Amazing new high performance intake...

[Meister]

'Twas a hot and muggy night, with a density altitude approaching 4000 feet, perfect for poor performance and unimpressive times...

Sometimes I'm luckier than I deserve. Such was the case last Thursday when FedEx delivered the parcel I had anxiously been awaiting, a production prototype of a revolutionary new high performance intake which I predict will stand the air intake industry on its ear. After the quick & easy install I could hardly wait to fire my ride up and verify my suspicions. The engine was already warm from having been recently driven, so after a short period of waiting for everything to stabilize, I blipped the throttle.

Whoa!! Did you hear that?! I blipped the throttle again, and sure enough, there it was again...this amazing intake design is so effective that throttle response is now so extremely sharp that I was chirping a drive belt from the super-fast response time! That had never happened before, but will now happen each & every time I blip the throttle.

Feeling very much like a kid at Christmas, I grabbed my trusty G-Timer II and the sc flashpaq and headed out into the night toward my test location. For sc tuner settings I run the 91 octane tune with corrected tire size, a 185 mph speed limit, and stock transmission at all times other than the track where I select custom, paddle kick, raised shift point and decreased torque management, the latter being moot as I use the GSM mod to totally shut down ESP & tm.

Using the superchips tuner's more aggressive tranny settings is worth a good .2 at the track, but I dislike the tranny shift behavior for daily driving so intensely that I didn't change to custom tune that night, so you can take .20 off of each of these times to see what the true track times would be. Another tenth can come off for weight - I started with 7/8 tank of fuel and a full trunk, including all the standard stuff such as spare & jack, plus my tools and a utility tray with 40 pounds of various spare parts and cleaning paraphernalia. etc.

Upon arrival at the test area I ran eight back-to-back quarter mile runs, followed by two high speed runs.

Performance of the new air intake system was at once flawless and measurable. The best outright 0-60 time was 5.04 seconds on the sc flashpaq, 5.07 seconds on the G-Timer II. This is three tenths quicker than with my own custom air intake system, which began life as a K&N Typhoon. Correcting for a DA of nearly 4000' would give a 0-60 time of around 4.8 seconds; getting the weight down and the sc tuner's tranny tune set to competition mode would likely take her into mid-4s.

The quarter mile times were all within a tenth and all reached the identical speed of 105 mph. Lowest ET of the night was 13.57 on the G-Timer II and 13.64 on the flashpaq. Again, setting an aggressive flashpaq tune mode and reducing weight are worth another .3, which would have us at the mid 13.2s. If one corrected for our high DA we'd have times of around 12.96@109.98.

Curiously the 60' times are unrealistically quick on the sc tuner. The sc tuner shows 1.45 seconds for best 60' time, and a 60' time of 1.69 seconds under Last Run. They show as 2.1s on the G-Timer II. Reality is in the upper 1.9s.

Here is the list of "Bests" from the sc tuner, each at least .2 quicker with the new production prototype air intake, the only change in configuration, than with my own intake, after taking into account transmission tune/settings and the additional non-track weight:

60' 1.45 sec 43 mph
330' 5.74sec 56 mph
1/8 mi 8.87 sec 83 mph
1000' 11.45 sec 96 mph
1/4 mi 13.64 sec 105 mph

Engine coolant temp shortly after the 8th and final quarter mile pass (at the point we could have begun a 9th run) was a perfect 176* F, the result of running both radiator fans all evening and a sufficiently rich fuel map, from running both the Super Chip stage II and the sc tuner, that the engine was running cool.

With response from the new air intake so impressive at the lower end, I was concerned that it may have a negative effect on high end performance; I needn't have worried. My prior record speed of 172 mph was surpassed on both high speed passes that night without my even having planned to do so, reaching 174 mph on the first run and 175 mph on the second. As I was intending merely to gently explore the upper limits of the speed envelope for the first time since making so many changes (radical new air intake system, heads, cam, headers, ff cats) my digital SLR was stowed in its case when I saw 174 mph. On the second run, the 175 mph pass, the flash washed out the EVIC settings, so we have pics of a pegged speedo and an appropriately wound tach, but no readable digital display.

But it's not a biggie, as we'll get some pics when we're planning for it after the weather cools off. (At 88* it was nearly 50 degrees warmer Thursday night than it was for my earlier record speed runs. I was pleasantly surprised that my sweet C got up there so easily in the heat.)

This new high performance air intake system is proving itself to be extremely effective. Despite finding it necessary to temporarily use the somewhat restrictive stock Typhoon filter element (the large & beautiful filter element shipped with the intake won't fit in my car due to the factory HIDs extending into the area needed by the filter) performance is up by .2 to .3 in 0-60' times. A custom filter element designed to fill the available space in an HID-equipped LX is being shipped and should arrive NLT Thursday. I expect performance to increase noticeably, once again, when the larger filter element arrives.

Note: The manufacturer has consented to allow this remarkable new intake system to be thoroughly tested and evaluated at MFO5 next week in Sacramento. Be sure to drop by if you're in the area, and tune in to the live feed if you're not local.

Edit: As you all know by now, the creator of the AirHammer high performance air induction system is Scott Peterson, aka Rev.Hammer.

Please see attached photos, as well as those posted here: http://s12.photobucket.com/albums/a243/computermeister/

[FreebirdSRT]

Wow Meister. Great write up and very impressed to see you eclipse your top end numbers. 174 & 175 on a 5.7L. Very impressive my friend.

Can't wait to see how your new intake does at the face-off.

I sent Matt the new Injen CAI to be tested at the Face-off. Matt and I wanted to see if the Injen CAI is just all beauty or is actually productive as well.

Wish I could be there.

[crhemi]

As always, great write up Jim.

[mjr5150]

Wow ,
Great write-up Meister !!! Drueling on my keyboard . As far as pioneer's go........I could not ask for one with more heart and knowledge than yourself (as illustrated by your imformative posts ) . Great work and we are looking forward to the video feed = more druel !! Take care and thanks for sharing, Mike .

[phillips2024]

like everyone else said, great write up also, cant wait for pics and vids

[bruno]

Meister,
Awesome write-up. I felt like your passenger observing the experience.

Feel free to test it out again in my car at the MFO5 next week!

bruno

[Moose]

EEESSSSSHHHHHHH! Just when I think you have that baby dialed-in like no other...you just keep raising the bar! Great write-up and man does that sound impressive. What an awesome ride you've got there, Jim. Unreal!

When I read that stuff from you a truly miss my 5.7 sweetness!

You're on a whole new level....AGAIN!

Nice show

[Northern Rider]

"T'was a hot and muggy night . . ", indeed!!!

Jim, I remember some time back that the two of us predicted that a 5.7 with an ECU tuner and the right mods would match 6.1 performance.

You are proof positive of that speculation. It is amazing what goes on in the Arizona desert after dark.

I guess I got some catchin' up to do!

[Trojan]

Meister 180 is just a hop/skip away, Keep it up this is sick!
At this rate of knocking tenths off , what next!

Great Show,
Trojan

[Ghost of Lancifer]

Any chance of Pics?