racebitz's DIY FMIC & Air Intake Thread

[racebitz]

To stop taking over the other intercooler thread with my rambling i thought i would start up a thread and give others a insight on what can be achieved with some spare time,planning and a bit of hard work.

After finding out that there is a serious lack of aftermarket parts for the MPS's in Aus and then the Aussie $$ going down the toilet i decided to make my own FMIC setup to save some cash. The FMIC is only a temporary thing as i will be using a W2A setup once i can plan it all out and find the componants i want. Anyway, heres a few quick pics, i will throw up more detailed ones once i have it all together and run though the installation and parts list.

I will start off with the cooler install as the intake placement is determined by the piping and will be done last.

As my 3 is used for daily duties and we traded the spare car in when we purchased it i had no choice but to do the install in stages. First stage was to mount the core in place. Here are a few pics to show it mounted. (will take pics of the brackets once finnished)

Without bar off

And with the bar fitted.

The core is mounted from above & below and is very secure, it needs to be with the roads i drive on every day.

Next part is of course the piping. For this i had to remove the plastic trims from inside the bar on the sides, these are just a few clips and bolts as you may know. I started off with the Hot side piping as this was the most involved. After doing a bit of research on the available kits i was able to figure out the best, and pretty much the only route for the piping and what alloy piping and silicon bends i will needed, however i didnt like the excess use of bends on the other kits piping and wanted to make it as simple as possible and look a lot neater. Clearance with this is the biggest head ache, especially over the top of the engine. It took countless efforts and a lot of headache's for my mate and i to get the clerance i needed while keeping to the plan. Below is a few pics of how it ended up.





The bracket for the piping is not yet welded on in the pics, and the silicon joiner to the right will not be there in the end, join will be welded. Oh and disregard the hammer . I tried to keep the front section of the piping out of the way and out of view as much as possible. We had an issue with clearance of the piping and the plastic tab that sticks out from the radiator support (that the factory air box joins to) However we spaced it as best we could and once its up and running will check for clearance and any vibrations and decide if it needs to be removed.

All this went together relatively easy, the only other issue i had was the silicon bend off the turbo. the size is juuust over 2" and has quite a big lip, the 2" to 2.25" silicon bend would not slip over, even when the turbo was hot, silicon was heated up nothing.. The slicon i am using is very stiff in the straight sections and does not expand as easy as softer silicon or rubber. In the end i needed to trim the edge slightly to allow me to get the hose started then with a bit of silicon spray and brute force it slips on, and has become easier with time as the silicon stretched to suit.

Since then, well today actually, i managed to get the down section of the hot piping almost finnished, was 1 bend short after a slight change to the plan when piping didnt line up as i expected. Should be able to get the last 45bend in and have it set up for welding which has to wait untill wednesday. Another perk of modding your daily

I will take a few more pics tomorrow and update when i can.

Jason

[EQ]

One word....Wow....

[2000MNLESS]

How many kilowats does the hammer give the car??

[racebitz]

How many kilowats does the hammer give the car??

Mte you wouldn believe if i told you!

Ok, hot side piping is all welded up now, and after a trial fit this afternoon im happy to say it fits up, so im happy with that. Was a bit worried with getting all of it done at the one time without checking in between, but i could only have it off the road for 1 day. Now just got to make up 1 more bracket and get them welded onto the piping and that sides finnished.

Also made up the MAF sensor housing aswell this week, MY GOD, how much power does the stock air box restrict The thing is an animal now once boost hits. I will say tho that im going to do a bit more work with it as i have flat spots and some hessitation on low revs, would be due to the larger(3") size of the housing if im correct. Im going to chase down some piping closer to standard size and make up another one and see how that goes, also chase up a better filter than the one i currently have on it.She's frigen noisy too Everyone knows its a turbo now, was a bit annoying at first as i dont want to sound like a ricer in a skyline, but just have to put around if i dont want to attract attention.

Anyway, here are some up to date pics, will throw up a few more detailed shots of the intake once its all sorted.










Jason

[shinslinger66]

Looks great!

[racebitz]

Thanks, will look better once its all coated, tryin to decide Matt or gloss black.... Goin to paint the valve cover too, and prob get the manifold heat shield coated black aswell to blend it in and keep the heat down some more.

[Nevermind]

Very nice job.

How much do you think you saved on this compared to ordering one from the states?

[PaulG]

nice work..

yea a running tally would be nice to know if your saving...

[lazydog]

Interesting to see if it came in under what a CorkSport FMIC with CAI Kit did?

[racebitz]

What have you guys paid for them? at the moment, i pretty much have all the material i need, except for the clamps and i am just under the $650 mark for both inlet and cooler setup. It will prob be about the $700 mark finnished, but then im going to get it all coated so that will add another priob $200...

This includes a few parts that i have not used or were not what i needed, and also a few tools along the way.

It may not be a big difference when the exchange rate was good, but buying one now from oversea's would be a mistake.