Dodge Challenger Forum banner

Hellcat Airbox vs Cold Air

44K views 92 replies 40 participants last post by  Desperado 
#1 ·
I've been thinking about doing some mods to my '15 R/T 5.7 and discovered that the hellcat's headlight airbox can be added to any '15 model. Then there's adding cold air intake. Any thoughts on which would be better in the grand scheme of things? A few extra HP definitely wouldn't hurt things.

While I'm on the subject of mods I've also thought about adding louder exhaust, looking at a flowmaster axle-back system. Only concerns I have deal with factory power train warranty being voided over changing the exhaust or the intake.
 
#2 ·
I did the hellcat lower box and tube with a k&n panel filter n I've been happy with it. I'm not a big fan of cold air intakes. As far as exhaust n warranty anything done post cat shouldn't affect your warranty. I did the blastin bobs resonator delete n I like it, yes it does drone but I'm half deaf so what do I care, I like the way it sounds.
 
#3 · (Edited)
Mike,
Yes all 15's ( and 2016s) have the removable headlight plug on both sides.
The hellcat box is a drop in, has both larger & a smoother interior, this being good for 8-9HP (per FCA)
Its as real cold/ram air, as you can get anyway, unlike many/most CAI for the challenger model, which pull from ambient underhood air. the Hellcat box will also not transfer underhood heat to said air charge as readily as an aluminum CAI tube will.
You can use your existing 2015 air box top, but the hellcat top is just slightly different, smoother on the inside, but will add $50 to your conversion. The lower box & tube is the best bang for the buck going. I got mine from steve white, they had the best price.
> Challenger Hellcat Headlamp Ram Inlet Cold Air Intake Box & Duct Functional Oem: Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram - Original Parts - SteveWhiteParts.com <

Genpartsco > GENPARTSCO-USA - HOME <
make an awesome little headlight port screens that pops right in and will keep things out of the airbox (and) engine compartment if you open up both sides. Once you find stuff in your air box or ports, you'll see why many of swear by them. BTW, Running the passenger side port open has shown to reduce under hood temps by 10-12 deg.

Finally, go with either the Green filter, AEM HP or some other oiless filter, the stock filter isnt bad either as is, but you will want to steer clear of oiled HP filters such as K&N, there have been more than a few reports that the oil vapor can mess with intake sensors, better safe than sorry.
I also went with the reso delete. Rolling Thunder version, which really made the car sound like its supposed to. As white15rt stated, anything back of the cats, is open to mod and will not affect warranty.
Hemi4Us
 
  • Like
Reactions: Trickrazor
#4 ·
Thanks for the replies. Well good to know about the hellcat air-box being a better choice, end up saving money that way. On the resonator removal, came across this which is also from Steve White, http://www.challengertalk.com/forums/f194/new-rolling-thunder-exhaust-resonator-delete-301322/ is that what you're talking about? Sounds very nice for not having to spend more than $200~ This being a dumb question concerning the exhaust, have the work done by a dealership or a shop that specializes in exhaust work? Have to have it done by someone else, don't have a garage or the tools or a lift. Have to cut me a little slack, my last car was a Prius...
 
#5 ·
Yep, not a fan of the CAI's on the Challengers, but I would consider the HC box/tube install. It's priced right, and can't hurt anything.


On my '10 R/TC with the A5, I installed the Flowmaster Force II system, and was very happy with it, As already stated, "cat back" exhaust systems don't affect the warranty at all.


Welcome aboard and best of luck with your choices.
 
#6 ·
Glad to help Mike.
Yes, thats the reso delete I went with. I am not sure SWM still carries the rolling thunder kits, I had heard word that they severed business ties with them earlier this year, so you may want to double check that they still have new kits in stock, if not, you can order directly from rolling thunder.
You will need to know what your pipe diameter size is so you get the right kit..(if you have the M6 trans, its going to be 2.5" the A8 cars use 2.25").
You can certainly do this conversion yourself with basic hand tools, a jack and either a sawzall, die grinder w/ cutoff wheel or similar tool to cut the pipes just before the reso..the hardest part for me was getting the tips re-alligned vertically.
Any good local exhaust shop could do this no prob for minimal $$..I would steer clear of the dealership, they will ding ya more $$ for the same job, thats if they dont simply contract it out to the same exhaust shop you'll find in the yellow pages anyway and charge you the cost of doing the leg work and vehicle transpo for ya..
Hemi4Us
 
#7 ·
The Force II sounded good, and so did the resonator removal...I think for the price difference I might go with just removing the resonators...I'll do some searching around...but if I can save $400+ and get similar results I'll do it.

Definitely sounds like the Hellcat air-box is the way to go on the intake...

Thanks everyone.
 
#19 ·
I've been searching high and low for an aftermarket tube, I swear I saw one on this site somewhere, and of course I did not subscribe to the thread. It is much more refined than the pressed fibre tube Dodge is selling. Anyone else run into this part?
 
#15 ·
That's good to know, wouldn't have anticipated anything like that. A co-worker got a Charger R/T Scat Pack, sound very nice with factory exhaust, I probably wouldn't want to change much with those anyway... The R/T 5.7 is a bit quiet which is why I want to make a couple changes.
 
#14 ·
I used a Mopar CAI and added a flex duct from Spectre to connect headlight port to air box. The air box already had a cutout, it was square so I used a piece of Kydex shaped to the box profile, hole sawed the proper size, fastened it with French screws (flush both sides) and fed the duct in. Best of both worlds. :)
 
#16 ·
Im sure the HC mod is good at providing more air and slightly cooler temps than the stock configuration, but its still using the factory plastic which is bad at dissipating heat soak.

I would like to see some logs of the HC mod intake temps so I could compare them to the LMI fender pull:
http://www.challengertalk.com/forums/f18/lmi-fender-pull-v2-temp-averages-102139/

I believe the LMI would still outperform temperature wise.
 
#21 ·
Actually the opposite is true, I bet the stock intake sheds heat about as well as anything in the aftermarket. If not as good I bet it's very close to whatever is the best...
 
#17 ·
I think the only question that remains concerning the exhaust mod (replacing the resonators with straight pipe) is whether there are any issues arising from doing so, like changing back pressure, etc. Louder is nice, but if it is reducing HP & fuel economy or reducing the life of engine parts (exhaust valves) then probably need to pass on that option and look at doing a cat back system that maintains back pressure and so on while making the exhaust louder and heck gain a few HP wouldn't hurt either. I'd rather fork out the money than to create engine problems down the line, or risk doing so.

As far as the CIA vs Hellcat, definitely will go with the hell cat airbox, cheaper and has some wow factor and possibly tangible HP gains.

Not to get off topic from what the threads purpose but someone mentioned to me about a product called the tazer, which plugs into the ODBII port and will supposedly unlock and add features, which ultimately I concluded was a bad idea. Supposedly lets you access other menus, allows you lock the front brakes to do burnouts and so forth. Even though I'm not plugging that or anything similar into the ODBII port to do that type of stuff anyone used one of these and just curious to hear what your thoughts might be.

Thanks for all the replies everyone!
 
#68 ·
better late than never



Mike I am a few months late on this thread and it was exactly what I was looking for. I have a 16 RT Plus 5.7 and first thing I did was swap out the bottom of the air box with the HC one. Not sure if it made a difference but thought it was a cool upgrade. As far as the resonator delete, I read that the reso has no affect on back pressure as its main job is just to minimize drone noise in the car. I would be curious to hear what you have found since you started this thread. :thumbsup:
 

Attachments

#18 ·
Plenty of people have used the Tazer product and have had good success with it, there are many threads on this topic. I have one for my '15 srt and have had no ill effects other than reduced tire life from big smokey burnouts. I also when with the hellcat airbox. The hellcat also has a different filter(same shape though) rated for higher flow as well, when my original filter gets dirty I will buy one of them.
 
#25 ·
Aftermarket CAIs are a pretty big waste of money unless you had a NA build and had a fender mount style CAI that really sucked in cool air but honestly the Hellcat airbox with the connecting tube and a drop in filter from K&N is really the best way to go IMO. Doesn't heatsoak and IAT temps stay 1-4 degrees above outside temps.
 
#26 ·
Aftermarket CAIs are a pretty big waste of money unless you had a NA build and had a fender mount style CAI that really sucked in cool air but honestly the Hellcat airbox with the connecting tube and a drop in filter from K&N is really the best way to go IMO. Doesn't heatsoak and IAT temps stay 1-4 degrees above outside temps.
All intakes heat soak. How fast they dissipate the heat is what is being questioned. I would like to see a data log for the stock box vs the hellcat box/mod to see how much it helps over the factory system.

I agree that the CAI is best on a built engine but to say they are a waste of money is only opinion.

All mods add up performance wise and compared to the cost of an exhaust system its relatively cheap.
 
#65 ·
any hp gains from that?
 
#32 ·
The HC box doesn't so much provide more air as it provides cold air.
That's something any engine can use when it's hot outside.
 
#38 ·
Although the hellcat intake solution is great, nothing beats a fenderwell intake. The LMI true cai is the best intake setup you can have. It might be more maintenance, but it will outperform any other intake.
 
#41 ·
Actually what really matters is the temperature reading at the IAT. That's what decides how much timing is advanced or retarded based on the temp of the air coming in. So you certainly can see a benefit by taking in cooler air. Another benefit is that an aftermarket intake like a fenderwell will recover from heatsoak in seconds on the highway compared to several minutes with the stock airbox.
 
#43 · (Edited)
blah blah blah...for my money the Hellcat box is the best value out there simply because it gets zero air from under the hood....It doesn't matter if the plastic box is hot or not if the air is passing though before it can get heated substantially. The other offerings I see I may as well throw my money in the fire...;) BBBBBut if I paid 400 bucks or more for an aftermarket one I'd say it was best too.... :lol:



And further more, my Hellcat box is so good I get 10 horsepower and its still in the plastic bag in the trunk...
 
#44 ·
You say bla bla bla because you don't get it, that's ok, not everyone will understand.
There's a reason why schools have kids that makes A's and some just barely squeeze by with D's and get the same high school or college degree.
 
  • Like
Reactions: GP70
#46 ·
You'd be surprised how much the air can heat up when traveling through the tube. It's enough to make a difference. Indeed, a majority of aftermarket intakes are no better than stock. However, there are some very well made intakes that have been proven to perform significantly better than the oem airbox. These intakes can make gains big enough to be noticed in the 1/4 mile. Just writing off every aftermarket intake as junk that is no better than stock just seems kind of ignorant :icon_rolleyes:
 
#50 ·
Actually it doesn't...spending money for nothing is...I stand by what I said. I run all day with my standard air box and the inlet air is about 10 degrees warmer than ambient. Doesn't take long at all to cool down....and the more throttle input the faster it cools imagine that. The Hell cat box will run within a couple degrees of ambient...all day long...and its less than 50 bucks and cools even quicker.. Ignorant indeed. :notallthere:

Pixie dust is better. ;)
 
#47 · (Edited)
here's a very nice write up on the hellcat box


Prop's to this person for testing

taken from another website (not allowed to say I guess- dumb)

Hello all, let me first say this post will be long and detailed, just so it's clear as to what took place.

I did 4 different acceleration tests and they were:

30-100 starting in 3rd gear
50-140 starting in 3rd gear
40-120 in 5th gear
60-100 in 8th gear

I did 3-4 runs in each test. I had put 265 miles on the AFE Intake when I started the runs and it had 310 on it when I did the last run. The 265 miles originally were put on in mixed city and highway driving, everything from cruising, stop and go traffic, to WOT blasts in low triple digit speeds. So I gave it plenty of mixed adaptation miles.
I filled up the tank both times with the same 93 Octane from the same gas station hours before the testing.

I have a dedicated road that is basically deserted, with no homes, no buildings and no side streets on either side of the road. Large grass median in between and grassy woods on each side of the road.
I start the tests in the exact same spot each time, crossing this black sealant strip line on the road and then I go full throttle.
I would not do the runs if there was any other cars in the area, I would pull onto the shoulder and wait for that occasional car to pass, no matter which direction they were traveling in.
Elevation of street is 10 feet above sea level.

Outside air conditions were:
Stock runs:
79-80 degrees
77-78% humidity
29.95 Barometric Pressure
Gives a DA of 1597 feet

AFE Intake runs:
81-82 degress
80% humidity
29.98 Barometric Pressure
Gives a DA of 1725

As you can see the temps and conditions were almost identical. I couldn't wait for the temps on the AFE to drop any further as it was already midnight, and the low last night was forecast to be 78 degrees at 5 am. The stock runs were done at 11 pm and it was 80 then and dropped to 79 midway through the testing. So that 2 degrees difference was minor but I'd of needed to wait till 5 am to match the temps, but usually humidity is highest in the morning so that would of cancelled out the 2 degree temp drop if humidity went up 5-6%

I was monitoring and recording Oil Temps, Coolant Temps, Intercooler Temps, and the all important Intake Air Temps for each run. Keeping them all about the same, but occasionally if they were different I did a run to see how it affected the times. I learned that anything from 120-140 IAT's seemed to matter none. On one run after idling for an extended period of time the IAT reached 154 degrees and the oil temp was 210 when I pulled out to go and it still matched the prior run when the IAT was at 134 and oil temp at 190.
However on another run when the IAT was at 147 and the oil at 217, it was one tenth slower from 40-120 than it was when IAT was at 133 and oil at 210.

So as stated before, the times on this car are amazingly consistent no matter what the temps are at. As long as you drive it a bit prior to the run, the engine normalizes the temps and all is good.
If you sit there idling for 10 minutes there is no air going in and around the engine and it does warm up a tiny bit, but even then it seems to have little effect on the times. So the car is amazingly good at keeping "cool" or at keeping to a temp that doesn't have much affect at all on it's performance. That may be different on a race track where you are lapping and going full throttle a lot more for a lot longer duration.

So here's the numbers:

30-100 Stock averaged 6.9 seconds with a best of 6.8
30-100 AFE averaged 6.825 seconds with a best of 6.8

50-140 Stock averaged 11.533 seconds with a best of 11.5
50-140 AFE averaged 11.566 seconds with a best of 11.5

40-120 Stock averaged 13.633 seconds with a best of 13.6
40-120 AFE averaged 13.566 seconds with a best of 13.5

60-100 Stock averaged 20.7 seconds with a best of 20.5
60-100 AFE averaged 20.56 seconds with a best of 20.4

So as you can see the only test that had a notable improvement was the 60-100 speed time in 8th gear.
This is of course the most irrelevant of the tests and nobody ever will do a test like that in real life. I did it because I wanted to do a "top gear" test and lug the engine in a big way to see what the results would be. It seemed the AFE was able to help the engine along best in that test.

I know one could say, "wouldn't the times be a bit better if the AFE tests had the same DA as the stock?" Well, first, 128 feet difference in DA is almost nothing, maybe .03 seconds difference, however, I went to my testing location in the middle of the day the other day too, when it was 88 degrees outside and I had only 165 miles on the AFE Intake. I did one of the runs for fun, the 30-100 starting in 3rd gear test, to see what it would do at that point. I got a 6.8 second run. It was the exact same time I got on the stock intake's best time, which I was excited to see that the AFE was able to match the stock intakes time when it was 10 degrees hotter with a DA of 1935 feet (338 feet higher). But it ended up also being the best time I could get on the AFE intake last night too even with a DA of 210 feet lower than that. So again the Hellcat seems to be really consistent even when temps and conditions vary by 10 degrees and 300-350 feet difference in DA. So the 128 feet difference in DA from the AFE runs and the stock runs doubtful it would make any difference at all.

My thoughts: I'm a bit disappointed. I was hoping for a .1-.2 second improvement in every test to show that the intake actually opened up some power for this car when on the road.
As it stands, it did .14 seconds better on average in 1 test, but the one with the least meaning for me and everyone else.
It did minuscule amounts better on average in 2 of the tests, and actually a minuscule worse on average in one test (though that test also had the AFE matching the stock intakes best time).
One one test it did an acceptable job of improving the time but again it was a 8th gear WOT pull that you'd never do on the street or on a track.
The AFE did have one test 40-120 where it's best time was .1 second faster than the stock intakes best time, but it wasn't consistent as the other runs equalled the stock intakes time.
The test that is probably most meaningful is the 50-140 test. It's the biggest speed spread, covering 90 mph in the lowest gear, and it's the one test the AFE did the worse than the stock intake on average, and only matched the stock intakes best time.

So to me, the AFE is doing very little in the power adding department, sadly the same results DAK found out on the dyno. I truly felt the intake would shine on the road tests compared to the dyno, but it didn't. This engine is amazingly capable and consistent no matter if it's on a dyno with limited fans or out on an open road. I don't think I've ever had a car that has such consistency in all areas like this.
Sorry so long, but needed to be detailed.

I have a feeling that without other supporting mods, an aftermarket intake on these cars is pointless and unnecessary. With a pulley and tune these aftermarket intakes would probably be more necessary and show gains over just the pulley and tune by themselves.

I have sent the email for a Return Authorization. I will be returning the intake, as I have no plans to add a pulley and tune to my Hellcat.
Thanks for reading this long and detailed post. :)
Cheers
 
#48 ·
As of right now there aren't any really good aftermarket intakes for the hellcat. Give it some time, though, reputable intake brands like LMI will develop something for the hellcat that will be better than the stock box.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top