Is the CAI a good HP mod on the S2000, or does it just sound good. One of my friends has one on his S, and the intake pipe stays really hot, unlike most CAI's. Should this be my first mod????? Does anyone have dyno for the AEM???
Thanks

 

I think "CAI" for the AEM might be a bit of a misnomer. It is a "performance" intake in that it has been shown to produce good gains but once the engine bay heats up, those gains are gone and you might even go into the negative. My AEM is on its way but I'm still not certain that I'm going to install it. If I do, I will most definately insulate the part that's exposed to the heat.

 

It doesn't matter whether there is an objective power gain. The AEM smooths out the F20C and lets the engine grab off the line without gasping. My opinion is that the AEM is a definite power boost at all RPMs, except perhaps for the very top end. There is no point in arguing about objective power gains with a CAI unless you have a sophisticated wind tunnel / dyno. The point is that the car runs more smoothly and is more fun to drive with the AEM. I've never even come close to perceiving a loss of power compared to stock. It's a good buy -- especially compared to the unnecessarily convoluted and expensive carbon fiber solutions that predominate the s2000 CAI market.

 

just dont expect too much from an intake no matter how good it is.. 5 hp would probably be the max benefit..

 

U'll gain anywhere from 5 - 10 hp..

 

Then you'll lose 10-15 HP when the intake temp gets up to over 70*C.

 

there is a simple solution to that. just go out and buy thermal wrap and wrap it around the aem pipe. no biggie . i have a friend that has a 12 second allmotor civic, and that's what he did. he wraped his aem w/ thermal wrap.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by GSRacer
[B]

there is a simple solution to that.

 

Hi, my name is Lawson Mollica and I am the marketing coordinator at AEM. To answer your question regarding heat, although the actual piping may retain heat, the heat is not able to transfer to the inlet air because of the lack of resident time of the air in the pipe. The air is traveling at around 400 feet/sec at full throttle, and heat transfer from the pipe to the air stream is insignificant. An analogy of this is if you hold your hand over the flame of a lighter it will burn your hand because the resident time your hand is exposed to the heat is great. Conversely, you can pass your hand through the flame of a lighter all you want without burning yourself because the resident time your hand is exposed to the flame is short.

At light load, the volume of air passing through the pipe is minimal, the air speed is low, and you may see some rise in air temp due to heat transfer. However, at light load, charge density is not as critical because maximum power is not the objective under light throttle conditions. Typically, economy is. Given this circumstance, a warmer air charge may have merit.

Also, we perform extensive thermocouple testing of the engine compartment with our intake systems during the R&D phase to ensure that any heat saturation of the pipe is negligible with respect to intake temps under full throttle operation.

We are in the process of posting dyno results on our website and should have them up by Friday, April 5th. We will have the results of the S2000 intake testing, and I also encourage any S2000 owners who have our system and have dyno'd their vehicles to post their results too. I know the members will also appreciate independent results. Thank you.

 

Lawson - welcome to s2ki! thanks for the explaination.

you dont sound like you are in the marketing department. =)