I read this a couple of hours and was so excited I have been running around town trying to find the K&N filter in stock so that I could try it tonight. No such luck. I am toying with the idea of of the HAI and then putting a small battery where the original filter was. I would then eliminate the battery box and put a very nice and much less costly straight through exhaust on.

The other idea is to put on the HAI while I modify the existing big air box to hold a similar great big filter and then do a clean and sealed large opening to the cold air at the base of the windshield to try to have a true cold air system. Pretty much every intake I have seen looks like a HAI system with more cost.

 

Hi RImini,

I've done the battery box removal and now have what I call a Super Borla catback- a SuperSprint 2.5" center pipe with resonator flowing into a Borla Turbo muffler with zero bends needed. I love it! As with a few others, I also have one of those "small batteries" called SLA or sealed lead acid batteries. I've had mine installed for almost 2 years with no problems. And while I'm no expert on these batteries, a fair amount of reading has taught me that they dislike heat very much. Keeping them away from the engine is a plus. Also, moving more weight to the front of the MCS is not exactly advisable...

 

Tony B,

Thanks for the info. I don't want to change the subject since I think this is a great thread. Where did you put the battery? Is it still in the stock but now smaller area? on in the boot?

 

I agree, this is a thread I've been waiting for, so let's not corrupt it any more than we already have. Here is the link over on MINI2:

http://www.mini2.com/forum/showthrea...muffler+choice

You might want to look a few pages prior to this one for more photos. PM if you have any questions...

Back to the HAI, please!

_________________
2003 IB MCS

 

So has there been any testing in regards to the intake getting wet or is that no longer a concern?
Guess you could spray the grill with a hose and see if the intake gets wet :smile:

<A HREF="https://www.northamericanmotoring.com/albums/album04/Mini_X_2b1.jpg" TARGET="_blank">
His, Chile RED over, Madness intake, Magnaflow exhaust, Helix 15% Pulley &amp; RDR Swaybar
Hers, Electric Blue / Union Jack on top and BONE Stock

 

Yes, that is my main concern also, compressing water

The hose idea is good. Since it might be a little difficult to discern if some water got on the filter or not, I'd wrap a paper towel arournd the filter and secure it with a rubber band, close the hood, shoot and open. Even a few drops would register on the paper towel...

 

&gt;&gt;So has there been any testing in regards to the intake getting wet or is that no longer a concern?
&gt;&gt;Guess you could spray the grill with a hose and see if the intake gets wet :smile:
&gt;&gt;

Umm... I would NOT recommend this.

One of the PhillyMINI members siezed his engine driving through a puddle with the stock intake (didn't post details on puddle depth, driving speed, etc and I forget if he has a MC or MCS).

 

&gt;&gt;Yes, that is my main concern also, compressing water
&gt;&gt;
&gt;&gt;The hose idea is good. Since it might be a little difficult to discern if some water got on the filter or not, I'd wrap a paper towel arournd the filter and secure it with a rubber band, close the hood, shoot and open. Even a few drops would register on the paper towel...


So how many droplets are you ok with?

--
Cheese

 

&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;So has there been any testing in regards to the intake getting wet or is that no longer a concern?
&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;Guess you could spray the grill with a hose and see if the intake gets wet :smile:
&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;
&gt;&gt;
&gt;&gt;Umm... I would NOT recommend this. :smile:

Would it be possible to use a smaller K&amp;N filter and leave the snorkel in place?

<A HREF="https://www.northamericanmotoring.com/albums/album04/Mini_X_2b1.jpg" TARGET="_blank">
His, Chile RED over, Madness intake, Magnaflow exhaust, Helix 15% Pulley &amp; RDR Swaybar
Hers, Electric Blue / Union Jack on top and BONE Stock

 

Is water really a problem? There is no protection for anyone that has one installed on their cooper, and i have yet to hear anything about accidental water compression.

 

The position of the snorkel hole is behind the hood, above the grille. Most automakers put their air inlets there to avoid ingesting water, bugs, cigarette butts, etc. The next time it rains, I'll pop the hood and do a hand check on the filter. I'm really not that concerned because even if water gets ON the filter, that does not mean the water is getting IN the engine. I could do a test with a wet/dry vac attached to a filter to see how water behaves when it hits the filter. Lastly, in order to hydrolock, a fairly decent quantity of water needs to be ingested in a very small amount of time (submerging the nose of the MINI would do the trick). You'd need to suck in about 50 cc of water in about 1/50 of a second in order to completely fill one combustion chamber with water. That's a big shot of tequila consumed VERY quickly with no salt or lime.

 

By the time a droplet (or many drops) of water make it through the filter, and then through the supercharger, it has become a fine mist. Unless you are going scuba diving with your MCS, you should not panic. As mentioned above, a significant and sudden amount of water would be the concern. ie. garden hose, deep water crossing, or sharing a shot of tequila with your car!

 

Water in and of itself should not cause the engine to seize, it is the amount of water. Obviously small amounts of water is not to bad, since you can purchase water injection systems.

To control water you could put a shield in front of it. While this gets rid of some of the cold air, we have already seen that cold air is not the big benefit, it is the amount of air and the tubing. The air in the engine compartment is at it's hottest, when it is standing still. When the car is moving, it gets quite cool under the bonnet (relatively speaking).

Another way to control water would be to put a very small tube between the filter and the TB and put a snorkel on it.

What I am even more interested in, which no one is touching on, is the effect of a larger TB with this setup. I really think the larger TB with the current setup is not really showing a lot of gains, because, again the tubing is restrictive. Now that the filter is directly bolted to the TB, I am going to guess that a larger TB will have a much greater impact on this system.

 

Gimme a larger TB and I'll test it!

How about relocating the throttle to the supercharger inlet and using a short, smooth aluminum adapter to connect the round throttle to the oval supercharger inlet? I bet there's tons of room down there for a VERY long filter. A true velocity stack on the supercharger inlet itself would be the best possible situation for airflow.

 

I drove with this filter for ~ 3-4 weeks. I was going to meet Andy at Atco one day to test it and it rained so hard on the way there that the wipers couldnt keep up and there was atleast an inch of standing water on the highway. I was obviously driving slow and not under load but no hydrolock for me.

This intake isnt pressurized like M7's so water that is ingested by the intake isnt forced into the engine. If the filter were to get wet, I'd imagine that air would simply enter the filter from a different spot. Its a common misconception that air is entering the entire surface of the filter at all times. It doesnt work that way, it travels through the path of least resistance. You'll notice the black circle when you change your stock panel filter, thats the part thats gettting used.

I think using good judgement when driving in the rain would be optimal for you, your car and your engine. :smile: Hope that helps.

--
Cheese

 

doesn't K&amp;N make those filter &quot;socks&quot; now? they look kind of like spandex for the filter to prevent any such water ingestion.

 

I want to point out that the original idea for this came from Cheese. He's the idea man but I'm the visionary.

 

Well, I guess this gives me a real reason to take off my CryO2 system. There is no way to run the HAI with it.

Andy-cheese-tech, keep thinking about a way to relocate the TB closer to the SC inlet. I think your on to something...

 

To answer an earlier question, I think posed by mac, I don't know how many droplets of water would be considered ok or acceptable to hit the filter, or paper towel around it while testing. That would certainly be a topic for discussion afterwards though. Suffice it to say the less the water the better...

Yes, the engine would be off for such an evaluation, and if indeed a fair amount of water were to hit the filter/towel set-up, that would not be good to have some water go in and trickle downward. Since the engine will not be operating, I'd pop-off the filter and put a small sandwich baggie (or the like) over the TB, then refit the HAI. Such testing could resume with no worrries of water, if copius, entering the system...

Someone had said about the possibility of an extension on the TB. That was why I asked Andy about the clearnance between the hood lining and the top of the filter. As he shared, there is none as it is actually touching, forming a crease in the hood lining. At least with this filter, this is not a consideration...

The idea-hoping is great guys! Larger TB, a velocity stack on the SC. Wow. I hope Andy has more testing planned for the weekend...

 

What i meant to say is that there are a lot of Cooper owners who have the pipercross filter(not the viper) which also allows you to get rid of the tubing with the &quot;water catch&quot; which connects to the grill and replace it with a straight through tubing aimed right at the filter. And so far i have yet to hear of any incidents of water being a problem, and the piperx came out a while ago. I have been running mine for over a year and we get tons of rain and snow here.

 

i still think the bottle neck is inbetween the throttlebody and SC......im sure somebody can figure away around this.....

 

Here's an idea. The upstream MAP sensor measures the air pressure at the supercharger inlet. I have installed a nipple in the connecting pipe just downstream from the throttle body. I could do a couple runs in the normal config, then reroute that upstream map to connect to the nipple (plugging the hole at the supercharger inlet) and do a couple more runs, comparing the results.

Having the HAI makes it much easier to access stuff down there.

 

&gt;&gt;Here's an idea. The upstream MAP sensor measures the air pressure at the supercharger inlet. I have installed a nipple in the connecting pipe just downstream from the throttle body. I could do a couple runs in the normal config, then reroute that upstream map to connect to the nipple (plugging the hole at the supercharger inlet) and do a couple more runs, comparing the results.
&gt;&gt;
&gt;&gt;Having the HAI makes it much easier to access stuff down there.

As I was reading this post, my thought was &quot;how does he have all this room to be putting nipples here, connectors there, etc.&quot;!!

 

&gt;&gt;Gimme a larger TB and I'll test it!
&gt;&gt;
&gt;&gt;How about relocating the throttle to the supercharger inlet and using a short, smooth aluminum adapter to connect the round throttle to the oval supercharger inlet? I bet there's tons of room down there for a VERY long filter. A true velocity stack on the supercharger inlet itself would be the best possible situation for airflow.


This is a great idea and I think we would see a lot better results.

If water were to enter the intake it would stay condensed along the inlet path, may become gaseous when it hits the supercharger if the heat was near 100C, but then condense again when it hits the intercooler. Would the Alta Oil Catch can be able to collect the water as well as the oil? Since the water would be sticking to the sides of the intercooler only moving toward the engine because of air pressure. Just a thought. But I think since no one is seeing problems with the MC, then we will probably not see anything either.

 

my expressing concern about keeping water off the filter wasn't because i thought you'd hydrolock, but because the water will wash off the filter oil and/or interfere with the air flow through the media pores.