[Tdocter]

Hey guys,

So I've been lurking around a lot looking for info on what the best air intake to use would be. A lot of people say that the aFe intake is bad, while a lot say its great. Along with this, a lot of people have said to go with K&N and do a charcoal delete - but I don't know a whole lot of details on what that entails.

I want to get the best performance and sound for the best price - I know n52's don't have a whole lot of gains from mods, but I certainly don't want to lose performance for sound.

Let me know!

[Ali-E90]

I think afe sealed intake is one of the better ones. Not sure if this is the stage 2 or not.

The open air intakes from afe, injen, may provide better sound, but potentially at the expense of 1-2 HP due to potential hot air being sucked in.

I love the sound my open injen intake provides, and haven't felt any issues with power. Most open intakes come with a heat shield to protect from hot air.


Hopefully some others can chime in too. Good luck.

[Tdocter]

Thanks man, I'm looking towards the aFe stage 2 si, cause of the sound, but I want to make sure I've got the right piece ya know?

[Takeshi]

For best performance go with the sealed intakes
For the best sound go with the open intakes
For the best price go with a drop in performance filter and cut out the charcoal filter from the stock airbox (used for emissions control)

I would be wary of AFE cuz they had problems with mounting the MAF sensor. Someone on this site designed a spacer to fix this issue for the old open AFE intake. But if you run into problems on the new sealed intake, I'm not sure what you can do.

That said, I used to run an open AFE intake and it sounded amazing. But it bogged down in rush hour traffic where heatsoak was at its worse. Switched back to stock intake with K&N drop in and no more bogging. But goddamnit I miss that sound

[benzo23]

What's wrong with the stock air box?

[Delta0311]

Originally Posted by Tdocter

Hey guys,

So I've been lurking around a lot looking for info on what the best air intake to use would be. A lot of people say that the aFe intake is bad, while a lot say its great. Along with this, a lot of people have said to go with K&N and do a charcoal delete - but I don't know a whole lot of details on what that entails.

I want to get the best performance and sound for the best price - I know n52's don't have a whole lot of gains from mods, but I certainly don't want to lose performance for sound.

Let me know!

AFe SEALED intake is fine but their CAI is just a heat soaker that makes a lot of nice noise. Charcoal delete is when you open your stock filter box, remove the filter, then cut out the filter underneath it.

[Dylanize]

Check out the Dinan Ram air intake kit. It comes with a K&N drop in and lets you mount an air duct down in the lower grill to suck more air into the airbox!

[Tdocter]

Does the AFE sealed intake still have a better sound than stock though?

[e90-328i]

Originally Posted by Tdocter

Does the AFE sealed intake still have a better sound than stock though?

Yes. I have it and it does sound better than stock. Not too loud but comes alive if u punch it.
I have PE on the other end too