[94 RoLLa DX]

Ok, first off... no I am not a ricer. I have a practically bone stock Corolla DX... with a front upper strut bar, that's about the extent of any modifications. I am interested in getting an ebay intake for my '94 DX. What I want is a better sound, that deeper tone that comes with putting an intake on. I realize that it's not going to yield many benefits as far as performance goes, but I would like to hear from other members here that may have installed a ram or cold air intake on their 1.8L (7th Gen) Corolla. Did you notice any difference in acceleration, gas mileage improvement, improved exhaust/engine sound, at all?? I know that the stock air intake system is probably sufficient for the car... but I was just curious as to what other members have experienced with a cone filter setup. Thanks!

[Dan_H]

A true cold air intake (pulls in clean, ambient temperature air, not heated by the car) is definitely preferred over a short ram intake. Most short ram intakes pull in hot air from under the hood, which reduces performance-- and likely take in more dust. I tested a short ram intake a couple years ago on my 99. Intake temperatures were ~20-50 degrees F higher than stock with the short ram (20 degrees on freeway, up to 50 idling in traffic). Measuring the acceleration with an accelerometer-- the short ram was just a little bit slower than the stock intake. The sound from the 1ZZ-FE was nice, though.

As far as I'm concerned, every claim about increased mileage due to increased airflow is completely bogus for fuel injected cars. In normal driving, your throttle plate is designed to be the bottle neck in your intake. No matter how freely the filter allows air through, anything less than wide-open throttle does not benefit from high airflow capacity. The only exception I see would be carb'd cars where clogged filters might cause it to run more rich.