How to keep engine dry with ram air hood

[kozy]

I just recently bought this car and it's got a fiberglass ram air hood on it. I drove it in the rain for the first time this morning and once I got to my destination the car died a few times on me. When I left the office on lunch, the idle was rough and it wasn't running right. My assumption is that rain made its way through the front openings on the hood and soaked my air filter (cone filter clamped to the end of the TB).



Does anyone have tips on how I can keep this from happening again with this hood?

[Scottydoggs]

seal off the holes. problem solved.

[coolone]

^^^ this ^^^

Or if you want it functional, make a custom duct to channel air to the intake/filter (boxed) and divert water away. Otherwise, its just allowing more air to get hot under the hood, lol

[REDCRAPGP]

Or redo your intake and route it into the fender and seal it. Booba had a nice setup.

[kozy]

^^^ this ^^^

Or if you want it functional, make a custom duct to channel air to the intake/filter (boxed) and divert water away. Otherwise, its just allowing more air to get hot under the hood, lol

Call me naive here, but how the hell do you allow air to get through the front rams but divert water away that comes in through the same place???

Or redo your intake and route it into the fender and seal it. Booba had a nice setup.

I saw his, looks good but I would assume water would get past the headlight and still get the filter wet in that case...right?

[REDCRAPGP]

Doubtful.. Plenty guys do it.. Waters is not going to get past the headlight unless for whatever reason you have body panel gaps..

[industrialfish]

Doubtful.. Plenty guys do it.. Waters is not going to get past the headlight unless for whatever reason you have body panel gaps..

I've never had water in mine that I know of, but somehow the stock airbox kept getting full of leaves in the fall.

[kozy]

Ahh ok thanks.

I guess a better first question would have been "How does this ram air hood work?" Since it has openings in the front as well as the rear. It's the F.1 hood from PFYC.com.

[nik12937]

I can attest to using a filter inside the fender, I just used some 3" PVC, a few couplers, a low profile Spectre cone filter (so the whole filter fits inside the fender) and a roof baffle (used to seal chimneys, you can find them at Home Depot) that I cut to size to seal the fender from the engine bay.

It's been about a year and even after driving through some very heavy rain and deep puddles, I've never had any problems. From what I could see the filter never got more than a few drops of water on it, and if you wanted to be super safe you could just use a bit of weather stripping to seal around the headlight and wheel arch liner.

[Fivefingerdeathpunch]

I would also remove all spark plug wires and put di-electric grease in the ends to protect them from water getting in and causing a misfire.

[kozy]

I would also remove all spark plug wires and put di-electric grease in the ends to protect them from water getting in and causing a misfire.

Already done. I'm going to try checking things out tonight for a few minutes but it's summer in the desert so I don't plan to stay outside too long!

[Logan541]

can you show us a pic of the underside of the hood

[Logan541]

front holes force air into engine rear holes allow hot air to escape

[kozy]

Here are pics showing where the air is directed to from the scoops. The pic with multiple holes is fed from the passenger side scoop and the pic showing a single hole is matches up with the drivers side scoop. This hole is pretty close to the air filter and probably the culprit.


I am going to ghetto-rig something with duct tape to cover the hole by the filter the next time it rains to see if that keeps the filter dry. I bet blocking that hole off would do the trick.

[coolone]

It's simple to make actually and all you need do is let Google and YouTube be your friend...

Plastic or fiberglass can be shaped to channel air, holes can be drilled to allow water to escape and drain away. It's just a project that requires a little planning and can be done easily. Search ramair hoods and go from there. Or heck, be the first! Lol...
; )

[REDCRAPGP]

Ahh keep it simple and just convert it to a fenderwall intake.. Get a shorter intake you don't have to completely route it down to the fender.

[Logan541]

If you close up the one big round hole above the filter you defeat the whole ram air function I have the SD hood and have never had a poblem with water. I suspect that the holes in back to let air escape are teh problem when the car is sitting water runs into them. You also may want to try what I did just cut a small hole in the air box that lines up with the whole on teh hood and take out that plastic piece attached to the fender on teh side of teh box and use a k&N cone it sounds nice I have an slp airbox but I think really any air box will do I just put it in because I got a goot price on two of them

[kozy]

I needed something cheap/free and quick so I could keep driving the car until I can re-work the intake setup. I don't still have the factory airbox at all, only a cone filter connected right to the throttle body. I just put duct tape over the hole for now to keep the filter dry.

I'm wondering if I can somehow attach a curved pipe/tube of some sort to the hole on the bottom of the hood closest to the filter to shoot air/water in a different direction AWAY from the filter. In theory, that sounds like it would work.

[Logan541]

The theroy would work only thing is a.) how to attach it and b.) diverting air away from the filter defeats the ram air issue also if you are worried about hydrolock it takes a LOT of water for that to happen. think about the shaker and ram air hoods back in the 60's and 70's they all got wet in the rain

[kozy]

Nah, there's no worry about hydrolocking the engine. I've sucked more water through an intake intentionally (to steam clean the combustion chambers and piston tops) than would ever get sucked through my air filter.

Maybe I'm totally off-base here and the reason my car was stumbling was not because of a wet air filter but rather something else?