who has the fa20club cai? cant find many comments about it
 

I'm looking at buying one in the next week or so and wanted to hear how the owners like it. I have searched here and google and didn't find any good reviews. Anyone think the thermal coating option is worth the $30?

I've had my brz since June waiting for a decent intake. Perrins looks good but this seems like a better deal.

members:
reeves
mad_sb
nemes
white devil
tony stewart
chase bay
and about another 40+ members but those guys post allot on more technical topics so you can contact any of them you like

Got one! great product!!! I didn't opt for the coating......

i got 1 too and love it. the coating however..... i feel like it's more of a thin paint (my dad's ring scratched it so easily). in an overall look its good, but up close it wasn't the quality powder coat i expected at all. not sure if the same can be said on the thermal coating tho. performance wise tho i noticed a difference immediately. and i live in super hot south florida, so i doubt thermal coating should matter too much for you up in ohio

I've got one. I love it. It wasn't too bad to install, but the one constructive feedback I can give would be to add a 90deg elbow for the EGR.

I have one. Install is easy. Make a good sound, fabrication is quality. I love it !

If you wanna spend the extra money for 'bling' and a nice-looking logo stamped onto the intake, get something else.

If you just want an effective CAI that keeps your intake temps down, at a lower cost, get FA20club's CAI. I've driven it through several hours of downpours and washed my car with high-pressure washers too.. no problems with water getting up into the intake. Didn't opt for any coating tho.

I'd like to see intake temperatures for the FA20 club CAI vs the Perrin CAI with silicon inlet. I'm all about the true cold air intakes when summers here go 102+ degrees.

I just installed mine this past weekend. What other mods do you have / plan on getting?

My Mini Review:
- Get the Smaller bodied K&N filter (It has 30% more filter area than the AEM dryflow AND allows you to keep the radiator blocking plate in place)
- Sound is very stock while at low throttle angle
- Sounds very mean when your on the gas (way better than i expected)
- Fuel trims went a little richer across the board (Ecu is registering more airflow) but still within reason
- Pulls harder for sure
- no idle issues what so ever (I should note that i have never have had any idle issues with the stock intake either)

No dyno's yet, my days of dyno tuning every individual mod are over until I get free dyno access again :) There is an option for Eliminating the Crank case vent, or keeping it. I wanted to keep it but was not aware of the option when i ordered so i came up with my own solution and made a coupler out of the stock accordion tube.

The intake pipe does not get hot or heat soak because the rad fans blow air right on it when they kick on. Temps will climb at stopped idle but drop as soon as you start moving. I doubt you would see any measurable difference between the perrin and the FA20. They both suck in air right in front of the radiator so they will both climb like stock at idle.

My brother bought an used injen CAI for his Lancer GTS and was a little bit ugly so I suggested to paint it with plasti dip and it came out looking like new and even looked like their black version of it. Hope this helps! :party0030:

Mine pictured above is plastidipped hence why it looks chipped where it passes into the engine compartment.. i didn't bother to touch it up since that part is under the bumper cover.

Totally agree on this! Love that aggressive WOAAAWWHH sound! :D

We get it Matt. It gets hot in Texas. :happy0180:

Scott

lol, did you know it gets pretty hot here?

Spring ambient temps are outstanding though. :)

@FA2Club.com the website is coming up with an error calculating shipping cost

oh and you guys are a great bunch of salesman. about to order one with k&n filter and no coating.

Just ordered my FA20club CAI with thermal barrier. The stock intake was showing 6-10c higher than ambient on the torque app, so it will be interesting to see how much this will lower it. I also have Unichip, but there's no tune for it... I guess I'll just pick the Perrin CAI map because it's the closest in design until I can afford the FA20club tune for it.

I don't understand why people think aftermarket intakes with that draw from the nose area are going to produce lower intake temps than stock when the stock system draws air from the same area :iono:

The whole idea with intakes like this is to reduce any pressure drop (restriction) that may exist with the stock system while continuing to draw fresh air like the stock system rather than warmer under hood air.

It will still read higher than ambient at light throttle cruise and drop closer to ambient under WOT... same as the stock setup did. It may vary by a few degrees compared to stock but not much from what i have seen on the logger.

:thumbsup:
Good point, I didn't think about it that way. I also bought the thermal shield, but I guess the difference will be minimal nonetheless. We'll see!

Looks like mine shipped today! Can't wait to get it installed

Lucky you! Pictures please! Are you going to get a tune?

I prefer a metal tube in place of the stock plastic one.. that's just me. Metal conducts heat better.. It gets hot easier, but it cools down ALOT faster than plastic too. Never measured the difference on this car, but on my previous cars, once the plastic intake tube gets hot, it's NOT cooling down anytime soon. Maybe there's less of a difference on this car since the stock intake does draw air from the outside.. All I know is, FA20club's metal intake (I'm sure it's true of other metal intakes too) cools down within seconds once air starts to flow through it.

I'm not sure about the 'reducting pressure drop' either.. but that's not the only reason to get intakes like this.. 1) I just prefer metal over plastic.. 2) You get a much cleaner & open engine bay, and 3) The WOAAAAAHHHH! sound the intake makes sounds MUCH better than the wimpy stock sound. I'd pay $200 for that alone! :thumbsup:

dont have a tune right now. i like ecutek,but not a fan of its price lol. really just love the intake sound. if it adds power or any other benefits thats just another plus.

I'm just hoping that Unichip makes a tune for it! Unichip worked great for my Injen intake, but I switched back to stock due to problems with heat soak. The stock intake doesn't seem to have near as much pickup as the Injen did on a good day, so I'm hoping the FA20club CAI will give me the same performance as the Injen and do it consistently.

A good tune will probably make that awesome sound more pronounced as well! :thumbsup:

You've taken your resonators off the stock system haven't you? This seems to lose you some response, or at least it feels that way. I have still yet to see any aftermarket intakes produce more power when tuned than the stock system with a filter.

I didn't lose any response deleting my resonators.

Mine does not feel as good at low RPM as it did before, I'm certain of it. I posted in the other thread that I'm going to do some testing so we shall see. I'm not biased either way.

Taking the front bumper off to change the air filter seems like a bit of a design flaw, but then some others are the same way. Personally I prefer stock intake (gains don't justify the PITA filter replacement) until the turbo is finished, then it'll probably be in the bumper and ill be complaining about how hard it is lol.

Where's your other thread? I could swear that the car runs worse than stock as well! I deleted all of the resonators, including those on the snorkels. For anyone thinking of resonator delete, I would recommend not doing it. Can't be sure though, as I'm using Unichip with a "stock cai + dropin tune" The problem may be that the tune isn't right anymore because it's a modified stock intake.

#215 on this thread. I will test it out, I'm collating MAP, MAF data for the road and dyno and dyno power data using different resonator configs. I will undoubtedly just put the main resonator back in and, fingers crossed, that will restore the stock airbox's performance.

I think a good comparison would be to test the STOCK intake (with aftermarket filter) vs. a complete aftermarket intake system, on a car with exhaust modifications.. after alot of hard driving.

Is it possibly that's where there'll be a difference in power gains on an aftermarket intake, especially a CAI..? Maybe the stock exhaust is SO restrictive, it really doesn't matter what intake you have on there.. But when you start modifying the exhuast to allow more air to move through the engine, the better intakes will start to show a little more gain? I'm no expert, just interested to see if there's more of a difference on more heavily modified car.

IMO, doing I/H/E isn't heavily modifying and I doubt that even then the OEM setup is a restriction. Once you start increasing engine capacity and/or changing cams then it may well be worthwhile to improve the intake.

Surely there must be some cars with exhaust, remapped with both CAI and stock box?

'Heavily modified' is the wrong term.. more like heavily bolted-on modded is what I meant. But the OEM setup is pretty restrictive, especially considering the 2 cats on the exhaust system. The engine is just basically an air pump afterall.. it can't draw in more air if it can't spit it back out at the same rate.

Restricting the exhaust might possibly restrict the intake as well is all I'm saying. So if you put in a more free-flowing exhaust system, maybe the better intakes will start to show themselves. But I didn't do any before & after air flow tests of my intake with my other mods, so it's just conjecture at this point.

as stated plenty of times before front bumper doesnt have to come off to install or serve the filter in our intake

I have mine deleted plus a custom tune.... My car runs perfectly fine. Maybe you should find a local tuner and not run a base map. I hate it when people make speculations w.o data to prove "it runs worse" I would personally recommend doing it because the car felt better to me and my led foot.

I'd actually go as far as saying that the cats are only slightly restrictive, but for the time being I'm not on about the exhaust but I understand your point. Although swapping the front-pipe out doesn't create a huge jump in power, although I know it does help.

The opening of the stock air feed in 60mm, if you look at how much power a 60mm TB can support (It's well above 200hp BTW) then you have an idea of when the stock system becomes a restriction. I know the routing is more convoluted than a CAI but that will just change the power curve rather than choke the engine.

@NickFRS, I have to agree with @BuBlake that I feel the same. I don't think it's down on power though and I will dyno it to likely prove that, I just feel that at part throttle applications it's no where near as good as it used to be. I also have a custom tune BTW.

That's awesome! How do you do it?

Unscrew the TOP and SIDE (wheel well) bolts/screws of the bumper, don't bother with the ones on the underside.. You can pull the top portion off & away from the frame far enough to install the intake.

www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=31662

Especially if you opt for the long body K&N filter (which has 30% more filter area than the aem dry flow) :thumbsup:

my intake came in yesterday. quality looks great...there does seem to be a lot of loose metal dust inside the piping. going to have to clean that out before it gets installed.