Scoots new Cold Air Intake

Someone has the tanabe installed. Gets a mean lil rumble if I recall correctly. Loving the intake.

 

Wth really? You would do it to clean up the look under the hood??? Have you looked under the prius hood. It is clean to start nothing ugly to look at. Now install this pipe and you can see all the ugly nasty wires and parts that are not clean looking.
Not sure if your eyes are working.
The pipe definitely looks sporty and tuner style. But from what everyone says it is not even a performance mod.
So yeah if you are going for the tuner look then yes it is an improvement. But with no benefit???? Hmmmm.. Put your money in suspension. This car handles like a bus. Get a rear sway bar or front strut tower bar. Wheels and tires, or lowering springs.
No one wants to hear a loud intake or loud exhaust especially if the car is not going fast. It is just a joke.
HAHAHAH looks cleaner. This took a clean engine bay and made it look ugly. Performance look without performance gain just seems stupid. This car needs handling not HP. You try to tune it for more HP and you lose the whole idea of a prius in the first place.
Get the plus body kit and suspension mods.

 

My custom CAI on my Gen II made a noticeable difference in acceleration, so his wanting an intake isn't that unreasonable. The stock Prius just isn't for everyone, just as a modded Prius isn't everyone's goal either...

 

Hey improved cold air intake is a great idea!! Longer engine life and improved mpg possibly. But he has a ram air intake that sucks in hot engine bay air.

I get it tuning your car is fun. But this is no tuner car (at least for hp). It has 130+ hp. Once you start modifying the set up for power, you will start to lose mpg.

Unless mommy or daddy gave you the car, the whole idea for spending the extra money on a prius is for the environmental benefits and mpg.

Tune a scion or a honda if you want a small low hp car to modify. Or get a real tuner car: subaru, dsm, chevy, or ford. Something that will go fast.

Again people don't waste your money on parts that make your car loud and not fast. Spend it on suspension, light weight wheels and low profile tires. This car needs handling not hp. I have a front tower bar and a rear sway bar and it was easy to feel the results. Very noticeable, no one can argue it did not drastically improve the way this car drives. Plus it is fun to drive a car that handles better and more rewarding than a possible 1-5 hp gain and a potential mpg loss.

I also put on a frequency tuned center frame brace which lowers low frequency noise when driving (it was also noticable). This car needs interior sound proofing bad. It is LOUD when on the highway.

No one thinks it is bad nice person to see a honda making so much noise screaming loud intake and exhaust and just barely moving at all. It is funny. A loud prius........

What is bad nice person is when someone is following too close on some sharp turns or a highway turn around (just wishing that this slow dorky prius would just get out of the way) and you have the improved handling to leave them in your dust not with acceleration but with cornering ability.

It reminds me of the expression, " All talk, no action." A loud car is tolerable if it can put down the gas pedal and take off!!

JUST MY THOUGHTS. No offense to anyone who wants to tune their car but think about $ vs Reward.

 

Makes no difference in Prius. ECU runs throttle plate open, the vacuum in intake is -1-2psi most of the time.

With respect to hot air the OEM takes air from under the hood, so it is a wash.

 

This statement is not accurate when taken as a generalised statement.

Energy input (petrol/gasoline, or some other type of fuel) - parasytic losses = energy output ("power")

One way to increase energy output is to increase energy input, i.e. inject more fuel into the engine.

Another way to increase energy output is to decrease parasystic losses. One can do this by using stronger components, which can then be made lighter to reduce rotating mass.

The best way to maximise energy output is to do both, but that's not to say you can't increase energy output by simply decreasing parasytic losses per se. You may even be able to decrease energy input and still end up with more net energy output because parasytic losses are now lower.


Efficiency is the ratio of energy out to energy input. A perfect, ideal engine would have 100% efficiency, which is not possible in the real world.

If you are careful, you could increase mpg AND make more power if you optimise the correct combination of drivetrain components.


In conclusion, it is not totally correct to assume that more power = fewer mpg; it depends on how that additional power is obtained.

 

Nice fancy words!!
No one is talking about lighter gears or wheels. Sure lighter more efficient parts, a lower rotating mass in any place on the car will possibly help power, acceleration or parasytic loss (fuel efficiency) haha did I just say that... . Example lighter wheels, gears. But who is rebuilding their prius engine? I would like to know who is rebuilding a prius motor with lower rotating mass parts or lighter components. They would have to be custom built parts $$$$$$$$$. Plus after speaking with the dealer that is one way they have allready increased fuel efficiency. The prius already uses extremely light weight parts. The wheels are basicly racing wheels they are so light and that is a huge way they save on mpg. So if anyone is planning on getting fancy wheels just know if you increase the weight you will lose mpg. Oh gosh excuse me Parasytic consumption.
The best anyone does with regards to what you are saying is lighter or smaller wheels.
Also, most vehicles run rich (not the prius) so using less gas tends to increase the power. When people start screwing with the airflow of a car it will tend to compensate by adding fuel and running rich. Which means a possible power or energy output loss (increase from starting hp yes, but comparatively no). Unless you retune the car. Keep your car stoiche and you would have a larger hp increase, if you do not and the car becomes rich you may gain hp but really you lost power (and surely mpg) if you were to have properly tuned your car.
People who do intake and exhaust will generally screw up the way the computer calculates air/fuel mixture and will use more gas and get a pathetic hp or power gain (2-5 hp), echhem excuse me ENERGY OUTPUT (are you a scientist or something? No one on the planet who is in to racing or driving fast says energy output). I do not know of a piggy back cpu for the Prius so you can't retune the air/fuel ratio. SOOOOO this discussion started about simple mods, not engine rebuilds or drivetrain rebuilds. My comment is still true. But thanks for trying to correct me Bill Nye.

 

Oh and this is not accurate if taken as a generalized statement. That only applies to turbo or super charged engines. Increase air in must increase fuel in and then more power but just increasing gas makes you run rich and you will lose power not gain it.
Totally wrong. Stoiche not rich not lean. If you are too lean you might get more power but risk a lot on damaging parts. Rich and you lose power. Stoiche is the perfect balance.

Fancy words do not make you correct. Just only adding MORE FUEL = LESS POWER. Unless you have more air intake. Example forced induction (turbo or super charger)

Oh and just a bit of friendly advice: If you think you have to write definitions for the words you are using in your post, then try not using those words. You are just insulting the readers assuming that they do not know what you are saying.

Energy output = hp
Parasytic Loses = mpg

HMMMMMM what is easier to say and requires less typing????? Get real guy don't insult me with your definitions of fancy terms. Get off your high chair and come back down to the real world

 

I have been reading about the Injen unit all through prius chat. I was going to get one, but changed my mind. I just don't like the way the engine compartment looks with it in. I like the engine compartment the way it is. And base on that, for me, it would only be worth it if it added a lot more exceleration. I think I will go the Apex switch route.

 

Looks badass to me haha IMO

 

Yeah man. How dare you do a thing you like with your money. Unforgivable.

 

. I wonder what some people's thought processes are... "I'm gonna make a brand new PriusChat account and tell people in the dedicated modding forum that they're modding wrong."

 

Hey anything that brings you pleasure is right on the money. But don't lie to yourself and think you're improving things that you're not.
New member or not. Facts are facts. If you guys say things that are flat out lies then people will believe it and make decisions based on "senior member" nonsense.
Oh and yes from the front ten feet away intake looks great. Stand in front of the car look into the engine bay and its a mess..
Why people can't use their own brains is beyond me.
Oh and senior members, just because you comment thousands of times giving useless input does not make you an authority on a prius or the internal combustion engine.

 

I have a lot of real experience dressing up engine bays. Hiding wires, relocating parts all to hide the ugly and bring out the beauty.
Removing the stock intake components just reveals a mess of ugly. Your will never get style points in a competition for mods that expose ugly in your engine bay.
Do what makes you feel good people but don't trust the word of a "senior member". Just because they have no life and troll message boards all day does not make them an authority on anything.
#of comments does not equal experience. Read their comments and if they add no real value or facts about the discussions then they are useless members and should be banned. Their comments clog the truth from being exposed.
Think for yourselves, do the research. Do not trust people blindly.

 

It took me a while to figure out what you're even talking about since this thread has been dead for so long, but I'm sorry you feel so offended. I've never made any claims to be a "senior member" that's dropping knowledge bombs on here, so you can stop with that. I haven't even been active in here for quite some time to "troll newcomers".

If the "senior members" in here are misleading any newcomers about performance gains, then they haven't been doing enough research, just like you said yourself. The majority of us here collaborate and discuss our experiences with new parts before making a decision based on personal anecdotes. No one here is posting dyno charts.

My point with all this is you came into a Prius modding community telling everyone they had no reason to mod their cars because it's not a tuner car, there's no performance gains, it's not a show car, etc. You talk about people not doing their research, but if you had done your research and got to know other members in this community, you would've learned these things as a few examples:

1. @saulbassfan has won several awards with his car, despite the Prius not being a "show car"
2. @Burna J has the cleanest engine bay I've seen, even with an aftermarket intake
3. @TheChip is beating out Honda Civics and other cars in autocross, even though "the Prius isn't a tuner"

 

We all get it dude, the Prius isn't a fast car, but we still gotta mod it.

 

This mod frees up a lot of space under the hood. How else could we mount a gallon sized oil catch can?!

 

So what does that make “Sidewalk Supervisors” then?

 

?! It's simple there are even holes in the passenger fender well. I've got mine neatly hidden away under the factory intake parts. Your right though if you don't have a brain and follow the leader like a mindless sheep then there is no room. And if you have a gallon can your crazy, or a lieing whiner.

 

Supervisors are great they make sure the brainless employees do the right thing.