Winston - Just a personal suggestion, generally Fram is not the best air filter out there, and if you plan to own something for a lifetime, a drop-in K&N filter and oiling kit is the way to go. I live next to a corn field, so it gets dusty as hell twice a year, and it's nice to just be able to wash out and reinstall the filter for free whenever it's dirty. Sure, it's a heavy up front cost, but worth it in my opinion.
THANK YOU!Thank you so much for posting this. I used to own a ‘83 Firebird and a ‘85 Trans Am with carburetor 5.0 V8s which did not have this option (i.e. that added more HP) and I’ve been wondering for over 35 years exactly HOW those damn scoops worked! Thank you again....put a big smile on my face today!! 😉😁😄
Would have watched it sooner but RUclips? I'd make a controller for that thing from an Arduino. Add another skillset. I promise it is super easy and cheap. I'd make a control knob that changes the rpm it opens at by 100 rpm increments. Off the line, low rpms, a longer intake will make more tq. Up top you just want the engine to have access to as much air as possible. This is why pickup trucks have big long wrap around intakes and cars that use the same engine have short, low intakes. Mustang vs. F150 which they called the triton same engine except for the intake. Also the secret sauce in the MR2 with the T-VIS, similar principal. Most if not all the programming code could be figured out in an hour or two, having never done it before. I'd try to do a little research on that servo, see if they burnout with a lot of use. If that became a problem I'd convert it to a vacuum actuator with off the shelf stuff.
So a kid from south Africa via China immigrates to America and shows a deep love and appreciation for American muscle cars. That's what I call effing awesome.
I'm older but if we were neighbors I'd be over there helping you whenever you were working on your cars I graduated high school in 1984 so those era cars are exactly what I worked on back then and even to this day it's my favorite era of vehicles to tinker with I've been wrenching since I was idk a freshman in high school I guess and it's one of my back up trades when I am presented with the opportunity to make a few bucks my main trade is in construction although so it's like I said just something I enjoy and often make a few dollars along the way so a weekend here and there working on something like the 78 or the 90 would certainly not hurt my feelings one bit.. lol keep up the videos I'm enjoying them once in a while I cringe at the way you do things and it's a miracle you didn't get hurt with that front coil spring be careful
That was the FIRST mod that I performed on my 1989 Firebird Formula-350 back in the fall of 1988. TPI cars run hot and it helped out a lot in reducing under hood temperature. Thanks for the video !!! 👍
I still have the car which has been garaged since new. I only install the tin plate before washing the car which is only driven when it’s nice out. I guess there would be a water issue if the car was driven during inclement weather.
@@MarkoNurmenniemi it would probably have some effect, since a bunch of the air doesn't have to travel through a long tube under the hood where the heat is trapped, but i'm not going to speculate on whether it makes a significant difference.
As much as I like old GM cars, this just demonstrates why they catch as much crap as they do for the bean counters running the show. This was such an easy fix for a noticeable power increase -- with parts that probably cost about $2 to manufacture. Great job! I hope you're able to get the manual switch installed 🙂
The hood bulge was functional in the early 80s, but after 84 it was discontinued. After 87 it was brought back nonfunctioning as a retro peice to the formula model. See the 3rd gen trans am was meant to house a 4.9L turbo pontiac engine which used the hood bulge. It would of out performed the corvette so GM basically took Pontiacs engines leaving the Iron Duke.
Hey Winston, did you know that Corvettes, C4, C5, and C6 in particular, benefit tremendously from putting vents in the hood (most effective in certain spots). Not for the intake, or cooling the drivetrain (this is a side effect though), but because they suffer from a terrible buildup of pressure in the engine bay at speed. Nearly all vehicles have this issue to an extent, but in Corvettes it is compounded by the manner in which they draw in air to the intake, and are engineered to draw air upwards under the front air dam into the radiator (be sure to check that area, it tends to build up debris). The area underneath the hood is tight, and has little to no space for the overpressure to egress. This causes lift at speed (I can tell you from experience that >170 is wild without certain aero mods; best way to describe this is airplane turbulence. As in darting back and forth 2 or 3 feet at a time virtually instantaneously, as if the tires aren’t even touching the ground. Very temperamental situation). If this pressure buildup is mitigated, the effects are surprisingly noticeable, even at interstate speeds. The mid-high speed handling improves as well. A few years ago I was able to hit 212 mph in my highly modded C5. Btw, have been watching you for years. Since the “China, how it is” days. Happy to see you out of that sinking ship, and here in America. Sorry that you ended up in California (just kidding, guess that’s a personal choice)
Well Zora Antov DID want to put Hood Vents, Functional Ones on the C2 but GM told him no, so I wouldnt be surprised if this also applied to ALL of the corvettes really.
Winston, you are clearly a lover of all that is genuine and sincere. Good job on the induction fix and the joke about the rolled socks, made my day. Take care and good luck with your stylish beast of a car.
That was truly awesome! It may sound odd but your formula to happiness can be practically applied to our lives in general. I appreciate seeing your efforts from near homelessness in China, to owning a couple of proud birds, motorcycle, wonderful wife and family...hard work pays off. More Power!
I had an 89 formula 305tpi five speed that I did the honeycomb insert mod to. I found an 84 T/A that had been traded in at a local pontiac dealer and asked them if I could use the part. They told me yes as it was gonna be whole saled to someplace anyhow. It was painted yellow if I remember. So off to the auto parts store I went for some flat black spray paint. Needless to say, the underwood temp was better now that the air had somewhere to go. That blocking plate just kept the heat underhood. Don't have the car anymore but loved it while I had it. Miss it today looking at this video. Enjoy your car sir
They only did that on the second generation turbo Trans Am. The third gen had the wire mesh insert just like shown in this video. The 1989 V6 turbo Trans Am had the usual flat Trans Am hood of the mid 80s onwards.
I came across this channel randomly while looking at 3rd Gen stuff (my favorite car), boy was I surprised when I realized this is made by ADVChina guys that I was watching years ago. What a crazy coincidence. I really love this small but very clever mod to make this epic hood induction system functional again.
My Ex's scoop on her Celica was for additional engine cooling and downdraft to prevent front end lift at high speed. Only thing is she had the auto trans so she would never really be able to go fast enough to experience front end lift. But it looked cool.
Very, very well done. I haven't seen anyone do this yet and I'm impressed with the results but not terribly surprised. I had two mid 1970's Trans Am's back in the late 1980's and made the shaker hood scoops functional. They sounded great and from the amount of snow they ingested at around 40 mph, they clearly worked too.
YOU ARE SO THE MAN! This was the exact mod I was looking to do to my Formula so thanks for coming through! Looks like I’ll be hunting the junkyards for a similar set up. Also the 🦅 sound effect was perfect! 🤣
A mod we used to do on that actuator for the flap is to run it to the ignition switch circuit so when you start the car the flap opens up the entire time the engine runs. I have always thought the scoop on those should have been functional the whole time the engine was running and available on all Firebirds.
Hat’s off, Win! Take good care of that dashboard- all my friends who had Trans Ams back in the day would see cracks regularly forming - especially at the corners of the speakers toward the edges. Cheers, bru!
I remember doing the same mod to my 1978 Z28 back in the early nineties, ...mine was way more of a hack job, though. I just opened the slit and installed an open element air cleaner. We adjusted the 4bbl so the secondaries opened really fast, it gave it deep, mean intake roar. Nice work and nice F-body!!
My first car was an 84 Trans Am 5.0 HO in 1995, with the cowl induction hood. Depending on year, the HO package was good for about 40ish HP over the base v8. All these cars were anemic with their HP, but made up for it in torque. I'd love to have that car again now that I'm not a broke teen. Great video.
Nice job - and great that (for once) it proved to be surprisingly straightforward. With the added bonus of increased power and improved sound and aesthetics 👍
I had a 89 formula with the same motor. I put a hypertech computer chip in it and it helped a lot. Love watching you work on your car,it brings back a lot of memories. I may just have to get another one some day!
@@Longlostpuss He kinda worded the sentence awkward. The computer will re-learn air fuel ratio not the battery. Unless you were just making a joke about the battery.👍😉
I dont have the pleasure of owning a "ram air" vehicle but if i ever do this is the first thing im going to do. Fake scoops really bother me😞. Great vid man! Happy motoring👍💯❤👑
Did the exact same mod on my 87 305 Formula firebird years ago got the parts from from junkyard for $30 .00. Totally agree with you about air scoops being functional. The long plastic piece attaches below the screen to divert water away from the distributor, and the hole on the bottom side of the housing is a drain hole for water.
The offset hood bulge was originally engineered to accommodate the 301 Pontiac Turbo V8 motor before the GM brass mandated that all of the F bodies use the 305 Chevrolet motor from 1982.
Those hoods were originally for clearance for a turbo,these cars were designed for turbo but GM axed the pontiac motors at the last minute so they had to use a small block chevy instead.
I bought one from the junkyard when I had my 82 Trans Am, took the door out and made my own air cleaner mod. The drain goes right on top of the distributor, so use a hose from the drain hole to the area between the brake reservoir. Remember that you’ll have to clean the carb more often. Also can use black window screen in there to keep out bigger objects
I had an 80' Mustang Turbo that had a "power bulge" hood and an 82' GT that had a hood scoop. Both were non functioning but I easily modified an made functional. This was well before fuel injection so the mods worked fine.
this is cool as hell! i wouldn't go as far as saying "20%" but i'd agree that its gotta be a noticeable improvement.. at least as much as any cold air intake would provide to a modern car. keep the cool vids coming sir.
Stay tuned next week when Winston installs a NOX kit!!! Really interesting how everything matched up but drastic changes by car manufacturers are expensive so they basically keep the same car but introduce subtle changes to entice new or old owners to buy newer versions. So in your case Winston this proved to be a win win situation for you.
That was one of many mods that I made on my 79 TA. The next improvement that you can do is ditch the Fram air filter and replace it with a K&N, you will notice the difference.
Was the difference actually LESS filtration & more air flow to carburetor? FRAM survives on smart marketing strategy & they have done a great job of that for a long time.
I had this on my 1983, which was the first year the base motor got air induction, 82 only had it on the crossfire motor. The solenoid was activated by pressing the throttle to the floor and it felt like a downshift in terms of additional power, my car was a five speed. And with the roar of the secondaries, it was a lovely sound. The other thing they had in 82 and 83 was the dual resonator exhaust which made wonderfulsounds and the pipe actually split after the catalytic converter, it was as close to a true dual back in those day’s. From 1997 to 2003, the WS6’s had functional RamAir hoods, which could easily have been made to create a true ram air supercharging effect. Are you bypassing the air filter? The original unit did not bypass the air filter as there was a secondary dome under the top fileter cover
Worthless Whips I wonder, if air is vented only when the solenoid is open, it wouldn’t be that harmful to vent directly to the throttle body. That would yeild even more air. A brief direct venting of air directly wouldn’t be that harmful. Again, only when the solenoid opens
@@richarddobreny6664 You are correct about it only being available on the Cross-Fire Injection engine in 1982. I own a 1982 Firebird T/A and it has the bulge hood with the wire grill and block off plate. The bulge hood was available with 15'' wheels and bigger sway bars if the car was ordered with the WS6/WS7 option. Standard Trans Ams had 14'' wheels, smaller sway bars and a flat hood. 1983 and 1984 Trans Am's were offered with the functional bulge hood as a standard equipment. And yes the dual resonators sounds really wonderful. They were still available on the standard engines in 1984 and the more known single muffler was first used on the late 1983 H.O. engines which had larger manifolds, intermittent pipe and tail pipes among other goodies such as an electric fan, a tuned Rochester Carburetor, better camshaft etc. The dual resonators were dropped by late 1984 and the single muffler became standard in 1985 until 2002.
Awesome work, I love seeing a car reaching it's potential. To somewhat answer your question as to why they stopped using this system, GM is notorious for "bean counter engineering" where they find out it costs them $5 less per unit to have whatever option is on there (though it drastically improves performance), they will remove it and have a slightly higher profit margin, it can be infuriating at times. The second reason is probably some obscure emissions/EPA requirement (less air and fuel running through the engine=less emissions) and the only way they could get it to pass from factory was to delete the scoop altogether. You'll notice in the early 3rd generation f-bodies (82-86) that the 5.7 wasn't offered again until I think 1987 because emissions laws were outstripping the technology and they couldn't get a 5.7 to pass the emissions the EPA wanted. The EPA, more than anything else, killed the muscle car.
3rd gen TAs only had these hoods from 82-84. After that they were only on Formulas. It wouldn't work on TPI. My 82 TA had it with Crossfire Fuel Injection.
i want to buy a 1975 Firebird Trans Am so my dad can relive his younger days.. He crashed it in a rainy day going 160mph, hit a pole head on..lol Said the car still ran but he just didn't fix it.. I've always loved these Pontiacs n would like to build a big block for it..
I had an 84 Trans Am HO. My Hood Scoop was 100% functional and when you would punch the gas you could hear the Cold Air being sucked in.. It was Awesome!
I have an 89 TPI but I still took the blocking plate off the hood scoop. It's not a working air induction but what it does do for my Formula is it lets a tremendous amount of heat escape from the engine bay with the hood closed.
Cooler air is more dense. More dense air has more oxygen then the the same amount air that is less dense. More oxygen you put in an engine the more fuel you can add. Bigger bang!
nice cept he was pulling cold air already from the nose above and to the left of the radiator.. this mod gave him NOTHING except a woosh sound at WOT... ZERO PERFORMANCE gains. the little TBI wasn't starving for more air.. so it didn't help in that way.. it's all in his head..
The main reason for fake hood scoops on American cars is NASCAR. In NASCAR, cars move fast enough that hood scoops are actually functional. At public roadway speeds -- even on freeways within hailing distance of the speed limit -- hood scoops don't improve performance at all. Yes, cold-air intakes are effective, but ram-air intakes are not effective at freeway speeds. The performance increase you felt was the result of increasing the effective cross-section of the intake plenum, not the result of pulling air _specifically_ from the hood scoop. A wider intake plenum under the hood would've accomplished the same thing. So American carmakers install cold-air intakes that reach forward to the bumper instead, and add fake hood scoops to satisfy American car buyers' desire to have cars that look fast, without adding one more place for water to leak in.
This reminds me of my highschool friends 92 Firebird Formula that had a bunch of SLP parts on it. It was a TPI but we swore it really was a 350 but it was originally a 305 TPI engine. It had that same hood scoop. It wasn't an intake scoop, but it was open so we figured it helped with engine cooling
On the car that originally had the functional scoop, there was a switch connected to the throttle linkage that opened only at full throttle. Fuel injection can compensate for a variation in the fuel to air ratio, well to a certain point without tuning. The 82-84 cars that were equipped with this setup were all carburetor equipped (to the best of my knowledge). Carburetors are tuned generally for wide open throttle maximum performance. Extra air at part throttle positions would affect the performance and drivability in normal situations. Your car shouldn't be affected by this. The only thing else is to close the flap so that nothing like water, bugs, leaves, etc get in there. Also, realistically, it adds about 5 to 10 percent more power. It may feel like more but it isn't. A quick trip to your local dyno will show you the before and after. Good choice in cars so far!!
My 82TA had this and was Cross Fire Injection. You could really hear it suck air with the T-tops out. I also put a Hypertech power chip in it and tried different exhaust setups and rear gears. It would outrun stock Foxbodies. It was a rare car, every option. PDS, Rear wiper, rear defroster, etc. I owned it until 2000.
Nice job! This is how this car should be! I used to drive 1981 Z28s back in 1981 that had a functional cowl induction hood scoop. The flaps were located right at the entrance of the scoop and would kick open when the secondaries of the 4 barrel carb opened. It looked and sounded really cool!
One of my gripes I had with my old 88 GTA Trans Am was the hood vents were nonfunctional. They look like they should be ram air vents but they don't go anywhere. I'm glad they addressed this in the 4th gen ws6 and firehawk cars.
I grew up with an early 84 model. Scoop worked but it was early in the year for the particular model. Toughest car I've ever owned in my 56 years now. My dream car son, you have fun.
Well done mate. I've thought of this mod for my 89 TBI Formula but the parts... as you found out aren't cheap. I already installed a larger 14" open air element so it wouldn't work anyway.
MAN, I love what you are doing to those Pontiacs !!!! .... my high school clique was all about British sports cars, but the Trans am and the Firebird were close 3rd's. Neither was #1 however... the most excited I ever got over a new car, was in 1978--in my auto shop class-- when one of my classmates drove into the shop in his mom's brand new Ford Mustang 2... it was blue and white, just like Jill drove in Charlie's Angels.... still #1 on my bucket list, and still my biggest shame :-) ha ha ha
I have a '74 Corvette that has basically the same system. the flap solenoid is operated by a switch on the throttle pedal...pretty much only opens up under WOT. when closed, its quieter, and, prob more important to Chev when they designed it is that closed it pulls in the hot air over the exhaust manifold for quick warmup. but when open, i get to hear all that quadrajet goodness
If you really wanted to go crazy, the 1984 HO Z-28 had a dual-snorkel air cleaner. You could source one of those and then you'd have 3 access points for the intake. I was going to do this back in the day, but the deal fell through on the 84 Trans Am I was about to buy, and I ended up with an 85 TPI model instead. Love that yours is a 5-speed.
Greetings, ZA, loved the ADV series. Enjoy your Firebird. You are doing it right! Induction mod was sweet, mad style points for keeping it OEM! Stay awesome!
I had an 87 TPI and mine had the mesh chicken wire open and no hood liner. I always thought it was to vent heat from the engine bay. Cool to know it was functional for the TBI. I’d look into getting a K&N air filter for that bad boy
My first car was a 1983 Trans Am with that scoop. The issue with the hood scoop solenoid was that it would bind and not open sometimes. I just wired it open like you did. In heavy rain, you'd get some water in the intake but if you look at the underside of the scoop, there's a hole where water can exit without damaging anything so it's of little consequence since the bulk of it drains out.
You would need a throttle position sensor hooked up the flapper for when it opens etc. this set up is for 82-92 F Bodys, they even had the Camaro good like that. It could work on a TPI, you would have to modify a pipe to the TPI, this all most like a Air box or Ram Air. I think the best air scoop was the 70 Chevelle SS with the flapper door, really cool set up.
That was freaking awesome! I had a white 1992 Formula with same engine but was automatic. That thing was actually a nice car but was slow as a boat. I got devoured by every Mustang in town. It is good to know that there STILL are solid options out there for these specific F bodies. My first car was a red 1976 Camaro with a 305. The interior was REALLY nice. It was actually pretty quick. It had these THICK spacer plates between the carb and intake. It was MUCH faster than my 92 ever was somehow...
I had an '84 HO Black and Gold T/A exactly like the one in that commercial. It was an L69, the 190 hp 5.0. I remember the vent working well. Pedal down, it would flap open and go to town. I wish I'd never gotten rid of that thing. I looked up the VIN recently (I do every now and then), and actually found the damn thing. I'd just missed it being on sale not far from here a couple months ago. 50K more miles than when I sold it and not QUITE in as good shape, but in shockingly good shape. I'm so pissed I didn't look that VIN up a couple months ago - I would have bought it back in a heartbeat.
I wanted to do this to my car but could never find the parts aside from the hood so I just sold it and went a custom route. I removed the front fog lights on the bottom corners of the front end on my 1989 TA and got a double snorkel throttle body cover and routed one to each fog light opening. Gave her a little more power. Not sure if it was just the placebo effect or not.
The issue with closure is carburetor ice. On a very cold day, the cold air drops to a lower temperature as it goes through the venturies. Thus causing ice in the carb.
Find a chassis dyno in the area. First run; disconnect the linkage and run closed. Second run; hold it open with some wire or something else. You could even wait for a cool day so there would be a larger temperature differential. Also, you could make it a three way comparison. Do an extra run with the snorkel hose disconnected and the hood air closed so under hood temps would be introduced into the intake. I think the snorkel hose pulls air from near the front of the car which could introduce cooler air, or maybe introduce warmer air near the blacktop. I see many older cars with the snorkel hose deteriorated or missing.
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Winston - Just a personal suggestion, generally Fram is not the best air filter out there, and if you plan to own something for a lifetime, a drop-in K&N filter and oiling kit is the way to go. I live next to a corn field, so it gets dusty as hell twice a year, and it's nice to just be able to wash out and reinstall the filter for free whenever it's dirty. Sure, it's a heavy up front cost, but worth it in my opinion.
THANK YOU!Thank you so much for posting this. I used to own a ‘83 Firebird and a ‘85 Trans Am with carburetor 5.0 V8s which did not have this option (i.e. that added more HP) and I’ve been wondering for over 35 years exactly HOW those damn scoops worked! Thank you again....put a big smile on my face today!! 😉😁😄
I'd probably mechanically fix it open. Don't know if the old solenoid can handle a long duty cycle on.
tastiger91 That is a REALLY good point.
Would have watched it sooner but RUclips? I'd make a controller for that thing from an Arduino. Add another skillset. I promise it is super easy and cheap. I'd make a control knob that changes the rpm it opens at by 100 rpm increments. Off the line, low rpms, a longer intake will make more tq. Up top you just want the engine to have access to as much air as possible. This is why pickup trucks have big long wrap around intakes and cars that use the same engine have short, low intakes. Mustang vs. F150 which they called the triton same engine except for the intake. Also the secret sauce in the MR2 with the T-VIS, similar principal.
Most if not all the programming code could be figured out in an hour or two, having never done it before. I'd try to do a little research on that servo, see if they burnout with a lot of use. If that became a problem I'd convert it to a vacuum actuator with off the shelf stuff.
This is the first time I've seen someone turn them into real vents NICE
So a kid from south Africa via China immigrates to America and shows a deep love and appreciation for American muscle cars. That's what I call effing awesome.
I'm older but if we were neighbors I'd be over there helping you whenever you were working on your cars I graduated high school in 1984 so those era cars are exactly what I worked on back then and even to this day it's my favorite era of vehicles to tinker with I've been wrenching since I was idk a freshman in high school I guess and it's one of my back up trades when I am presented with the opportunity to make a few bucks my main trade is in construction although so it's like I said just something I enjoy and often make a few dollars along the way so a weekend here and there working on something like the 78 or the 90 would certainly not hurt my feelings one bit.. lol keep up the videos I'm enjoying them once in a while I cringe at the way you do things and it's a miracle you didn't get hurt with that front coil spring be careful
From discussing China to getting worked over car parts.
Man I like this man.
That was the FIRST mod that I performed on my 1989 Firebird Formula-350 back in the fall of 1988. TPI cars run hot and it helped out a lot in reducing under hood temperature. Thanks for the video !!! 👍
Any issue with water coming in?
I still have the car which has been garaged since new. I only install the tin plate before washing the car which is only driven when it’s nice out. I guess there would be a water issue if the car was driven during inclement weather.
This doesn't have effect on the temperature outside of the intake. It's a closed system and drawing air from outside of the hood...
@@MarkoNurmenniemi it would probably have some effect, since a bunch of the air doesn't have to travel through a long tube under the hood where the heat is trapped, but i'm not going to speculate on whether it makes a significant difference.
@@MarkoNurmenniemi TPI ingine don't have this kind of intake. Only TBI. So its open.
As much as I like old GM cars, this just demonstrates why they catch as much crap as they do for the bean counters running the show. This was such an easy fix for a noticeable power increase -- with parts that probably cost about $2 to manufacture. Great job! I hope you're able to get the manual switch installed 🙂
The hood bulge was functional in the early 80s, but after 84 it was discontinued. After 87 it was brought back nonfunctioning as a retro peice to the formula model.
See the 3rd gen trans am was meant to house a 4.9L turbo pontiac engine which used the hood bulge. It would of out performed the corvette so GM basically took Pontiacs engines leaving the Iron Duke.
It wasn’t being counted it was the greenies
Hey Winston, did you know that Corvettes, C4, C5, and C6 in particular, benefit tremendously from putting vents in the hood (most effective in certain spots).
Not for the intake, or cooling the drivetrain (this is a side effect though), but because they suffer from a terrible buildup of pressure in the engine bay at speed. Nearly all vehicles have this issue to an extent, but in Corvettes it is compounded by the manner in which they draw in air to the intake, and are engineered to draw air upwards under the front air dam into the radiator (be sure to check that area, it tends to build up debris). The area underneath the hood is tight, and has little to no space for the overpressure to egress.
This causes lift at speed (I can tell you from experience that >170 is wild without certain aero mods; best way to describe this is airplane turbulence. As in darting back and forth 2 or 3 feet at a time virtually instantaneously, as if the tires aren’t even touching the ground. Very temperamental situation).
If this pressure buildup is mitigated, the effects are surprisingly noticeable, even at interstate speeds. The mid-high speed handling improves as well.
A few years ago I was able to hit 212 mph in my highly modded C5.
Btw, have been watching you for years. Since the “China, how it is” days. Happy to see you out of that sinking ship, and here in America. Sorry that you ended up in California (just kidding, guess that’s a personal choice)
Well Zora Antov DID want to put Hood Vents, Functional Ones on the C2 but GM told him no, so I wouldnt be surprised if this also applied to ALL of the corvettes really.
What hood did you go with on your c5?
"This Hood Mod gives 20% more POWER!" Scoty Kilmer has entered the chat
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Hey, don't knock Scotty.
Prolly more like 2%...
Probably not 20%, but a worthwhile modification nonetheless. Nicely done!
Or anyone that's ever, I dunno, DRIVEN A CAR?
Winston, you are clearly a lover of all that is genuine and sincere. Good job on the induction fix and the joke about the rolled socks, made my day. Take care and good luck with your stylish beast of a car.
No no no...
*Up to* 20% more Power.
Those two key words are the magic sauce that keeps the aftermarket out of legal trouble.
That was truly awesome! It may sound odd but your formula to happiness can be practically applied to our lives in general. I appreciate seeing your efforts from near homelessness in China, to owning a couple of proud birds, motorcycle, wonderful wife and family...hard work pays off. More Power!
Thanks mate!
That is so frickin' cool. Love to see all you're doing with this car. You honour it, and american cars. It's a beautiful thing to see.
and you are even more beautiful to see ;) .....( so did the sweet talking do anything a year later? ) lol
I had an 89 formula 305tpi five speed that I did the honeycomb insert mod to. I found an 84 T/A that had been traded in at a local pontiac dealer and asked them if I could use the part. They told me yes as it was gonna be whole saled to someplace anyhow. It was painted yellow if I remember. So off to the auto parts store I went for some flat black spray paint. Needless to say, the underwood temp was better now that the air had somewhere to go. That blocking plate just kept the heat underhood.
Don't have the car anymore but loved it while I had it. Miss it today looking at this video. Enjoy your car sir
On the turbo cars with this hood they put the boost gauge in the scope. It's a series of lights going left to right going green, yellow, red.
They only did that on the second generation turbo Trans Am. The third gen had the wire mesh insert just like shown in this video. The 1989 V6 turbo Trans Am had the usual flat Trans Am hood of the mid 80s onwards.
Definitely a worthwhile modification!
I came across this channel randomly while looking at 3rd Gen stuff (my favorite car), boy was I surprised when I realized this is made by ADVChina guys that I was watching years ago. What a crazy coincidence. I really love this small but very clever mod to make this epic hood induction system functional again.
My Ex's scoop on her Celica was for additional engine cooling and downdraft to prevent front end lift at high speed. Only thing is she had the auto trans so she would never really be able to go fast enough to experience front end lift. But it looked cool.
Also, stickers add 5% hp or so I hear. Gratz on the channel....content is great. Cheers.
I heard you can increase the power by 43% just by putting flame decals around the exhaust.
The sticker thing is actually true. Good info there.
@@NeverMetTheGuy cause it is!
Gas Pedal's been known to go right to the floor and stay there with me behind the wheel
You guys are beyond belief. It is really something to see someone give these cars this kind of love.
waste of time LOL
Very, very well done. I haven't seen anyone do this yet and I'm impressed with the results but not terribly surprised. I had two mid 1970's Trans Am's back in the late 1980's and made the shaker hood scoops functional. They sounded great and from the amount of snow they ingested at around 40 mph, they clearly worked too.
YOU ARE SO THE MAN! This was the exact mod I was looking to do to my Formula so thanks for coming through! Looks like I’ll be hunting the junkyards for a similar set up. Also the 🦅 sound effect was perfect! 🤣
A mod we used to do on that actuator for the flap is to run it to the ignition switch circuit so when you start the car the flap opens up the entire time the engine runs. I have always thought the scoop on those should have been functional the whole time the engine was running and available on all Firebirds.
Hat’s off, Win! Take good care of that dashboard- all my friends who had Trans Ams back in the day would see cracks regularly forming - especially at the corners of the speakers toward the edges. Cheers, bru!
I remember doing the same mod to my 1978 Z28 back in the early nineties, ...mine was way more of a hack job, though. I just opened the slit and installed an open element air cleaner. We adjusted the 4bbl so the secondaries opened really fast, it gave it deep, mean intake roar. Nice work and nice F-body!!
Yeah I did something like that on my 78 trans am, also here on the channel
My first car was an 84 Trans Am 5.0 HO in 1995, with the cowl induction hood. Depending on year, the HO package was good for about 40ish HP over the base v8. All these cars were anemic with their HP, but made up for it in torque. I'd love to have that car again now that I'm not a broke teen. Great video.
Nice job - and great that (for once) it proved to be surprisingly straightforward. With the added bonus of increased power and improved sound and aesthetics 👍
Love that compression (downshift) stop there at the end, smooth. 9:12... the man can drive. I'm starting to like this car.
8:36 that firebird really singing now!!!😁
Thanks for sharing the mod with us.
I had a 89 formula with the same motor. I put a hypertech computer chip in it and it helped a lot. Love watching you work on your car,it brings back a lot of memories. I may just have to get another one some day!
Not sure if you know this but unplug the battery for about 10-20 minutes so it'll re learn air fuel ratio. You'll notice even more gains
I don't get it, why would the battery be remembering anything other than supplying a fixed amount of charge to the vehicle?
@@Longlostpuss He kinda worded the sentence awkward. The computer will re-learn air fuel ratio not the battery. Unless you were just making a joke about the battery.👍😉
thank you for telling us this. It's helpful
Transformed the way this car sounds. I personally was in awe, awesome mod!
Love the period esque wailing guitar solo .
More POWER to you !
I dont have the pleasure of owning a "ram air" vehicle but if i ever do this is the first thing im going to do. Fake scoops really bother me😞. Great vid man! Happy motoring👍💯❤👑
That’s a stunning Firebird. I didn’t realize the cowl-induction ceased to be functional after ‘84. I also thought all Formulas had TPI. Great vid!
Did the exact same mod on my
87 305 Formula firebird years ago got the parts from from
junkyard for $30 .00. Totally agree with you about air scoops being functional. The
long plastic piece attaches below the screen to divert water away from the distributor, and the hole on the bottom side of the housing
is a drain hole for water.
congrats on the conversion. very nice, indeed. a friend of mine purchased a 1981 z-28 sith air induction and she absolutely loved it!
The offset hood bulge was originally engineered to accommodate the 301 Pontiac Turbo V8 motor before the GM brass mandated that all of the F bodies use the 305 Chevrolet motor from 1982.
That would have been a sweet motor in one of these!
Those hoods were originally for clearance for a turbo,these cars were designed for turbo but GM axed the pontiac motors at the last minute so they had to use a small block chevy instead.
I’m not a car person but all of this makes sense to me from a pilot’s perspective. Keep up the good work. 👍
I bought one from the junkyard when I had my 82 Trans Am, took the door out and made my own air cleaner mod. The drain goes right on top of the distributor, so use a hose from the drain hole to the area between the brake reservoir. Remember that you’ll have to clean the carb more often. Also can use black window screen in there to keep out bigger objects
I had an 80' Mustang Turbo that had a "power bulge" hood and an 82' GT that had a hood scoop. Both were non functioning but I easily modified an made functional. This was well before fuel injection so the mods worked fine.
this is cool as hell!
i wouldn't go as far as saying "20%" but i'd agree that its gotta be a noticeable improvement.. at least as much as any cold air intake would provide to a modern car.
keep the cool vids coming sir.
This is a certified hood classic
Certified bonnet classic
Job well done! Your fine example of Pontiac Formula brings back many memories. Thanks for the vid, C5 guy
Stay tuned next week when Winston installs a NOX kit!!! Really interesting how everything matched up but drastic changes by car manufacturers are expensive so they basically keep the same car but introduce subtle changes to entice new or old owners to buy newer versions. So in your case Winston this proved to be a win win situation for you.
That was one of many mods that I made on my 79 TA. The next improvement that you can do is ditch the Fram air filter and replace it with a K&N, you will notice the difference.
Was the difference actually LESS filtration & more air flow to carburetor? FRAM survives on smart marketing strategy & they have done a great job of that for a long time.
The bald eagle sounds were hilarious.
I had this on my 1983, which was the first year the base motor got air induction, 82 only had it on the crossfire motor. The solenoid was activated by pressing the throttle to the floor and it felt like a downshift in terms of additional power, my car was a five speed. And with the roar of the secondaries, it was a lovely sound. The other thing they had in 82 and 83 was the dual resonator exhaust which made wonderfulsounds and the pipe actually split after the catalytic converter, it was as close to a true dual back in those day’s. From 1997 to 2003, the WS6’s had functional RamAir hoods, which could easily have been made to create a true ram air supercharging effect. Are you bypassing the air filter? The original unit did not bypass the air filter as there was a secondary dome under the top fileter cover
No it's not bypassing, if you look at the beginning you'll see the lid has a dome
Worthless Whips I wonder, if air is vented only when the solenoid is open, it wouldn’t be that harmful to vent directly to the throttle body. That would yeild even more air. A brief direct venting of air directly wouldn’t be that harmful. Again, only when the solenoid opens
@@richarddobreny6664 You are correct about it only being available on the Cross-Fire Injection engine in 1982. I own a 1982 Firebird T/A and it has the bulge hood with the wire grill and block off plate. The bulge hood was available with 15'' wheels and bigger sway bars if the car was ordered with the WS6/WS7 option. Standard Trans Ams had 14'' wheels, smaller sway bars and a flat hood. 1983 and 1984 Trans Am's were offered with the functional bulge hood as a standard equipment. And yes the dual resonators sounds really wonderful. They were still available on the standard engines in 1984 and the more known single muffler was first used on the late 1983 H.O. engines which had larger manifolds, intermittent pipe and tail pipes among other goodies such as an electric fan, a tuned Rochester Carburetor, better camshaft etc. The dual resonators were dropped by late 1984 and the single muffler became standard in 1985 until 2002.
Thanks for making this video. I found it very informative and food for thought as i am currently in the market for a firebird.
It's like something out of The Fast+The Furious! 👌😁
Awesome work, I love seeing a car reaching it's potential. To somewhat answer your question as to why they stopped using this system, GM is notorious for "bean counter engineering" where they find out it costs them $5 less per unit to have whatever option is on there (though it drastically improves performance), they will remove it and have a slightly higher profit margin, it can be infuriating at times. The second reason is probably some obscure emissions/EPA requirement (less air and fuel running through the engine=less emissions) and the only way they could get it to pass from factory was to delete the scoop altogether. You'll notice in the early 3rd generation f-bodies (82-86) that the 5.7 wasn't offered again until I think 1987 because emissions laws were outstripping the technology and they couldn't get a 5.7 to pass the emissions the EPA wanted. The EPA, more than anything else, killed the muscle car.
3rd gen TAs only had these hoods from 82-84. After that they were only on Formulas. It wouldn't work on TPI. My 82 TA had it with Crossfire Fuel Injection.
These videos really make me want to buy a car of that era
i want to buy a 1975 Firebird Trans Am so my dad can relive his younger days.. He crashed it in a rainy day going 160mph, hit a pole head on..lol Said the car still ran but he just didn't fix it.. I've always loved these Pontiacs n would like to build a big block for it..
Love the Scotty Kilmer style thumbnail images :D
I had an 84 Trans Am HO. My Hood Scoop was 100% functional and when you would punch the gas you could hear the Cold Air being sucked in.. It was Awesome!
06 GTO was the same way. Knocked out the inserts and installed an OTR intake. Now has functional ram air. :)
I have an 89 TPI but I still took the blocking plate off the hood scoop. It's not a working air induction but what it does do for my Formula is it lets a tremendous amount of heat escape from the engine bay with the hood closed.
Hey Lorq, have you came across any issues after doing this? Maybe issues with water getting inside from rain or anything?
@@burna7202 No issues, no water getting inside.
Good job! Glad everything went together so well and worked. I like honeycomb screen for the intake. That is so Pontiac.
Cooler air is more dense. More dense air has more oxygen then the the same amount air that is less dense. More oxygen you put in an engine the more fuel you can add. Bigger bang!
nice cept he was pulling cold air already from the nose above and to the left of the radiator.. this mod gave him NOTHING except a woosh sound at WOT... ZERO PERFORMANCE gains. the little TBI wasn't starving for more air.. so it didn't help in that way.. it's all in his head..
The main reason for fake hood scoops on American cars is NASCAR. In NASCAR, cars move fast enough that hood scoops are actually functional. At public roadway speeds -- even on freeways within hailing distance of the speed limit -- hood scoops don't improve performance at all. Yes, cold-air intakes are effective, but ram-air intakes are not effective at freeway speeds. The performance increase you felt was the result of increasing the effective cross-section of the intake plenum, not the result of pulling air _specifically_ from the hood scoop. A wider intake plenum under the hood would've accomplished the same thing. So American carmakers install cold-air intakes that reach forward to the bumper instead, and add fake hood scoops to satisfy American car buyers' desire to have cars that look fast, without adding one more place for water to leak in.
This reminds me of my highschool friends 92 Firebird Formula that had a bunch of SLP parts on it. It was a TPI but we swore it really was a 350 but it was originally a 305 TPI engine. It had that same hood scoop. It wasn't an intake scoop, but it was open so we figured it helped with engine cooling
Well done Winston that is nice. . I totally agree about utilising the scoop
Now that’s how it’s done folks, proper and true to its legacy as it was intended. Absolutely brilliant!
Kinda like a updated RamAir air flow system !! Like the late 60s early 70 Pontiac GTOs !! Love it !!
On the car that originally had the functional scoop, there was a switch connected to the throttle linkage that opened only at full throttle. Fuel injection can compensate for a variation in the fuel to air ratio, well to a certain point without tuning. The 82-84 cars that were equipped with this setup were all carburetor equipped (to the best of my knowledge). Carburetors are tuned generally for wide open throttle maximum performance. Extra air at part throttle positions would affect the performance and drivability in normal situations. Your car shouldn't be affected by this. The only thing else is to close the flap so that nothing like water, bugs, leaves, etc get in there. Also, realistically, it adds about 5 to 10 percent more power. It may feel like more but it isn't. A quick trip to your local dyno will show you the before and after. Good choice in cars so far!!
Thanks, this is exactly what I was wondering about the original setup. Very cool, I had no idea the early 3rd gen cars had this option!
My 82TA had this and was Cross Fire Injection. You could really hear it suck air with the T-tops out. I also put a Hypertech power chip in it and tried different exhaust setups and rear gears. It would outrun stock Foxbodies. It was a rare car, every option. PDS, Rear wiper, rear defroster, etc. I owned it until 2000.
@@clintdavis9511 hypertech chip,good for 3-5 horsepower......on the best days.if you had 3.73s you might have had a chance with an automatic 5.0
Nice job! This is how this car should be! I used to drive 1981 Z28s back in 1981 that had a functional cowl induction hood scoop. The flaps were located right at the entrance of the scoop and would kick open when the secondaries of the 4 barrel carb opened. It looked and sounded really cool!
One of my gripes I had with my old 88 GTA Trans Am was the hood vents were nonfunctional. They look like they should be ram air vents but they don't go anywhere. I'm glad they addressed this in the 4th gen ws6 and firehawk cars.
I grew up with an early 84 model. Scoop worked but it was early in the year for the particular model. Toughest car I've ever owned in my 56 years now.
My dream car son, you have fun.
Well done mate. I've thought of this mod for my 89 TBI Formula but the parts... as you found out aren't cheap. I already installed a larger 14" open air element so it wouldn't work anyway.
MAN, I love what you are doing to those Pontiacs !!!! .... my high school clique was all about British sports cars, but the Trans am and the Firebird were close 3rd's. Neither was #1 however... the most excited I ever got over a new car, was in 1978--in my auto shop class-- when one of my classmates drove into the shop in his mom's brand new Ford Mustang 2... it was blue and white, just like Jill drove in Charlie's Angels.... still #1 on my bucket list, and still my biggest shame :-) ha ha ha
Haha... Yeah mustang 2...
I have a '74 Corvette that has basically the same system. the flap solenoid is operated by a switch on the throttle pedal...pretty much only opens up under WOT. when closed, its quieter, and, prob more important to Chev when they designed it is that closed it pulls in the hot air over the exhaust manifold for quick warmup. but when open, i get to hear all that quadrajet goodness
If you really wanted to go crazy, the 1984 HO Z-28 had a dual-snorkel air cleaner. You could source one of those and then you'd have 3 access points for the intake. I was going to do this back in the day, but the deal fell through on the 84 Trans Am I was about to buy, and I ended up with an 85 TPI model instead. Love that yours is a 5-speed.
I love this channel. I've watched your other channels too and found them very interesting but as a car guy I'm really happy you made this one.
Greetings, ZA, loved the ADV series. Enjoy your Firebird. You are doing it right! Induction mod was sweet, mad style points for keeping it OEM! Stay awesome!
Loving the garage playlist too!
Good job bro! True hot rod trick. My dream car in 87 (the year I got my license) was a silver 87 Formula 350.
Hell yeah, always excited when these release!
EDIT: how much did this mod cost? maybe i missed the part in the video...
Think he said like $400 for the used one he robbed parts off of
It cost about 400 dollars in parts and 0 dollars in installation
@@serpentza These videos should be longer. Awesome work! Although I will like to see you driving electric sometimes.
@@tomatojews8500 he should have put the $400 toward an LS swap.. this mod didn't make a single HP more than before.. it's impossible..
I had an 87 TPI and mine had the mesh chicken wire open and no hood liner. I always thought it was to vent heat from the engine bay. Cool to know it was functional for the TBI. I’d look into getting a K&N air filter for that bad boy
My first car was a 1983 Trans Am with that scoop. The issue with the hood scoop solenoid was that it would bind and not open sometimes. I just wired it open like you did. In heavy rain, you'd get some water in the intake but if you look at the underside of the scoop, there's a hole where water can exit without damaging anything so it's of little consequence since the bulk of it drains out.
I had a 1984 T/A that had a flap that opened when you hit the gas. Pretty neat to watch.
I really like how this channel is shaping up, this episode was really well produced. Keep up the good work!
Thanks mate! Will do!
that is a really cool mod on Thirdgen with the formula hood. Sounds like the butt dyno recorded a nice gain for the $$ invested
Hey so proud of you to go the extra to get the most out of your Pontiac. I agree with all you said. Good job 👍
You should get a hurst shifter. Had one factory installed in my ‘87 IROC. GOOD STUFF. Love the firebird man, great video!
That is coooo cool! I actually had the same idea in 1993 but couldn't/didn't do it. You did! That is awesome!
You would need a throttle position sensor hooked up the flapper for when it opens etc. this set up is for 82-92 F Bodys, they even had the Camaro good like that. It could work on a TPI, you would have to modify a pipe to the TPI, this all most like a Air box or Ram Air. I think the best air scoop was the 70 Chevelle SS with the flapper door, really cool set up.
That was freaking awesome! I had a white 1992 Formula with same engine but was automatic. That thing was actually a nice car but was slow as a boat. I got devoured by every Mustang in town. It is good to know that there STILL are solid options out there for these specific F bodies.
My first car was a red 1976 Camaro with a 305. The interior was REALLY nice. It was actually pretty quick. It had these THICK spacer plates between the carb and intake. It was MUCH faster than my 92 ever was somehow...
it seemed like it was quicker,it wasnt....
Great to watch this as Trans Am GTA owner, really good idea, plus good tune in background.
This is awesome! I have an '89 with the same engine, and will definitely look into this!!!
I had an '84 HO Black and Gold T/A exactly like the one in that commercial. It was an L69, the 190 hp 5.0. I remember the vent working well. Pedal down, it would flap open and go to town. I wish I'd never gotten rid of that thing. I looked up the VIN recently (I do every now and then), and actually found the damn thing. I'd just missed it being on sale not far from here a couple months ago. 50K more miles than when I sold it and not QUITE in as good shape, but in shockingly good shape. I'm so pissed I didn't look that VIN up a couple months ago - I would have bought it back in a heartbeat.
Love the car, but honestly love the Kawi even more. I have 1975 Kawasaki Z1b waiting to be restored in my shop.
Simple but brilliant! Gotta love it when you have a epiphany !! LOL COOL.
You need to plug this on your other channels more!
@@jeroenvermiljoen serpentza, ADVChina and laowhy86
@@jeroenvermiljoen those channels are pretty awesome too. Highly recommended.
@@jeroenvermiljoen I think you may be the only person why was here before ADV/Serpent ZA and Laowhy. Also, there's a 5th channel ADV podcast.
That's pretty sweet. Need more footage of you getting on it.
I wanted to do this to my car but could never find the parts aside from the hood so I just sold it and went a custom route. I removed the front fog lights on the bottom corners of the front end on my 1989 TA and got a double snorkel throttle body cover and routed one to each fog light opening. Gave her a little more power. Not sure if it was just the placebo effect or not.
Sounds good! Yeah I lucked out finding the parts
"Slash 'bonnet'" 😁
The issue with closure is carburetor ice. On a very cold day, the cold air drops to a lower temperature as it goes through the venturies. Thus causing ice in the carb.
a)it isnt a carb b) you dont drive classic cars in 0 degree weather 🤣
You have inspired me to build one for my own Firebird. I’ll make it out of aluminum. Coming to my Chanel soon enough
I had an 84 5.0 HO In the 90s. No scoop but I did rig up a cold air intake that worked nicely.
Find a chassis dyno in the area. First run; disconnect the linkage and run closed. Second run; hold it open with some wire or something else. You could even wait for a cool day so there would be a larger temperature differential. Also, you could make it a three way comparison. Do an extra run with the snorkel hose disconnected and the hood air closed so under hood temps would be introduced into the intake. I think the snorkel hose pulls air from near the front of the car which could introduce cooler air, or maybe introduce warmer air near the blacktop. I see many older cars with the snorkel hose deteriorated or missing.
This has to be my favorite of all the videos on this channel !