Has anyone fabricated a cheap snorkle for a Discovery? I have installed a $350 safari guard snorkle on a d90 and helped build a pvc snorkle from parts for $70.. and can't really notice the difference.. If anyone has pictures and parts list.. that would be great!

edpe@im.se

Did Kyle send you over?

lol OS, i was just going to say that there was a good discussion about this on discoweb a few months ago... :D

Good! Yea right. The was a discussion on D-web and then the raging loon Kyle lost his marbles. Why don't you take it over to YOUR Forum. (http://www.automotiveforums.com/vbulletin/f749/)

i was kidding bob... and my forum... :laughing: a friend of mine asked me to be moderator with him in that forum over a year ago. as you can see it wasnt very active so we bailed on it. then i went back and started editing peoples posts and got banned :D

You got banned. Dam I was going to send Roxy over and make your life hell!:D :flipoff2:

Another guy in my club and myself built one for our range rovers for $130 each, including a pre-cleaner.

Donaldson clearview precleaner - local filter supplier
3" High temp racing hose - summit racing
mandrel bent exhaust tubing

Could be similar for a Disco...I can dig up the part numbers if you are interested...

http://www2.bitstream.net/~zaphod/images/snorkel2.jpg

Got a shot of the smorkle, under the hood, and air cleaner connection ? That silver is mighty nice. Is that a zip tie holding in place or how is it secured ?

T'anks

WARNING, WARNING, WARNING WILL ROBINSON!!!

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Tom

Yup...zipties all the way:cool:
It is zipties into a 'u' shaped bracket...it pretty much stayed there without the ziptie.

http://www2.bitstream.net/~zaphod/images/snorkel4.jpg

Underhood

http://www2.bitstream.net/~zaphod/images/snorkel1.jpg

Also...thanks to Bret for the pictures...and for the snorkel design help...

Here is the aircleaner cover

http://www2.bitstream.net/~zaphod/images/snorkel5.jpg

My buddy opted to have his powdercoated black...but that was above my budget:D

Total cost:

Hose: $35 ($69 for 10' (and you'll use 5' or less)) - we had to fedex it so it was $20 more....
Mandrel bent exhaust tube $33
Donaldson precleaner $45
Misc blade/mouting stuff: $10

Total: $123 (or $160 if you had it powder coated)

I seem to remember that you can purchase the Mantec top seperately from the rest of the snorkel. I think it is around $50 for just the top. Then you just bend the exhaust tube and connect the hose to your intake. Probably could build one identical to the Mantec for about $100-150.

Mantec tubing is 2.5" ID or less - I have a 3" ID pipe.

You also don't want to buy mantecs "under the hood" hose...they want almost $100 just for the hose...

Also, why not put a precleaner on for $45, vs. a ram for $50?

Once you get over having the flying saucer/popcorn popper/dog bowl on your truck, it actually works great!

You can also go with a smaller CFM precleaner for $27 or so from donaldson, but it has 1/2 the CFM that this one does.

The smaller CFM donaldson for $27 is what ARB sells for $75 or so...

Personally, part of my goal was to provide MORE air to my engine, so I didn't want to choke it off with a smaller diameter pipe...

Great job so don't take this comment the worng way....Why did you NOT choose to have a DOM (mandrel bent) tube on the inside of the engine. Smooth curves and such causes less friction and would let the air whip right on down to the engine. The hose has a lot of internal friction causing a loss in speed of the air coming from the filter. However, with a larger tube and a bigger cleaner, you still may have a bit more flow than a regular set up??? For the cost of the mandrel bent piece in your price list, it would have functioned better and possibly been cheaper. Of course I am not factoring in a small piece of hose to connect the two pieces....

Also one thing on the mantec is that if you turn the filter around backward of how it is intended, it is a ram air, but in the stock config it is not.

Way

Also do you have any other pictures of the hose actually connecting???

Way

Way:

I thought about it, however we whipped the parts together and installed them in aobut 4 days...

The issue would have been this:

To mandrel bend the shop requires 5 ft of material to feed into the machine....so it would double the price to make it a second piece, or we would have had to have the 180 degree turn put in at one of the ends and then cut off.

I would agree that that would have been the best solution.

However, the hose we used is pretty smooth inside (when stretched, there is not corrugation...)so I am not too worried about it.

http://www2.bitstream.net/~zaphod/images/snorkel6.jpg

Is your factory air cleaner empty then??? Just thinking out loud here, but wouldn't the air cleaner inlet/outlet be the bottleneck so to speak. Bottleneck concept meaning only as good as the weakest link..making me wonder if or by how much your set-up is superior to stock. Did you notice a power gain at low speed or at highway speed?

Another out of curiousity. Has anyone made a straight connector (obviously with sensors in between) from the engine directly to their snorkle without all of the miles of tubing. Basically drop the thing to engine compartment and AB line it to the motor???

Way

Way:

Yes I have a filter in there...and you can see from the above photo that I cut the horn off, but the inlet to the filter housing is smaller than the tube.

My goal was not to be "better than stock," but to be "better than mantec or safari at 1/4 the cost." and to keep from sucking water into the engine (which I have done and so have a number of our club members) with the added bonus of precleaning the dirt, etc to extend filter life...

All of the muscle car freaks are always looking for "colder" air, so I suppose I got that too...

As far as power goes...there was no decrease and if anything a slight increase at full throttle from a standstill...and a LOT more power than when you have a soaking wet filter


:cool:

Originally posted by RoverOn

All of the muscle car freaks are always looking for "colder" air, so I suppose I got that too...
:cool:
Did you remove the hot water supply to the intake plenum?

Scout:

That statement was mostly a joke ;)

Being that it gets 80 below here in MN :eek: ...I have not removed the plenum heater hose

well you could put in a valve or use a pair of vice grips to turn it off for the summer. :D

Looks good well done.
Its another thing I have been waiting to do.
Although mat require 2 as I am feeding 355 cubic inches.
1 would be ok at low rpm but hey 2 will look balanced lol.
Regards
Michel.

What the heck does that plenum heater hose do anyway?

I have a shut-off valve to the heater core for the summer time months, and it works quite nicely actually.

Someone enlighten me what the plenum needs heating for please!

From what I've been told there is a pressure drop at the throttle plates and in the winter months cold moist air can freeze the throttle open. LR plumbs hot water thru a small jacket under the throttle plates, thus heating the intake air and throttle plates.

Originally posted by Way

Also one thing on the mantec is that if you turn the filter around backward of how it is intended, it is a ram air, but in the stock config it is not.

Way

You can't turn the Rangie or Disco Mantec around. It would point to the sky if you do this. It has a sort of add bend in it.

"Can't" is a matter of opinion. I have seen it done before on a Range Rover. Can't remember exactly where, but why is it not possible???

Way

Originally posted by Serious One
What the heck does that plenum heater hose do anyway?

I have a shut-off valve to the heater core for the summer time months, and it works quite nicely actually.

Someone enlighten me what the plenum needs heating for please!

Michael,
Do you want the truth or what I am supposed to say? LOL. Sorry, old dealer moment.

In Theory:

The Plenum lines are directly off the manifold, so they heat rather rapidly, and in theory they would heat the chamber, pre-heating the air in effect acting as a "choke" and making up for the woefully ineffective lucas hot-wire system. Bosch used the same thing for Porsche with the CIS system, as the injectors were constant rate, and not a pulse fire system as on the Lucas. Basically, it is supposed to make less work for the hot wire system.

In Reallity:

Unless you live in severe climate areas, you aren't going to notice a difference. Hence, why OS doesn't have that much of a problem. (yes I know it gets cold in Tahoe, my brother-in-law runs the Apple Cafe on the Cali side on 80).

j

Fellows:
I too am working on this project as well (I sure seem to have a lot of ideas on the drafting board, don't I Adam?). Anyway, I was in the right place at the right time and picked up three sticks of 2" 316 stainless tubing (BLing, BLing!) to make a snorkel with. At first, I was concerned over the reduction in flow from the relatively small pipe, until I began to think of the stock Discovery air intake configuration. If flow is mathematically expressed as Q=A*V, with A being the cross sectional area and V being the velocity, why does Rover neck down their air intakes? Seems to me that the narrow opening would be the limiting factor and anything that one would do to remove this restriction would be an improvement. Hence, if you remove the restriction, increasing the cross sectional area and the velocity stays the same, your flow has increased proportionally to the increase in diameter. Ergo, if I remove the horn from my air box and replace it with a piece of pipe larger in diameter that the hole in the air horn, I shouldn't be reducing the effective flow to the intake-ignoring Q reductions due to the bends, etc. But, if I also increase the velocity of the air entering the intake, I may well experience an increase in flow.

After assisting a friend in designing a snorkel for her Rangie, I have decided that the most difficult part of this project (other than cutting a hole in the wing of my otherwise pretty nice truck), is the issue of securely affixing the tube to the A-pillar...

Paul

Originally posted by Way
"Can't" is a matter of opinion. I have seen it done before on a Range Rover. Can't remember exactly where, but why is it not possible???

Way

OK, OK. Can't is a very strong word. You could, but you would have to change a few things. Anything CAN be done. You are correct in that sense.

Personally I think the ARB Snorkel and others that face forward look goofy. I think Mantec's Defender "Spinner" top (round) is the coolest since it throws sand out as a pre-filter.

Originally posted by lwg


I think Mantec's Defender "Spinner" top (round) is the coolest since it throws sand out as a pre-filter.


cheaper than Mantec's one.....

http://www.mattsavage.co.uk/bits/raised/index.html

although i'm not sure what shipping from the UK would be, but it's identical to the Mantec one,

with UK VaT @ 17.5% it's about $34. (plus shipping)

Jamie

Originally posted by redrangie


Michael,
Do you want the truth or what I am supposed to say? LOL. Sorry, old dealer moment.

In Theory:

The Plenum lines are directly off the manifold, so they heat rather rapidly, and in theory they would heat the chamber, pre-heating the air in effect acting as a "choke" and making up for the woefully ineffective lucas hot-wire system. Bosch used the same thing for Porsche with the CIS system, as the injectors were constant rate, and not a pulse fire system as on the Lucas. Basically, it is supposed to make less work for the hot wire system.

j


Whoa There ..........The hot wire has nothing to do with heating air! Please read up on how your MAf works:
http://www.kemparts.com/TechTalk/tt06.asp

Were did Bosch get hot water on a Porsche with CIS?

FOR SALE:

Donaldson pre-cleaner (as sold by ARB).

Condition: new, in box

Price: negotiable

Reason for selling: Centri pre-cleaner is better (but spendier)

PS Donaldson also makes a spinner pre-cleaner, but the impeller blades are made out of plastic, as is the housing. Potentially less-durable. I've been researching pre-cleaners for about a year now....(after I bought the Donaldson unit from ARB).

"Spendier" is a very kind word...

Would has LOVED a centri....but we are talking over $150!

I figured I could break 3 donaldsons off for the price of a centri...

BTW, Donalson's top-spin (the "ejective" pre-cleaner) was only $52 or so at my filter supplier...

I too am working on this project as well (I sure seem to have a lot of ideas on the drafting board, don't I Adam?). Anyway, I was in the right place at the right time and picked up three sticks of 2" 316 stainless tubing (BLing, BLing!) to make a snorkel with. At first, I was concerned over the reduction in flow from the relatively small pipe, until I began to think of the stock Discovery air intake configuration. If flow is mathematically expressed as Q=A*V, with A being the cross sectional area and V being the velocity, why does Rover neck down their air intakes? Seems to me that the narrow opening would be the limiting factor and anything that one would do to remove this restriction would be an improvement. Hence, if you remove the restriction, increasing the cross sectional area and the velocity stays the same, your flow has increased proportionally to the increase in diameter. Ergo, if I remove the horn from my air box and replace it with a piece of pipe larger in diameter that the hole in the air horn, I shouldn't be reducing the effective flow to the intake-ignoring Q reductions due to the bends, etc. But, if I also increase the velocity of the air entering the intake, I may well experience an increase in flow.


Rather than the amount of volume inside the tube, the pressure and velocity is where I feel that the most gains can be made. It is fine and dandy to throw a 4" pipe and say it is not being restrictive up there and call it good. I think that with a 2-2.5" tube and a direct path with smooth bends and a smooth pathway for air to travel through inside, combined with maybe some heat protection wrapping on the tube on the section inside the motor would give the best result. Not sure how to calculate this as it is pretty advanced engineering for the common person. I can find a few equations that deal with pressure, but most equations that I can find eliminate geometry due to the difficulty of calculating the volume - restrictions in the geometrical pathway.

Supposedly the horn on the air intake is to "speed" up air BTW. So the engineers at Land Rover must see the need for greater pressure???

Way

Yeah, it is spendier, that's for sure.

But, at this point in the game, what's a couple hundred bucks mean right?

It's only money! (grumble grumble grumble)

I also have for sale an ARB snorkel, new in box. I might not be able to use it with the heater I've chosen to mount in the engine bay right above the passenger side footwell.

Speaking of formulas, here's one:

(a x b) + c = d

a = amount of mods you've done

b = modifications that have cost at least $1000

c = initial cost of vehicle

d = dollar amount you've spent on something cool vs. something you could have invested in the NASDAQ and lost 80% of it's value.

That equation makes me feel a lot better about my "investment". I'll be sure to tell the wife so that she feels like I made the right choice.

Michael, isn't that the definition of opportunity cost?

Paul