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Intake manifold insulator/spacer?

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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 05:11 AM
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Intake manifold insulator/spacer?

Just curious has anyone here considered the benefits of using a manifold insulator or spacer to bring down intake temps, and keep things cool?

This a common bolt on, in piston engines, and I think it might work well with our high temp rotaries.... I looked around but didn't see that anyone made these. However I do have a friend that custom makes them for other cars. He could easily whip one up off a design of a stock gasket, with thicker more resistant materials.

Any thoughts?
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 05:36 AM
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I always thought those things were bullshit, even on piston engines...


-Ted
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 05:40 AM
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Agree
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 11:52 AM
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Mmmm... air is flowing in really fast fresh from outside... heat is naturally going to soak into everything over a period of time, so I Can't think of it helping... maybe a little for a short while, but once everything eventually reaches a stable temp it will be the same.. right?
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 07:02 PM
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I've actually seen dyno's on these, they work well on piston engines, good for about a 4% gain from what I've seen.
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 07:35 PM
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BTW the purpose is to keep the manifold from heating, thus keeping the air flowing through it denser. The idea is to seperate (space out) the metal on metal so that they can't conduct heat to one another.
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 10:11 PM
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I have experience with insulator plates reducing temperature soak in industrial applications. I know that the they work.
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 10:16 PM
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A phenolic spacer would mainly keep fuel cooler by isolating the fuel in a carb from heat conducting through the intake manifold.

An intake manifold heat shield would reduce heat in the intake. Radiant heat from the header is significant.
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 10:25 PM
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spacer to increase plenum volume,like on a carb?
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 10:31 PM
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Originally Posted by 13BT_RX3
A phenolic spacer would mainly keep fuel cooler by isolating the fuel in a carb from heat conducting through the intake manifold.

An intake manifold heat shield would reduce heat in the intake. Radiant heat from the header is significant.
Originally Posted by TonyD89
I have experience with insulator plates reducing temperature soak in industrial applications. I know that the they work.
I have similar thoughts. I'm just curious to know others opinions about how this would work on our rotaries, which tend to run hot anyways. I think we could seem some gains to be made, or atleast a prevention of heat soak.
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Old Apr 24, 2007 | 10:53 PM
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I've never seen them on a single race car in my life...


-Ted
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Old Apr 25, 2007 | 10:34 PM
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Originally Posted by RETed
I've never seen them on a single race car in my life...


-Ted
Have you seen a P-port with the manifold connected to the housings with a rubber tube? I believe they put those in racecars.

Check out the gold foil on the airbox. Certainly not a carb spacer, but it is proof that race cars use thermal barriers on their intakes.
Attached Thumbnails Intake manifold insulator/spacer?-rx8.jpg  

Last edited by 13BT_RX3; Apr 25, 2007 at 10:42 PM.
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Old Apr 26, 2007 | 05:54 AM
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Originally Posted by 13BT_RX3
Have you seen a P-port with the manifold connected to the housings with a rubber tube? I believe they put those in racecars.
Nope, I'm talking about piston cars...
Never seen them on F1, F3, Indy, NASCAR, IMSA, etc.
Anyone got a pic of one of them?
Or are they all banned?


-Ted
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Old Apr 27, 2007 | 05:01 AM
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So would cooling (actually preventing heating) the intake manifold be beneficial on a wankel?
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Old Apr 27, 2007 | 09:40 AM
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Originally Posted by RETed
Nope, I'm talking about piston cars...
Never seen them on F1, F3, Indy, NASCAR, IMSA, etc.
Anyone got a pic of one of them?
Or are they all banned?


-Ted
f1 intakes are composite so that deadens heat transfer,same with indy and most imsa engines.nascar engines use the spacer to increase or decrese the plenum volume along with isolate the carb from heat.

i would have lost my job if i took pic's sorry...
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Old Apr 30, 2007 | 05:30 AM
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It will definately help with keeping the intake manifold cooler,but is it worth the gain?

I would rather focus on isolating the Exhaust heat from the intake.It will help a great deal more.Keeping enginebay heat down is turning into a bigger problem than before,seeing that more HP equals more Heat.

Karis
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Old Apr 30, 2007 | 08:38 AM
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Originally Posted by RETed
I always thought those things were bullshit, even on piston engines...


-Ted
they definitly work on piston engines, i had them on 2 seperate cars..... you don't necessarily GAIN hp, but it keeps it from losing hp when the intake mani gets heatsoaked. granted, both cars were NA, and i've never used it on a rotary
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Old Apr 30, 2007 | 06:43 PM
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I think I might have my friend do some research developement, and see if I can score any gains, or atleast cut back on heat soak. I know these work well on piston engines, I'd love to see what benefits would come to a rotary. For starters how hot does the "block" and manifold ussually get on both FI and NA apps?
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Old Apr 30, 2007 | 08:02 PM
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wouldn't a hotter intake manifold, be bigger, and therefore flow more air?
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Old May 1, 2007 | 08:59 PM
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I've emailed my friend back and forth and he's got a few questions:
For the RX7, I was thinking of getting a manifold insulator for it. But there don't seem to be any on the market, would you have any interest in producing one? Any thoughts?


The manifold:
http://cgi.ebay.com/S4-S5-rx7-intake...ayphotohosting
I totally forgot about this message, had a draft ready to send and all. Sorry about that.

We can definitly look into it. I'll need some help from you though. To keep the price down it would be very nice if you could get a few more people interested in buying them. If I have to order small quantities of materials it is going to increase the price. Other than that I need the rough dimimensions of the flange so I know how much material one insulator is going to take up. I also need to know how thick the insulator can be. This may require replacement of studs in your engine. You'll have to measure them.
Anyone know the stud length? Or the rough dimentions of the gasket? I'll order a spare one for him to play with, but he needs to know the temps to get the right material as well.
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Old May 1, 2007 | 09:15 PM
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i have one on my 88tII but it is used as an adaptor for an fd uim intake temps are nice and cool, it about 3/4 of an inch thick, there is a ton of room under the uim i can even change my injectors w/o removing the uim its great
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Old May 10, 2007 | 06:27 PM
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Awsome thanks for the heads up. Would changing the space affect the power bands?
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Old May 10, 2007 | 07:03 PM
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Another thing, are there two parts to the intake manifold?
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Old May 23, 2007 | 02:29 PM
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I can only speak for the second gen RX7, but yes, there are 2 parts: one upper and one lower intake manifold that join together to form Voltron. Hahahaha, I couldn't resist. But seriously, series 4 and 5 13Bs utilize a 2 piece intake manifold.
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Old May 23, 2007 | 03:21 PM
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there *kinda* is a "spacer" in the FC to begin with.

I've noticed that while gauging the efficiency of my intercooler setup, that my UIM will get *warm* (not hot by any means) while the throttle body right up until the exit side of the intercooler is all cool (20ish degrees) But the little black "spacer" that is mounted between the UIM and the TB seems to keep the heat soak to a minimum (at least for everything further upstream then the UIM)
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