It's all in the tune

A tune can only do so much. If there is a mismatched set of parts. It can help, but it still won't be 100%.

I saw a post of one of the guys in my local Z club (Central Florida Z Club) hit 350whp NA with admin tuning intakes and EPS throttlebodies

Someone on the FB pages is giving me his new 3" setup and i sold my stillin gen 3's. Guess it cant get any worse. I say that though but 3 times ive dyno'd changing things and ive lost power! Like a lot! Think my best was 312 SAE in 4th with my setup, 2.75's, LTH and dual cbe. Then i tried e85 and made like 298 SAE in 5th!!! So almost stock power in 4th. Now with the side exit cbe and stillen gen 3's i made 310 SAE 5th. So maybe i could use a bigger intake. Who knows. Im currently porting the heads, openening the SH*T out of lower manifold and then going to try the 3" intakes. Hope it works out.

keep us posted

Everything i've heard about the Admin tuning intakes is that they require a MAF scaling tune at minimum, perform the best with the EPS throttle bodies...which at this point you are now looking at $1800 for some CAI's and +22 whp gains? Maybe 40whp with the throttle bodies?
It also bothers me that Moncef, the owner of Admin Tuning will not post apples to apples dyno sheets of lets say a Stillen Gen 3 with a tune next to Admin Tuning with MAF scaling. Why? Because the results are going to be close and you'll be spending $1200 for what you could get for ~$900 (assuming you purchase used Gen 3 intakes).

The cost just doesn't seem worth it to me and pretty much defeats the purpose of a CAI, which is a low cost bolt on mod that gets you a little pick up.

Also, i'd like to point out that K&N drop ins or short ram intakes with a tune may get you within 90% of a CAI on the dyno...but try that in the real world with some heat and watch that 90% drop fast due to heat soak.

Short rams, absolutely. But you think that maf tubes and drop ins heat soak dramatically more than a long tube intake? I would think that, since it's still using the stock intake path (drawing air from outside the engine compartment) and it's all plastic/silicone instead of the metal long tubes that it wouldn't show as much of a temperature rise.

Plastic is a pretty crappy conductor of heat, pretty sure the aluminum tubing is going to maintain cooler AIT's across the board

Are you sure? Usually plastic has a much lower thermal conductivity than Al, so the long tubes would transfer more of the engine bay heat to the air within the tube. Granted, I'm not sure what type of plastic the stock intake tract is. I think the best case for an intake would be a long tube setup with the reflective gold foil wrapped around the pipe, but the way the factory intake is set up is pretty good for an OEM.

QUOTE=Eagle;3666928]Plastic is a pretty crappy conductor of heat, pretty sure the aluminum tubing is going to maintain cooler AIT's across the board[/QUOTE]

I think you're both on the same track, just going different directions. In this case, I think Chuck is correct... you WANT the non-conductive plastic inside the engine compartment because it will resist heat soak.... if the plumbing was seeing ambient air, you'd rather have the aluminum piping to dissipate any heat.

That being said, I don't think it matters much one way or the other when the car is in motion and the engine is eating. Thin walled AL tubing is not going to change the air temperature all that much I don't think.

It'd be a cold day in hell if you get that amount of power. People still run the same amount of power with all these setups. Nothing's really changing the game. Until we see consistent 340-350...360hp? Out of everyone just buy what you can afford. You're exactly right though! Tune probably costs more too because you do have to scale the **** out of them!

Which leads me to this question:

Who has the most reliable ecutech email tune available? Having come from the wrx world, it was easy to datalog and send a file back to the tuner for safety purposes, plus I was spoiled with Cobb being 10 mins away (I could walk there even!).

I care more about reliability instead of all out numbers/bragging/leaning out/blown motor, and reading the above posts doesn't exactly instill much confidence as far as I'm concerned.

I have the Admin Tuning intakes but I'm not here to defend Moncef either, although he's a great guy to deal with. I will say that most companies don't do comparative dynos for their products against a competitors by a third party; and if they did, I'd still be hesitant to believe them. Why hold it against him when he's a smaller business then Stillen or AAM?

The tune should cost exactly the same... Seb (Specialty Z) didn't have any issues with mine and I'm in Germany. I'll will add that I was able to drive my car without any CELs/etc. prior to tuning but I had GTR injectors installed at the same time as my Admin intakes and EPS tbs.

Seb @ Specialty Z hands down. Process is the same: data log, email, wait, upload, redo until perfect (took four times before he was happy with both of my maps).

I don't have anything against him personally but I certainly don't like false advertising. He and his fanbois claim they make more power than any other solution out there, but the catch is you have to pay for a tune and or buy throttle bodies to take advantage of a 3" intake charge pipe. Congratulations, you get to spend $1800 on something that should have been no more than $600 for a new CAI. For that kind of money I would much rather get a new set of Stillen G3's, an oil cooler and upgrade my brake pads. Outside of the 370z world even $600 is a lot of money for something like a CAI.

He's also pushing people to tune their cars after just doing the CAI which i think most people on this forum know is pretty stupid...unless of course you got money burn. Even if it is just MAF scaling, you're paying the same amount you would for an actual tune!!!

He may be a nice guy, he may have a decent product and know how to tune...but he is pretty bad about being honest with the community about what it means when you buy a set of Admin Tuning intakes.

As a old timer Z guy,I'll start with a apology.
Do not want to insult any other Z owners. But,this is how I see it.

For whatever reason,the intake is the first thing a new Z owner looks to mod after buying
the car.
Guilty-I did the obligatory Pop-Charger on my Z33.

Main thing I see about intakes and/or other go proposed "go fast" stuff is not the numbers. It is HOW the car's response is after you sunk the bucks into same.
For intakes,it will sound "sexy". That sound does not mean more power YOU CAN FEEL.
Trust me,perception is reality. You THINK it is faster. Bottom line,you will be using more fuel...
Intakes are not all that bad of an investment. Keep in mind,they are a component
or,a mix of parts to REALLY give you performance over stock.
Add HFC'S,exhaust etc. Lighter wheels--you'll have something.
Get a proper tune.
It'll feel that the car is "lighter".

Trust me