TRD springs is def must vs stock.

 

Coilovers > (TRD) springs or stocks

 

haha obvi!

good coils also are 7 times more expensive!

and if you get it with the EDFC then 10 times!

 

.....yea

EDFC?????? that is for people that use $$ as toilet paper and are too lazy to adjust their own suspension...

EDFC = expensive damn f*ckin coilovers

 

idk man, if you're willing to spend ~$1500 on coils, another 250-300 is nothing. Ppl spend more $$ on other more stupid ____. In this case for ~$300 you turn your car's suspension into something that can be compared to Luxury and super cars. In later case though they only have 2-3 adjustments. You get 16!

 

I did get the TRD springs and they are still on the car today. They did significantly improve the handling of the car…and I think the car should have come with those springs from the factory. If I was to do it again, I would not have installed the TRD springs. The TRD springs are a constant rate spring and the Eibach Pros are a triple rate spring. The starting rate is lower than the OEM spring and the ending rate is much higher than the TRD – you have a much better chance of getting a much nicer ride out of them. Since the spring rate is smaller to start with, the OEM shocks will effectively dampen them. My only complaint is that under high speed corners, I have completely stroked the suspension – that means tons of force, the car continued to bounce after the rough road ended. That means that the shocks are too weak to dampen the large forces of the TRD springs. As long as you don’t completely stroke your suspension at high speeds, you will never see that. For most people, and for me 99% of the time, that is OK and adequate. I don’t plan to change out the springs in the near future. They are working better than the OEM springs.

As far as strut bars go, I have chosen a steel bar, because the chassis is made of steel. If you get a strut bar made out of a different material than steel, it will have a different thermal expansion coefficient than the rest of the car and a different modulus of elasticity. The two ounces you will save from an aluminum bar or a carbon fiber bar, you will not see or feel. The strut bar does make the car much more precise on the control. You will like the feel. Any bar will improve the handling.

Your dad is right…once you put in a CAI, you will change it back to SRI and leave it that way. I chose the TRD intake for its quality of construction and I’m not sorry for paying the “extra” bucks.

 

For those of you concerned with water splashing up into the area where the filter would go, I say don't worry about it for the most part.

I live on the east cost around Scratch's area, and we have gotten a ton of rain over the past few weeks. I'm currently running the Takeda with no hydroshield and it has done perfectly fine. I have driven in some very heavy rain (including hurricane Irene) with lots of standing water to splash up there.

Obviously that area isn't going to be completely waterproof, but It would take a pretty high level of water to get enough in there to cause any issues.

In addition, a friend of mine has a cold air intake on his Mazda MX6 that leads directly to the bottom of the car and is exposed directly to the road surface. He has a hydroshield and hasn't had any issues with water damage.

Conclusion...a CAI with hydroshield for this car will be more than enough for anyone's piece of mind.

 

hydro-shield on mine is!

 

Why does the Descendant intake show only 5/5 horsepower and torque gained, while Injen and Takeda, respectively, show 9/8 and 11/11? I've read that Injen & Takeda might be doing something with the MAF to trick the car into a few more horsepower (leaner fuel mixture), at the expense of long-term engine reliability. Is this true? What else might account for these numbers, and which of these explanations do you consider to be most likely?

I'm still leaning towards TRD, but I'd love to see some numbers comparing it to the other guys.

Thanks. :-)

 

Injen is the only one that manipulates the MAF. Takeda is 'honest', which is why I got it

And don't take the numbers too seriously, a CAI is a CAI for the most part. The reason I chose to pay a bit more for the Takeda is because the manufacturer's dyno results show real gains as low as 3k RPM. The others show 0 gain or even a loss in the lower RPMs, and don't show positive results until you get closer to the redline.

 

I just found a Injen cai for 234.00. What does a TRD cost?

 

Just got quoted 243.00 for a Takeda.....What do you guys think on price? which one?

 

prolly u can find it for $370(TRD)

 

This is what I'm planning until I'm rolling in enough dough to throw at the minute things...

Removing stock snorkel. Removing/modifying driver side fog cover to allow air in; or molding a funnel insert in its stead to attach the same hose used in the Weapon R SRI and run up to the opening on the side of the stock air box with a few mm gap to account for water. Along with the K&N drop in, I believe this will effectively make a cheap ram cold air intake.
$51.47 K&N after tax
$19.99 intake hose

 

I think the issue here is that you are still working with the small hole in the side of the stock air box. A large advantage of aftermarket intakes for this car is that they have 3" tubing all the way from the filter to the throttle body.

It also would scare me half to death to drive in the rain.

Good luck.

 

A small hole still takes more air by the air being pushed in than pulled through.. plus no worries with CEL from MAF as some are having.
as for the rain driving.. perhaps you could enlighten me on how a bypass valve works on CAI.

My impression was that it is a foam ring at some point up the tube that is to alleviate the pure suction cause by a closed-one-opening pipe, thus removing the risk water will get sucked up like a straw.

Correct me?

 

You're exactly correct on the bypass valve. But that would mean the nose of your car would have to be submerged in water before the bypass valve would begin to act. This doesn't mean large water splashes will not still find their way up there.

And I'm not sure I follow on a smaller hole bringing in more air than a larger one...

 

read: http://www.aemintakes.com/air_bypass_valve.htm

 

Not arguing Big hole vs Small hole.
Just saying if all I get to work with is the smaller hole then at least the method of air delivery can be altered to get better results than its original method of sucking.

As for splashing... my thoughts: The wheel sits back about 2 feet from the front edge of the car. The wheel does the splashing. The car will be moving forward. If point A is opening at front of bumper, point C is wheel, B is the normal spot a CAI filter sits.. (A) has a head start on getting away from the rising water from (C), (B) is adjacent to (C) allowing the chance of being directly splashed on.

Not saying the risk isn't there but I think its substantially reduced.
Guess I could drill a few holes along the ram tube to allow splashed water to drain out the bottom..

 

That makes sense!

Also, I'm pretty sure you'd need to be carrying a pretty good amount of speed before you get to benefit from any sort of ram-air effect. That's just pure speculation though.