How-to 10-15WHP dyno proven For Free.

Well i dyno'd my car this past weekend and i was very happy with the numbers i put down for the only performance mods i have are a cobb SRi, Turbo X's test pipe and BOV, Thats it for any mods that you'd notice and yes the BOV is one because the stock BOV leaks like a siv so you hold boost hella better with a upgraded unit. Best run of the day was 270 Wheel horse power and 305 wheel torque this was with the mod done i'm about to tell you. We made 10 pulls all together and and all pulls were with in 4-6 HP and 5-6 Trq of each other on a dynojet 240 something i forgot the numbers parts but whatever.
I was at the race track about a month ago and some guys walked up to me and saw i had ice bag on my i/c i went to go remove the ice and put my ic cover back on and they said ishould leave it off. it's dyno proven 7-10 whp. I called their bulls*** never thinkig removing a cover would make that big a difference. Well when we were dynoing my car i figured i'd try it. this was after 6 pulls so the car was nice and hot and the i/c was already getting heat soaked. To my suprise every pull after removing the i/c cover and modding it got me no less then 10 WHP and no greater then 15WHP. 15 was the best and 10 was the worst out of the last 4 pulls. This is a free mod you just have to be brve enough to cut your stock cover. DO NOT JUST REMOVE IT. First this is stupid cause the factory hood seal no longer works as well and also i've seen countless people melt the rubber seal on the hood from when the stock i/c gets too hot. so do it right and cut it. here's how and pcs of mine.

Tools Needed :
-Air saw, hand saw ( will work just may take for ever ), wizard wheel, etc. basicly something that can cut plastic and also will allow you to cut certain angles. I'm a mechanic so i used my little air saw it worked perfect
-Misc. drill bits. No special size just one big enough to make a starter hole for your saw to start and then also will help you in cutting the corners.
-File, sand paper, wizard wheel with scotch brite pads, etc. basicly something to file down and make the left over plastic smooth since it will melt when cutting and just peeling it off looks like crap.
-10m Socketor 10mm wrench, wrench will work but will take longer this is needed to remove the two 10mm bolts holding down the cover.
-Striaght edge or ruler and a sharpie.

How-To
Basicly the easiest way i found is i wanted to keep the lettering in the front of the cover. you can cut it how you like but i liked the engine letters in the front so i cut around it. Take your straight edge or ruler and sharpie and for the sides you want to cut just alittle was down from the top i think i measured like 1 1/4 -1 3/4 " i believe but basicly you still want some of the side of the cover left to give the rubber seal on the hood a good seal. if you cut too low the hood will loose some effect. for the front i drew a line with my sharpie and ruler just above the letters and connected the line to the ones i already drew on the sides. NOW PAY CLOSE ATTENTION. IF you cut the rear and don't heed my warraning your cover won't fit right anymore cause there is a little plastic tab in the back that slides onto the I/C to help keep it still. You want to draw your line the same distance from the bottom of the cover as the front BUT when you get to the center where the plastic tab is you want to cleanly cut around making a hump so to say.

Now that all your lines are drawn you can start cutting. the corners are a little tricky and if you used a air saw like me the plastic can clog up and cause the saw to stall but all in all it took me from start to finish about 30-45 minutes with clean up time where you have to clean the edges so it looks good. Here's my pictures below sorry i only have a cell phone camera but they should give you a idea of what it's suppose to look like.

Final Thoughts :
You may not or probally won't notice a BIG difference but it's on 10-15 HP not 30. But this is dyno proven before and now i'm clearing things up and telling you they're right. The factory cover like everything else on the car is super restrictive and block air from gettting to the whole intercooler and because of the style of the stock I/C you need as much air there as possible. I noticed a big difference in heat soaking. Where before after alittle harsh driving the cold side of my i/c would be hot as balls. Now afterwards not the case anymore. I drove it hard at 80MPH on the highway for about 30 minutes then 15-20 around my house on the streets ( NO i wasn't doing 80MPH anymore once i got off the highway ) so all in all about 45-50 minutes of some good WOT driving and when i pope my hood my cool side of my i/c was nice and cool like it's suppose to be not hot anymore so your engine will thank you. here's some pics of how mine looks

above is a wide view here's a close up of the front

here's a close up of the rear. notice how i left the little notch for the bracket in rear

And last here's my car strapped to the dyno getting ready for the first pull. I will post all my dyno graphs/charts as soon as they are e-mailed to me

let me know if the pics don't work. i'll try and re post them tomorrow if they're not working right

Hmm interesting. Now is the cover purely for show or is there a risk of damage?

Hey man that actually looks pretty good! BTW if you make the pics jpgs they will be a lot smaller and a lot easier for people to see. I converted them all to jpegs for ya.

I/c

Hey bro good info and thank you.i'm at work right now (NAVY) but tomorrow i'll definitely be doing this and i'll keep you updated good info. and if you know any more tricks let me know and i'll spread the word too

This is interesting.....anyone else try this?

yeah, i definitely want to know as well. I may try to pick up an extra one and hack it up if its not too expensive!

Also, smeone needs to dyno or log this or do something!

I really wonder if this is something that would void warranty.......but probably yes

any pics of the dyno charts?

this doesnt seem like something that should cause that high of a gain.....

neox.286 said:

any pics of the dyno charts?

this doesnt seem like something that should cause that high of a gain.....

Click to expand...

If a fmic is good for 30 horses, why shouldn't this mod gain something too? Colder charged air = more power as far as I know....

neox.286 said:

this doesnt seem like something that should cause that high of a gain.....

Click to expand...

+1
Especially in a car that isn't moving. If it was in motion, I could believe the increased airflow over the IC might cool the charge and result in a power gain, but not sitting on a dyno. In fact, if the top of the shroud was relieved too much, I might expect a loss in cooling efficiency with the car in motion due to the air not being properly channelled through the IC. Perhaps the reason it worked on a dyno is that with the hood open the relieved cover allowed more hot air to rise up and escape from below.
I think this is one of those cases where Laloosh would have the right response. Take it to the track and show me the improvement on a time slip.
I just don't trust dynos when it comes to mods that work by directing airflow.

+1 on jpg, bmp is horrendous for the internet.

Looks like you did a really nice job on it though!

Because I read about this in another post, I tried running with my cover off just to see the effects.

Yesterday when I left home and was going to work my BAT was about 30deg hotter than my IAT. Somewhere around 58deg IAT and 97Deg BAT at highway speeds.

Today it was kinda the same but my BAT was a bit cooler. My IAT to work today was 57Deg and my BAT was 87 to 91Deg. This is a 7-10deg cooler charge.

I could see the top cover holding in heat as that makes sense to me. I'm not sure if you would get better results doing this mod or just taking off the cover. Sure the mod would push air down into the TMIC core better. But without the mod air would still be pushed into the core as well as all sides of the TMIC which would cool down the entire TMIC. More testing needs to be done for sure.

You say you got 270 wheel hp and 305 wheel torque from the cobb sri, test pipe, bov, and ic "mod" but if you read further down you say you have a home made bc. Is that factored into this dyno as well?

Super Unique said:

If a fmic is good for 30 horses, why shouldn't this mod gain something too? Colder charged air = more power as far as I know....

Click to expand...

because a fmic and removing a piece of shrouding are two COMPLETELY different things

1. fmic removes the heatsoak issues
2. fmic can flow air differently
3. fmic can flow more air or less air (both have advantages/disadvantages)
4. fmic is getting air directly on it from the motion of the car

there are plenty of HUGE factors into why a fmic can cause a 30hp increase over the factory tmic, just like how the aftermarket tmic can also see increases....the shroud covering being remove does not affect any of the factors that the new tmic/fmic setup affects (airflow/volume/size/etc...)

it is possible that the intercooler was able to cool better, but until we see dyno proven numbers (this thread claims them, yet doesnt supply pics) or even better yet time slip numbers....I wouldnt go cutting up your nice intercooler shrouding just yet ;-)

i cut mine about 9 months ago, i didnt cut as much off the cover. I basically cut the grill off , i doubt you will see 10 -15 whp but it should help (only drawback is the occasional pebble will bend a fin or two)

Looks like you did a nice job. It is easy to astray when cutting plastic. Maybe you didn't need to remove so much from the front and rear, who knows. Wonder what the effect would be if you created a seal between the shroud and the ic to make all air flow through the fins, not around the sides (or is it already like this?)

This really is a mod that has to be street proven to be meaningful. But at least tell us how you were set up on the dyno. Hood open or closed? Fans? Fan directly above ic?