Civic X Open Grille Cooling Debate - Short Ram + Open Grille Instead of Full Cobra CAI

[Mike2020si]

What’s up guys, I was thinking of a debate that I haven’t seen here on the forums. My car: 20’ Civic Si Sedan

As we all know Pro-Civic makes an open grille to enhance air flow in response to the restrictive stock grille. I have one on the way right now. As well as the full PRL Cobra Cold air intake installed already. But I’m thinking.....

Would it be more cooling efficient if I converted to the short ram intake taking in air from this new open grille? Rather than my current setup where the full PRL Cobra CAI filter is located in the bottom area.

Let me know what you guys think about this theory? I may have to run both setups and data log them... I’m curious.

UPDATE: Response from user who has experience with the short ram + open grille setup has let us know that his temps actually went up When changing to the short ram intake. However another user says his temperatures were much closer to ambient with the open grille setup with SRI. Read the forum for more...

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[Hazardous-Drunk]

If u run data let me know, I got the stock grill and a short ram mishimoto taking in air from the stock vent in the plastic/rubber seal on the hood and it directs it right to it like it did the stock intake.

 

[Kotaas]

You can buy open fog light garnishes online if you’re concerned about the airflow of the cobra intake. Or you can also just cut out the diamond shape plastic part for the garnishes also if u don’t wanna spend money. Shit even drill holes like I did when I had it lol whatever works bro haha

 

[jXian]

You can buy open fog light garnishes online if you’re concerned about the airflow of the cobra intake. Or you can also just cut out the diamond shape plastic part for the garnishes also if u don’t wanna spend money. Shit even drill holes like I did when I had it lol whatever works bro haha

This is what I did. I used a dremel to cut out the diamonds in the same shape as the passenger side, so they're symmetrical.

The cobra intake still runs cooler than the SRI, even with a "higher flowing" grille. But both intakes will benefit from foglight cover cutouts or high flowing grilles.

 

[Mike2020si]

It is not. I ran the Cobra and the grille and when I switched to a SRI my temps went up. They're still better than OEM, but you're still closer to a lot of hot items vs it being down in the lower spot, so it still soaks some of that heat. I haven't had my SI for about a year now so I don't have anything left to show that, but from my logging I noticed it, but I liked the ease of the SRI so I did not switch it back because at the end of the day, that little change wasn't going to make a noticable performance difference.

Yeah I forgot to think of when going short ram your hot hoses + other hot components are right near the filter. Thought I was onto something haha. Thanks for the post. My move now is to get that open grille on and keep my full Cobra CAI on. The open grille will work well with adding some air, to cool the silicone hosing of the PRL CAI. The combo will be great for cooling the upper part of the intake IMO. We’ll see tho. I don’t think we’ll have any crazy temp difference obviously, I’m just all for efficiency even within the smallest differences.

 

[Chaucer]

I've just installed the Ballade Sports mesh grill with the same idea in mind. My logs show that my IATs are much closer to ambient now. I also have the PRL Cobra CAI installed. I have a feeling the impact would be even more significant with the stock airbox, since it would be directly in the air path but more isolated than an SRI. I like the turbo whooooosh far too much to go back to the stock airbox though.

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