Well I finally broke down and ordered a Takeda Short Ram Intake and received it Friday. Now let me start off by saying I had a K&N SRI intakes before I got the AFE. (BTW these are for sale if anyone is interested send me a Private Message.) The reasons why I went with K&N are simple. They were cheaper than most of the other brands out there. It’s a name that I have trusted before, and have a decent reputation.

You may be wondering “Why did I buy the Takeda intakes”? The answer to this is because AFE (who is the manufacturer of Takeda) has always had better quality filters. I have used them on several of my previous vehicles and other family members as well. I have roughly 8 years of experience with them, and stand by them because of their quality. I have had the same filter in my Jeep Grand Cherokee with roughly 200,000 miles on it, and it is still in great shape. I have owned many other types of intakes/filters such as AEM, K&N, and Injen but the AFE has always been the best in my opinion. The first thing I did was kick myself for not waiting for the AFE’s. Unfortunately I had no idea they were planning on producing intakes for our vehicles.

Now on to the K&N. Let me tell you what a nightmare it is to install the heat shields for the K&N and get the brackets lined up perfect for them. It was a royal PITA that took me roughly 3 and half hours. (Not to mention I had to find a screw on the bottom of the splash shield that I had dropped). I have installed intakes on numerous vehicles before, but the K&N was just plain rough for the sheer fact I’m a perfectionist and the brackets that hold them in place use screws. I find this a pain because you may think you have everything tightened up but low and behold there are awkwardly placed nuts to tighten up.

The Takeda Install:
When I first opened the box I was happy to find a license plate frame, keychain, and a nice card that allows me to get 20% off future purchases from Takeda. It is included with every Takeda intake.



I began unpacking the contents and noticed that the only heat shielding is a shield that seems to fit behind a portion of the radiator that my K&N heat shield left open. I had always noticed that after driving for a while if I ever opened my hood right after driving; my passenger side intake was quite hotter than the driver’s side. I noticed the radiator dumps heat right on the passenger side, so that was obviously the culprit. The nice thing about the AFE intake is that the heat shield forces the air down and away from the passenger side filter.



The intake tubes are very durable and have a nice chrome look (which looks good under my hood). They are very sturdy and one thing I noticed the mass airflow sensor are mounted on the bottom (which points the sensor skyward). I thought that was an interesting design (probably for aesthetics to the intake tubes).



Having already installed the K&N and using it for 4 months I took everything out in about 20 minutes. I had a clean canvass and no factory air-box. It took me approximately 30-45 minutes to install everything from that point. (Again I’m a perfectionist, which is why it takes me a long time to do installs) This by far was one of the easiest intakes I’ve ever installed. It may have helped that I already had experience installing an intake on my car, but I think even a new owner could do it in less than an hour.
Here’s the final product:



As far as performance goes I can’t say for certain I feel it gives me more power than my K&N, but I plan on doing a dyno along with my BullyDog Tunes. (I’ll try and update this thread when I get that done). One thing that is definitely evident is the sound is better. I can’t describe it but it is definitely more pleasant than the K&N. (More of that sports car tone, and less of a muffled one the stock air box gives) One thing I hated about the K&N was that when I cruised around 75 mph it would make a drone noise. My Takeda’s already have eliminated that problem, and I get no drone noise at all.

Also as far as heat-soak is concerned I really can’t tell a difference in this 95+ weather we are having. With the K&N and the Takeda they both get really hot if I let the car idle or if I get off the interstate and open the hood. (I will take readings after I get home today after my 15 mile drive home with my infrared thermometer.)

One of the perks with this filter is that it is a dry filter as opposed to an oil filter. I hated having to handle the messy oil and also for the fact it would drip or eventually get inside my intake tube with previous filters. This alone was worth the switch. Would I buy this again? Yes I would and would highly recommend to anyone. They look and sound awesome. The jury is still out on the performance, however it’s been a while since I’ve been with a stock intake (and I’ve done the BullyDog since then as well). Feel free to ask any questions and hopefully I will be able to answer them.

 

Wonderful review Jack.

Cant wait for your performance review once you've had more time with these intakes!!

Can you post vid's? idle revving and perhaps a drive by?

 

Nice! Thanks for the write up . I can't wait to get your feedback as you drive the car longer and have it dyno'd.

 

Looks really good. A little more research and I'm in.

I would also love to see a vid.

 

I'll see if I can get a video up today.

 

very nice...

 

+1 !!!!

Your the man!!!

 

awesome review! i want to hear how it sounds

 

Looks very much like the Fujita to me.

 

Nice review, glad you're happy with the Takeda's.

I'm wondering how come you didn't go with the R2C intake....
They have some of the best dry filters in the market, along with the best heat shields for our cars.
I'd guess the R2C is by far the best choice for you cars due to those reasons. Plus their tubing is top notch quality too.

 

Welp my sister has my video camera so no video tonight of the Intake. (I'll try and get it up within a few days). As to why I didn't go with the R2C? I've always had good experiences with AFE. The R2C's look like the K&N in some respects for the fact of the heat shield. The problem I see with the R2C is the heat shield surrounding the filter. I had the K&N design similar but it still doesn't block the heat coming off the radiator from the passenger side. The build quality with the AFE's is top notch. They use solid metal tubing and a steel heat shield so nothing to tear up. As stated in my earlier post I've had one of their filters for over 8 years in my jeep with 200,000+ miles. (Just clean it re-oil and put it back in). I can't speak for the build quality of the R2C, but I can't imagine that it's made any better than the AFE. The nice thing about the AFE as well is that the connector points for the brackets are welded quite nicely.

My gripe with the K&N is that it had brackets that attached with nuts and bolts. This was a terrible design as you had to tighten it up after you already fit it in the engine bay. (There was extremely tight fits with this) For your enjoyment I've attached more pics.

 

Point taken.

I understand your gripe about the heat from the radiator and it's nice that the Takeda intake comes with a heat shield for that area but what about the rest? There's a lot of heat that comes from the rest of the engine bay so just putting a heat shield next to the radiator can't be enough.

I'd guess the R2C and K&N block heat better since they provide heat shields for 3 sides of the intake rather than one heat shield for the back of the radiator.
Either way, congrats and hope you enjoy the Takedas.

Maybe one of these companies can make a heat shield like the Takeda and sell to people with the R2C and other intakes. That would be very good in terms of heat reduction.

 

nice intakes. i have the injen sri and i dont like the fitment i might have to get myself the takeda's. just wondering why didnt you put the clips on the black rubber tubes that connect to the intake?

 

Nice.
I wonder if I can order just that heat shield.
I'd like to add it to my setup... can't hurt anyway.

 

Scott they dont sell the heat shield as a stand alone product. I know this cuz someone thought the same.. but they said no. Its a package deal.

Get on those CO measurements!! LOL