I may not remember to contact you in a year. Whenever you do comeback, just do the test and post it here. It will be interesting I am sure, probably even made a sticky.

 

 

Thank you! THIS idea makes perfect sense - don't let the water even get to the filter instead of relying on the false security of some silly water-trapping bypass.

toyota_scion_tc please don't go through with the test. Maybe if you find another tC with body totaled but engine intact, but don't use your own ride. I'm sure you won't want to duplicate the "Cheech & Chong NSX" by hanging a 3-foot bong off your intake. If you make it a realistic enough test you'll just hydrolock it. It's a nice gesture but seriously don't do this test to your car.

 

I know but when I come back the plan was to source another block to fully build and have mine as a spare. I was going to build the one in my car now as a all motor build in case something happened to the custom engine and or turbo I plan on building. If driving my car through SC and TN rain storms with it being lowered on TRD springs and having wire mess grills isn't test enough then I am not sure what is. All of my grills are open wire mesh the main ones top and bottom and then the right and left one. I have put almost 53,000 on my car and I haven't blown my motor due to sucking up water.

Another thing I was curious to know the people that have blown motors have any of them been boosted? I have read that AEM tells you not to use them on turbo or supercharged cars so keep this in mind.

 

You cant use them on boosted cars. I believ most had K&N, then Injen, then Fugita. Havent heard of an aem or trd hydrolocking, could be due to the valve.

 

Oh, I still think you would be fine testing it with the AEM. The method I just said is the exact same concept, only you run in bypass mode until you close it manually. Same thing though, valve is open to engine bay air, so no pulling water up the pipe.

On a boosted car, you are creating a much higher pressure differential than the bypass is designed to open under, so it will not operate correctly and will be open most of the time under boost. Also, the holes in it are most likely not large enough to make enough difference under boost, which means there will still be enough restriction that water could be lifted up the intake tube. If it had larger holes and a larger opening strength, it would probably work fine.

 

Don't think it would work even if it was bigger and sturdier. The pressure variation would confuse the heck out of it. You might be sucking in water at 2.5RPMs and the valve might think your boosting. If its too flimsy then there is the possibility of it opening under high psi.

 

Better safe then sorry, rather spend $20 than much more later on.... I plan to get a AEM bypass valve and the Injen water repellent cover when i convert my sri to a cai.

 

OK, let me ask engifineer or anyone else who might know. Please don't reply unless you're SURE about your answer:

You've got a CAI with bypass. You're driving on a road flooded 1-2". (Don't try this at home.) Pouring down rain. Intake is sucking up humid, moisture-laden air. Water sloshing & waving up underneath of you from cars both in front and going the other direction. Speeding truck goes by, big wave of water washes over your hood, water enters your engine compartment through the hood gap, douches your filter from above. Bypass never closes because filter is never submerged, CAI filter douched from above and below now.

Is it or is it not impossible at some point in this scenario for the approx 4 tblsp of water it takes to hydrolock to enter into the engine?

 

^ 100% not. I drove through 18inches of water in a rainstorm on a street with no lights and the only reason why my car sucked up water was because i let off the gas instead of trying to drive as fast as i could through it (once u are in the lake u just need to drive and get out w/o stopping).

inches of water wont do jack. Any water that enters the tube (when you are talking inches) it will just evaporate instantly due to heat.

Dont worry - just dont drive it horrible rainstorms on streets with no lights and you will be fine. ha.

 

^^Are you saying you had water in your cylinders? Have a bypass installed at the time?

 

Your scenario would only hold true if you had an SRI. If water would get to your intake through the fender, engine scoop, etc. Then it will get sucked up. The fact that a CAI is relatively long and is facing down, gravity will play a large roll in helping dispel the water. Thats not to say a few drops will not get into the engine but not nearly enough for a lock. Remember that the 4 table spoons have to enter at once, or in the article it says 100cc per cylinder in a 2.0L engine in one stroke. Thats pretty difficult to accomplish unless you submerge.

I am however against any water entering your engine, for other reasons. Whether by injection or other methods. Splash guard would be ideal, all those vinyl caps restrict your intake no matter what they tell you. No synthetic breaths as your filter was intended to. Thats just a selling point, as in the case with removable silencers, no matter how "unrestrictive" they are.

 

I had just a cover (net) on the filter. If I didn’t let off the gas and i just kept going I would have probably made it. But - I dropped the F'bomb a lot of times when I was stalled out in the pond. I heard the water whistle up the tube. I was able to get out whatever it was (who knows how much it was) by trying to turn over the engine for 20minutes. Once the car was started it smoked for at least 5minutes strait and you could smell the starter bad. I’m guessing it wasn’t much water because if it was bad there would have been zero chance of starting it. What I did hear when trying to start it was the normal turnover for 1/2 second and then it sounded as if you threw a sock into the engine cylinder. Over and over and over ... i didn’t give up trying to turn it over. A guy in a truck stopped to help me push my car out of the pond and he said just keep trying .... you don’t have much to lose.....and he was very right. Killing my starter was not even a worry since I thought I just killed my engine.

I have no clue who the guy was but he was driving a new diesel tuck and he just pulled up cause he saw me sitting in my car w/ my gf. We both had water 2 feet up our jeans. I guess I was lucky.

Anyway - I personally will never put my intake into my wheel like I had it. You probably have a 99.9% chance this will never happen to you but I guess I proved there is a percentage it can happen. I think this happened about the same time last year when there was a hugggeeee rain storm sweeping across the USA. I think it rained for like 3 days strait or something. Between the no street lights and me not knowning the pond was going to get deeper and deeper ... I never saw it comming.

 

Again, the CAI filter does NOT need to be submerged necesarrilly to open the bypass. The bypass does not "know" anything about the water level at all. All that it "knows" is that there is an increase in suction (by adding restriction, aka water, into the tube). It is not electronic, it has no sensors, etc. They designed it so that if the suction in tube is strong enough (which they calculated from the amount created when water is being pulled up the pipe) the valve gets sucked open, so the air is now entering through the engine bay bypass.

For enough water to splash, get under and around the hood, and all the way back down to the other side of the CAI filter (Which is in the fender well, surrounded), you probably just dumped it right on the bypass.. so of course it could suck it in no matter what (and even if you didnt have the CAI). If the water was simply that deep, it would fill the fender area, submerge the CAI and if it was hood deep, would have submerged the stock pipe if you didnt have a CAI. I have seen a wall of water splash over the whole hood of a car and not even get the engine bay wet. Again, 99% of the time a splash wont do it. Neiter will 2 inches of water on the road.

If you drive into water deep enough to hit the end of the filter, and it begins trying to pull water up the tube (which pretty much means it is submerged) the negative pressure created will pull the bypass open. That is how they work. The reason people mention it opening if you submerge the filter is because that is about what it takes for the car to actually pull a substantial amount of water up the tube. A few drops will do nothing. And 4 tablespoons is in ONE cylinder. That is a substantial amount if you think about it. I have seen engines pull much more than that in and not hurt anything as well.

Now, all I am saying is assuming the bypass is working as designed. Of course if it is faulty it will fail, or if it is incorrectly installed it will fail. But it seems there is this misconception that the valve somehow knows if the filter is submerged... it is simply a function of whether enough negative pressure is present to lift water a certain height and distance. If the filter is only partially submerged, air has a better path around it and has a much less chance of getting into the engine. Take a straw and only place a part of the end in the water, allowing air in around it. Now try to take a drink like that and tell me how much you get in relation to how much suction you have to create to get it.

 

And nothing is 100% I have seen and heard of a lot of people that have died from head injury while wearing a helmet on a motorcycle, so does that mean the helmet is ineffective?

 

That sucks, sorry jwaggz. Thats one of my worst fears, driving into something like that due to poor visibility. I know of a guy that goes to the same mechanic that I do and he came across a huge puddle/pond right before the free way entrance. He had no choice but to go through it as there was no where to go and the people behind him were starting to honk. Blew his motor half way in. He had a supercharged camaro too, cost him almost 10k. What people don't seem to understand is that they choose to put that mod on their car, they should take care and responsibility if anything does go wrong.

 

Exactly, I really dont like it when people mod thier car, break it and then want toyota to pay... just makes things worse for the rest of us if we have legitimate issues.

 

If I had to give someone advice ..... 1.) dont drive in tropical storm conditions 2.) dont drive in tropical storm conditions with no street lights 3.) put the bypass on 4.) dont worry about anything less then 10inches of rain (which is a hell of a lot).

This kind of thing isnt going to happen to you if you follow the above. ha. ....hence the reason why it happened to me.

I have driven in horrible weather and a lot of water .... the water has to get into your wheel well and actually cover the filter for a given amount of time ....do you know how unlikely that is? I had a chance of winning the lottery that night it happened to me - ha.

 

I have a question for you guys, i just bought the rs 3.0 and put the APR wind splitter on the front. In order to put the splitter on I had to take of all of the splash shields under the car. Also, I have very thin mesh covering the hole on the bumper where the intake sits. Air and water can easily enter the fender. I am also lowered on TRD springs and struts.

If i put the Injen cai, do I have a good chance of hydrolocking?

Is it safer to go with sri?

 

nobody really has a good chance of it happening but it happens