Homemade hi-flow air filter ideas???

Wrap Intake pipe (after turbo) with exhaust wrap, install cooler into fuel return line.

 

The minimal gain would not be worth the potential and expensive repairs in my opinion.

 

I would go with that. I am running a ported / polished / coated exhaust manifold with a larger BW turbo with a blanket, and getting ready to wrap the flange pipe. Along with Walker megaflows on the stacks, I am keeping EGTs a lot cooler. I am looking at several coolers and haven't decided yet which I will be putting on the return line.

 

I am not convinced that the engine is always getting the right amount of air. Depends on the hp and size of the engine, the turbo being used, and whether the truck has outside cans or under hood air filter. One of the big problems with under hood setups, especially when upgrading ECM's, larger turbos, etc, is that the turbo has a tendency to overspool due to the fact that there just isn't enough available intake air to grab on to. Stock OEM air filters are just not cut out for anything more than typical fleet specs in an underhood setup. These higher flow air filters that are being discussed increase air flow up to 40% over stock air filters. But one does have to watch the oil samples and look for excess dirt getting in.

True, fuel is a primary issue when it comes to power, but if there is not enough air to generate a complete burn, the what's the point? One is just sending unburned fuel out the stacks. Increasing power and efficiency is a package deal. You have to lower the restriction to get the exhaust out, you have to increase the fuel rate, and you have to make sure there is substantial intake air getting in. There is no one thing that will do it all by itself.

 

It's not the air Cowpie but the quantity of oxygen in the air and the density of the air and fuel. The key is getting more molecules to occupy the same cubic meter. This is achieved by cooling. In cool fuel and cool air the molecules are closer together so there's more of them to complete combustion. This increases the BTU content on 1 cm of fuel.

I've never heard of a turbo starving for air...that would create a negative pressure at the suction wheel and should collapse the rubber hose if you approached negativity...yes?

I also agree there is no one thing by itself. Flowing exhaust gasses, cooler air / fuel mixes and less restrictive mufflers all certainly will add to hp as will cc'ed heads and balanced engine components. The mechanical efficiency of a diesel engine is 35% which means 65% of whats burned goes out the stack. Hard to overcome that when the piston stops and you can't use the heat generated either. Or can we?

What I'm suggesting is we get more "work" from what we have.

I am citing data used to create fire pumps for buildings. We took a 6-71, made it a T/A with inter cooler and upped the injectors to 9290's giving us 90cc's of fuel per stroke. She dyno'ed 375hp when hooked to the buildings water supply. ( 50F ) The cold water cooled the air charge and fuel making them denser and the cooled fuel carried more heat away from the engine. ( through the fuel return )

FLC is on the right path although I don't like playing with the air cleaner. I see that as a recipe for engine failure from dirt which is right up there with heat. If I found dirt or contamination in my oil sample because I changed my A/F to a high flow, would that not be too late?

 

How do you think the old filter minders work, when the filter gets too restrictive it will create a vacuum. Some of the performance upgrade turbos prolly move enough air that at full flow they could suck a filter minder shut without the filter on it.

I still would not use a house filter, there is no way of knowing if it will support enough CFM to filter right.