Ok I know the gains are very minimal, if any, as I explained to my girl, but she wants it anyway for the re-usability, sound, & looks. Can't buy an eBay one coz the smog police here in Cali suck. So we're gonna fork out for the more expensive CARB legal ones I guess.
Which one would be a better choice & which filter would u choose dry or oiled?

Injen gives u the option of a dry or oiled filter.
http://store.newlevelmotorsports.com/is1545.html

Or

AEM
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/AIS-22-413P/

Injen is a few dollars more, but no biggie.

 

I would say but the one that is cheaper. I have had good luck with the longevity of both brands. Goodluck!

 

...neither and tell your girl to deal with it.

 

Lol! She's always talkin about how much stuff is on my Mustang so I think spending $150 on her Civic would be ok. + like I said, the re-usability of the air filters will pay for itself down the road... So what y'all think of these new "dry" air filters vs. the K&N style??

 

I have a Injen, It sits in my garage in a bag, with a K&N filter. They suck.

Not to be a dick, but your girl has no idea what intakes do. I LOST mpg, and every little bit of top end my car did have.

The filters on the other hand are good, expensive but good.

 

That's alot of money to put into something that really isn't going to do that much good, especially in cali.

Use the money elsewhere...my .02

That's just something they'll see during inspections and start digging more and more since you now have a modified engine as opposed to the bone stock situation that they would just glance over real quick.

If you weren't in cali I'd say a short ram wouldn't be a huge deal, slap a cheapo ebay one on for her with a TB spacer and she can hear her civic whistle and whoosh all day long.

Who knows...I do know females though, and 170 to avoid a headache of complaints might be worth it, that way she doesn't complain EVERY time she gets in your mustang about you not helping her with her civic. Good luck.

 

If your set on buying a SRI. why dont you look for a used one?... if anything you can probably get a new K&N filter with the used pipe WITH the carb sticker.

 

Why don't you just get a drop-in K&N filter? They're basically lifetime filters and just need a good cleaning with the solution every now and then. Plus, you don't have to spend 150. They're like 45.

 

oil soaked air filters are for extremely DRY,dusty, and/or sandy conditions. i think they stopped using those in the 1950's.

 

Probably the best idea...this along with removing the silencer system under the right front part of the front bumper will give you a decent little sound under acceleration, and it will still all look oem.

 

What is this sound from intakes that people seek out? I've never not had a cold air intake on my car, but if anything I would want it quieter. If anything the noise from the intake annoys me. All I want now is the OEM setup with silencer and everything.

To the OP, there's gotta be something else out there you can please her with in that price range, whether it's for her civic or not

 

This is what I ended up doing. The short ram sucks in hot air from the engine bay, which negates any demand you'd get (which is throttle response, not any noticeable horsepower) so they're more for looks than anything.

CAI would be a better choice if you're looking for gains [i]and[/] reuse-ability. It was a pain to maintain though, so I rarely did it. I'd have to replace all the clips on the bumper every time I did it because they'd get gunked up with road salt and such and would break when removing.

I ended up re-installing my stock intake with a K&N. If you want the sound when you hit VTEC, take out the resonator. If you want something to look cool, go with the short ram.

 

Yeah a short ram does suck in hot air. the only time I'd recommend using a SRI is in the winter when you don't want to suck up water through the CAI and hydrolock it. Unless, like in your case, you still have the stock box which I'd use over a short ram.

 

You and I both on being annoyed with the sound. I never liked the sound that comes from a CAI. I understand the power gains, but I'd keep the stock box over the small gains. To each his own, though. No big.

 

Girl here as well. I've had a stock airbox on my '98 Civic EX (D16Y8), an AEM CAI and an AEM SRI (after the CAI was stolen) and then an ARC box on the same car with a B18C1 swap.

I will never ever use one of those AEM type intakes on my car again. The CAI made the car louder, but didn't increase performance at all. I think there might have been a bit of a loss of fuel economy as well, but really all it did was sit there making the engine bay look strangely empty on one side and make noise. Plus it wasted my money in that I paid for it. At least it didn't shake around and damage anything under the hood since that brand has a bracket.

Oh, and I only got to clean that filter once before the whole thing was gone!

Then once my car was stolen and they took my CAI I got an AEM SRI. It was absolutely horrible. I lost top end, my car would have trouble getting up small hills. At least later on I was able to sell that one when I found a stock airbox (I had to get the SRI because it was so difficult to find a replacement airbox).

So then I had the stock airbox with a DC Sports (oiled) drop in filter and everything went back to normal. It was great.

But then I swapped and found a deal on an ARC box. I didn't want the arm and hooked it up to the stock arm instead. For whatever reason this hasn't caused me to have that bogging and power loss that the SRI gave me. My intake is louder than my Spoon Sports muffler though.

AEM CAI


AEM SRI


Stock Airbox


ARC Box with Stock Arm

 

Most likely going this route. Thanks for the replies folks!

 

Like I said earlier, there wasn't much performance gain, but there was an improvement in throttle response that wasn't totally apparent until I removed it. To truly get any benefit, you'd need to do I/H/E to remove any bottlenecks which may net 10-15hp, which you would never be able to feel but would make the motor more responsive.

I didn't notice much more noise during normal cruising. It was when blipping the throttle, going WOT or hitting the VTEC crossover where it would would make some noise. I actually thought it sounded pretty good, and so did some Honda haters I worked with at the time. When I test drove the new Si, it sounded like the engineers spent some time tuning the intake / resonator to achieve a similar effect.

The cone filters on any of these are cheap and low quality. It was somewhat time consuming to maintain, so I didn't clean the filter as much as I should have, but when I did pull it off the car after 4 years and at least that many cleanings, there wasn't much left. Anyone going this route, I would suggest getting a K&N filter right off the bat and throwing the one out that it came with. I'm guessing the eBay ones are probably made out of paper.

Overall though, I did like having mine. If I weren't such an unmotivated crusty old man now, I'd probably have left it on and kept maintaining it properly.

 

I love how I wanted to get rid of my CAI and get a stock airbox, but just couldn't find a stock airbox... so someone liberated me of having an air filter at all.