Yeah there's no one on makterxyz in new england, but theres a microcenter within biking distance from me that does 3d printing and cnc small jobs.

 

I am still getting the last parts of my final plug printed. However, this finally came from shapeways (it's a maf wiring connector):

 

You don't have to use someone local. I often get stuff shipped to me. That said, there are a bunch of people based out of boston: 3D printers near Boston Ma | makexyz.com

 

Nice, would you mind sharing that STL or solid model so I can print one out? Thats for a 1.6 or 1.8?

 

It's for a 1.8. I will share the file when it is finalized but I still need to add some way to get the pins to hook into the connector. I can't do it exactly the same way as the OEM plug since those details are too small to print reliably.

 

Iv had good luck making a two piece female mold that are bolted together, i then put strips of byest cut fiverglass or carbon with the ressin on it along the walls of the mold and then inset an inner tube section inside the center and presurize it.
When the layup cures you will end up with a tube that you can build further with proper external layup's with a tubular vacuum bag inside (so you do not crush or distort the hole thing) and another bag one over the outside with peel ply and absorbent mat.
Good luck

 

My goal is to be able to do them in one shot using biaxial sleeves but if that doesn't work laying them up on the split mold is my backup plan. The inner diameter is too small to fit a hand inside but i can do one side oversized and use a flap that overlaps them.

 

Defenetly laying it up in one shot
Is the most cost efficient way

 

Thanks for all your hard work on this. If you need a tester for a VVT motor in a NA, let me know. I have over 140+ dyno runs on my car with lots of testing and I would love to try your intake.

Some details of the car:
'90
VVT Motor (Unopened junk yard motor)
Flat Top Intake manifold
DIYPNP
VVTuner
'99 IAT sensor
Racing Beat Header
Custom 2.5" madrel exhaust with an 18" Hushpower muffler
Custom intake with open filter

Car makes 143HP with its current tune and I am looking for more. I would be very happy to test it for you and send you any information you need.

My current dyno graph:
racing beat header.pdf

My current intake set-up (Picture is prior to Flat Top install):

 

I finally got a hacked together heat shield installed. It is several carbon fiber layups bonded together with foil on the back:


Also, I have been playing around with tubing wall thickness and elbow diameters. This stuff is all 2.5" except where it hooks up to the duct (which currently has about 3.5mm wall thickness):



That crossover has an inner diameter of 63.5mm but the wall thickness is only .75mm so it fits well in a 2.5" elbow. If you measure silicone elbows and aluminum tubes there is significant stepping up and down in size at each joint. This might not have a huge effect on performance but making carbon tubes is really easy and inexpensive and any added cost is offset by cheaper elbows and filters. Some numbers:

Stock TB is 53mm
Skunk2 TB is 64mm

2.5" elbows have an ID of 64mm
2.75" elbows have an ID of 70mm

2.75" aluminum tubing has in an ID of 65mm but because the walls are slightly more than 2mm thick the elbow needs to be 5mm larger than that to accommodate it. The final duct will have an ID of 62.5mm but only 1mm of wall thickness. As a result it will use a 2.5" filter and 2.5" elbows. The complete filter to TB intake will only deviate by ~2mm. On the setup Curly tested there was a lot more deviation than that (62.5mm to 70mm).

 

Heatshield plug is printed:


And this is about 60% of the filters, elbows, and pieces of plastic involved so far:

 

We're all waiting for this to go on sale.

 

I logged the second half of an hour of tuning veal. During the log I am merging onto a 70mph highway, cruising for a mile, and taking the next exit to repeat the process. The IATs are reading ~2.5 over ambient with the sensor in the air filter and the heat shield in place. FWIW the log starts with the car up to temp and the ambient temp climbed about 5 degrees as the sun came out.
This is comparable to what I recorded at cruise with the dual wall crossover so I am inclined to think there is very little heat transfer into the large amount of air flowing through the intake.

Also, I autocrossed this intake through rain and puddles last weekend. No water ingestion issues and my IAT sensor didn't seem to care about getting wet.

 

Nice progress. Have you played with the gap between the heat shield and filter at all? If its too close your going to load up the open side of the filter with dirt much quicker than the rear. This will increase the pressure drop through the filter faster and shorten the filter life between cleanings.

But I guess you could also just rotate it 180 very easily.

 

I hadn't thought about dirt accumulation. I did design the heat shield to be as large as is practical so it wouldn't have an impact on flow into the intake. There will be about 1.5" of air space at the base and about 2" at the filter tip.


I have all my 3d prints now and I am taking them with me on vacation so I can get them sanded and polished to a mirror surface.

 

Alec,

Which file is the latest and greatest for the intake?
Version 1.0 dated 7/18/2014 from your Cold Air Intake website?
Or the Version 7 STL file from over on Thingiverse Project 189320?

About to send one off to a local printer... and not sure which is the most current file.

Thanks!

 

The file on my website is the most up to date version.

 

We just had our first track day with the '93 running your intake. He had a hoot, shaving 2 seconds of his best time, with the only change being MS and the intake on his 1.6.

Lots of comments on the funny looking intake, tried to point them this way, but we had 4 turbo miatas, a rotrex, and V8 miata. So they wouldn't exactly work.

 

The v8 guys would love a similar design through, so it would be just like the stock vette intake, except either split between the two holes or through the big trapezoid in the middle if they wanted to run without a hood latch.

 

There is an aftermarket corvette intake that looks a lot like a bigger version of mine:
Halltech Super Beeline™ 102 Carbon Fiber Stage 1, Halltech, Intake, Carbon Fiber intake, CF102, CF112,

I could do something that went down the center or a giant piece that forked off to both of stock holes. It would be a lot more expensive but people who can afford LS swaps might be willing to pay for it.


I wish I could pick halltech's brain and find out exactly how they do their layups. The weave looks continuous which would suggest they are using a bixial sleeve and a wet layup. Getting a totally pinhole free finish like theirs with a biaxial sleeve isn't easy. My parts will likely have small cosmetic flaws but they will be plenty strong waay cheaper. Alternatively, people can pay $1000 per kit and I can get aluminum tooling made and use pre-preg. I doubt the miata crowd is going to be interested in $1000 intakes.