How safe am I if my cold air intake has a bypass valve?

Question

I want to install a cold air intake on my 2006 Honda Civic.

I live in Miami, Florida, though and you know how it is. How safe am I with a bypass valve? Does it really decrease performance? Should I maybe go with another mode of air filtration, instead?

Give me a link or 2 to some products and you can get best answer, if you like?

Thank a lot.

Answer 1

Well there's a few things about bypass valves you should know. First of all, yes it does decrease the performance of the intake, your slightly constricting the airflow adding on one, its not that major though. Most people don't need a by pass valve. I mean you would have completely submerge your intake filter in water for it to suck water in and hydrolock, in which case you probably would have messed some other stuff up as well. You don't want a cold air intake if your driving in that kind of weather/conditions, even with a bypass valve, its not a 100% fool proof thing. If you drive in those extreme conditions where you filter is going to be submerged, your better off with a short ram intake.

If you want to see some more about this whole intake debate as well as the names of some good brands, check out this link:

http://www.8thcivic.com/forums/bolt-ons-...

^^Should be good for you since its 8thCivic.com so they're talking about 2006-2008 Civic's. Fujita, AEM & Injen are some good ones. I prefer AEM, they are a pretty good company, they make quality products that are tested to perform and endure well. I would recommend the AEM V2, it performs as good, sometimes better, than a Cold air intake and it installs like a Short ram intake. If you want to check out more about the AEM V2, you can read up here:

http://www.aempower.com/ViewCategory.asp...

I'm not 100% sure if they make one for the 2006 Civic though. The main one i keep hearing about for the base Civic's (i.e. Non-Si versions) is Fujita, so you might wanna check into them.

Good luck, hope i helped!

Answer 2

If you go with a short ram intake you shouldn't need a bypass valve...if you go with a full cold air intake that goes into your wheel wells, yes you may want one, but really only if you think your going to be driving through some deep puddles.

Depends how worried you are about performance, If you just want some better gas mileage and a little hp increase a short ram or just a K&N filter should work well and you should have to worry about water problems.  

Answer 3

unless you have a turbo or some kind of air compression system (super-charger. blower or?) on this car , you dont need a by-pass on it at all. .