do is re-run the tests again with the CAI split and only running the upper tube as an SRI.
Also, it would be interesting to see if anyone else has the opportunity to run some similar tests and post their results.
2006 3S Touring Sedan, 5-speed manual, Eibach springs.
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It's cool you took the time to do this, but as far as confirming your "butt dyno" is still calibrated, not so much. The intakes all make around 6-8 hp, so there's no surprise there. It was a safe claim to begin with. Still, I agree that it would be interesting to see this test repeated many times with other intakes so there is some repeatability and comparability.
Mazdafreak67
Member
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- '06 Mazda MX-5, 6-spd
Originally, the idea to do this was simply a sanity check to see if what I thought I was feeling was actually translating to a measurable performance gain and not just a placebo effect. But after compiling all of the numbers and having the data be consistent with what I felt, plus as you mentioned the dyno results that others have posted, it seemed worthwhile to document the results.
On a final note, as for my calibrated butt-dyno, on average I drive 70 miles per day and in the past 5 years I've owned the following cars:
1995 Nissan 300ZX
2001 Porsche Boxster
2006 Lexus IS350
2006 Mitusbishi EVO MR
2004 Mercedes E55 AMG
2008 Subaru WRX
2008 Mazdaspeed 3
2006 Mazda MX-5 Miata (current)
2006 Mazda 3S (current)
This covers an extremely broad performance range with 0-60 times ranging from 4.5 seconds to 7.5 seconds. As a result, I've had a lot of time to fine tune my internal dyno and do feel that the test results confirm it's still calibrated.
