When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
It took me a while to find some decent info on placing the IAT in the intake including pics. So i thought i would take some pics of mine after I did it.
My car is a twin turbo LS3 which is nearing the end of its completion finally.
I put it in the intake as i am going to be running 50/50 meth to keep the cylinders cool as i'm currently on a stock block and wanted as much distance as possible for the meth to atomize as i have a very short distance between my intercooler and the throttle body.
I drilled a hole in the side of the intake about 16.5-17mm using a stepper drill bit, just so it was a bit smaller than the threaded part of the sensor.
I then carefully lined up the sensor and very slowly eased it in with a long socket so it threaded the plastic, no need for a tap.
Once it was in i slowly unwound it, wrapped the thread with some PTFE to help prevent any air leaks and slowly wound it back in.
This is what it looks like -
I was pretty happy with the way it turned out and looks almost OEM.
I've always been told that keeping the temp and pressure sensor after the throttle body is the most consistent location, and tells the best story about the air at the valve, but thats all because "somebody said so" not because there was some research that said so.. Interesting simple question..
I placed mine in the charge pipe, any advantage to putting it in the intake?
As with anything, you add up the plus and minus. The charge pipe gives you a better reading of the intake air temps, but the manifold gives you a better reading of what temp hits the cylinders. Since the GM computer gives you a bias table that relates IAT to ECT, the best result could be very time consuming to quantify, and perhaps not the best use of your tuning time. The difference between plastic and aluminum intakes could bias any results significantly. I'm sorry that I don't have the capability to give a better answer, but this really is a complicated issue to generalize an answer for. The good news is that almost the only time this becomes a real issue is during episodes of slow traffic and high heat soak.