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Thoughts on running intake tube directly downwards in front of motor?
I want to run my intake tube in front of the water pump with the filter in between the crank pulley and the electric fan. On other swaps, guys have reported rapidly rising IATs in part I'm sure due to all the darn steel in the engine bay. Running the intake tube down and low will look really cool also. Anyone have any thoughts on this? The LS3 MAF will be a few inches from the filter.
I've seen other guys do it, but yeah, all that hot air going right into the intake. Any way to maybe take it down under the radiator with a type of fresh air intake? At least a chin spoiler to divert some fresh air up there. Maybe something like this...
I have a H/C/E 6.0 in my 71 GMC, I saw high IATs, maybe 140-150s with my original setup drawing air inside the engine bay, behind the left headlights. I ended up leaving the intake in the same place, but I built a cold air box around it, and I have vents cut into the front of the inner fender to supply outside air, this has my IATs much lower. I have meant to make mine nicer, and cut vents into my core support where they'd not be visible but would feed the air box.
I would imagine it'd be fine to run it like you show, but I'd agree that you'd probably want to have some scoop/duct to get below the radiator, and then a filter is a challenge. Without ducting, it might heatsoak pretty bad if you end up sitting in traffic.
Good ol' thermodynamics dictates a 1/2-1% HP loss for each 10F increase in intake air temps. There's a reason that, oh, half a billion or so new cars over the last 30 years all came with provisions for cold air getting into the intake piping. Are you sure you want your air filter right behind all the hot air coming off the radiator? Like others, my filter sits behind one of the headlights -- with some provisions in the front fascia that allow cold air from behind the grill to 'get in'. My IAT's are always with 5-10F of ambient.
Last edited by Michael Yount; 05-30-2019 at 11:13 AM.