Best CSL Airbox Setup?

[332]

I wouldn't have Kassel tune my car, that is my opinion. My old setup was an Alpha N RK Dyno Tune, with ebay headers, a custom intake/exhaust I put down 326whp. Now, I'm doing big NA numbers with e85, ARH 6 to 1, single 3.5 exhaust, same custom intake. CSL intake, TMS, based on the dyno's I've seen and price.

[Nardo S54]

What's the going rate for the whole process not including the box obviously?

And I didn't even think of emissions. There's no tune or way around that? I won't have a visual check since I'm in Maryland so I'd just need to plug up to the station to get it checked obviously.

Excluding the box, call it another $300 in ancillary hardware. My labor is free so then the rest is tune. Most folks do headers first so if you already had a header tune, then you just typically pay the incremental difference for CSL / Alpha-N. But you’re probably looking at $1200 for a good custom tune. Some may avoid the costly dyno time by relying on you performing your own data logging so YMMV.

Re emissions, I doubt any Alpha-N tune will allow you to pass emissions readiness. Easiest thing would be to pull the box and flash to stock for testing.

I honestly just want the look and sounds. I'm not trying to make a track monster or do a ridiculous bulld. Right now my car is stock other than a borla exhaust which I might be swapping back to OE anyway. I did plan into looking into some headers possibly. Still trying to decide where I'd like to go with that car but I'm definitely leaning towards airbox first then figure out exhaust stuff later.

If all you care for is the sound, again I think you are better off with an OE style carbon box.

[LSB4Me]

If all you care for is the sound, again I think you are better off with an OE style carbon box.

At the risk of straying us further off topic (and fwiw), the oe style carbon box should fail visual as well. You “can’t” do anything to any part of the emissions system other than stock for stock. A boyscout of a smog man would fail that without hesitation. Straight to jail.

As for the Evolve boxes, I’m pretty sure it was only the first 22 or 12 or something very low. It was spontaneously detaching internal trumpets right?

Very happy with my Evolve and my uninformed physics brain always favored the elephant trunk downspout. The flap isn’t for me.

Lastly, for those here that missed my prior thread, adding an Eventuri bumper scoop to my setup made a surprisingly wonderful difference. Highly recommend that if you aren’t scooping already.

[Nardo S54]

You have to remember that Evolve was the first few companies to have a rep CSL intake available stateside.
Back then circa 2010 it was Bimmerworld for 3k or Evolve for like 4k.

Yes, I applaud their effort in bringing something to market over ten years ago but I personally wouldn't give them a free pass just based on that.

Yea the earlier versions had issues but I've seen issues with every CSL intake brand except OE.

Agreed, others have had their share of hiccups but none as bad as something that could've led to catastrophic failure. And fwiw that link I posted was from 2020, so earlier relative to now but also not talking first production run either.

Many people have been running ECS airboxes because they sold them cheap.
If just getting the job done was enough, sure it's decent enough.

If by getting the job you mean solid power gains, then I'm not sure what more one requires. Unless of course, there's back-to-back dynos showing the Karb puts down substantially more power but I genuinely don't recall that being the case.

[siamkazi]

FWIW, Turner V2 box here for almost 4 years with an HTE Alpha-N dyno tune, no problems and really happy with the sound and power gains (335 whp), I'd do the same setup again if I were to start over 🤷♂️