Luke
02-20-2004, 04:06 AM
A couple of weeks ago I decded to switch from my whisper lid to a K&N FIPK. Mainly for appearance reasons, since I think it looks a lot cleaner than the lid radiator shroud combo. However, the FIPK sels for about $300, which in my opinion is pretty high for what you get. So with that in mind I set out to build one on my own. I had never seen one in person, so I had to go by picturs I found on the net. After looking at a few different pics, I started doing some measuring on my car and trying to get an idea of what size everything would need to be and what degree bends I would need to put in it. After going through this, I had a friend cut and bend a piece of sheet metal to the specs I had given him. This is what I got back.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119638879nXHQEc
It is just a flat piece that has two bends put in it. The piece you can kinda see standing up behind it is the piece that would later be used to attach the plate and the front of the filter. There's also one more piece you can't see in the pic, that is a tad bit shorter than the width of the plate and has an "L" shape to it, will be used to hook the plate to the radiatior.
I test fitted the piece when I finally got the filter in the mail (Istarted building without the filter so I had to kinda guess on some dimensions. I noticed when I had the piece laying there and tried to attach the filter/bellow/maf onto the throttle body, they hit on the plate and mad the filter stand up high enough that the hood wouldn't close.
After looking at some more pics on the net, I noticed the K&N piece had an indention that allowed the bellow/MAF combo to lay a little bit lower. I couldn't put the bend in mine like they did in their's, so I just cut a section out. You can't see it when everything is in place, so the cut worked just as good as the indention.
I next welded to "L" shaped bracket onto the plate and also welded the plate filter attachment on.
Here's what that looked like.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119639270gEYuHo
You can't see the underside, they welds don't have to be pretty.
Here it is from the top side.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119639061aEYxaL
And finally here it is temporarily stuck on the car.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119638567DKGxVD
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119638770iNQOyJ
So far things are going really well with it, it sitll looks kinda rough, but will be fine whenver it is done. I still need to round the edges of the plate as I don't think they look good as they are. I also need to sand it smooth, prime, and paint it.
The main difference between mine and K&N's is mine is a perfect rectangle, while their's has extra length on the driver's side. I believe this is for the small filter that later year LS1's have, mine is a 98 so I don't need that. Also, K&N's is all one piece, where mine is 3 and welded together. Once mine is done is will only appear as a 2 piece and even then it won't be noticeable.
When it is all said and done, it will end up costing me about $125. $115 for the filter and $10 for paint, everything else was, as they would say on Monster Garage, a freebie. :D
I'll get some more pics up as more work gets done on it and will post pics of the final product.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119638879nXHQEc
It is just a flat piece that has two bends put in it. The piece you can kinda see standing up behind it is the piece that would later be used to attach the plate and the front of the filter. There's also one more piece you can't see in the pic, that is a tad bit shorter than the width of the plate and has an "L" shape to it, will be used to hook the plate to the radiatior.
I test fitted the piece when I finally got the filter in the mail (Istarted building without the filter so I had to kinda guess on some dimensions. I noticed when I had the piece laying there and tried to attach the filter/bellow/maf onto the throttle body, they hit on the plate and mad the filter stand up high enough that the hood wouldn't close.
After looking at some more pics on the net, I noticed the K&N piece had an indention that allowed the bellow/MAF combo to lay a little bit lower. I couldn't put the bend in mine like they did in their's, so I just cut a section out. You can't see it when everything is in place, so the cut worked just as good as the indention.
I next welded to "L" shaped bracket onto the plate and also welded the plate filter attachment on.
Here's what that looked like.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119639270gEYuHo
You can't see the underside, they welds don't have to be pretty.
Here it is from the top side.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119639061aEYxaL
And finally here it is temporarily stuck on the car.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119638567DKGxVD
http://community.webshots.com/photo/119638339/119638770iNQOyJ
So far things are going really well with it, it sitll looks kinda rough, but will be fine whenver it is done. I still need to round the edges of the plate as I don't think they look good as they are. I also need to sand it smooth, prime, and paint it.
The main difference between mine and K&N's is mine is a perfect rectangle, while their's has extra length on the driver's side. I believe this is for the small filter that later year LS1's have, mine is a 98 so I don't need that. Also, K&N's is all one piece, where mine is 3 and welded together. Once mine is done is will only appear as a 2 piece and even then it won't be noticeable.
When it is all said and done, it will end up costing me about $125. $115 for the filter and $10 for paint, everything else was, as they would say on Monster Garage, a freebie. :D
I'll get some more pics up as more work gets done on it and will post pics of the final product.