*Review* Rallitek Air Intake 90-99 *Review*

[David Carter]

Overall I must say my experience with Rallitek to be good.. on a scale from 1- 10 they got an 8.

The Air Intake though itself i would rate a 4..as shipped..with 30.00 bucks of silicon hose and hose clamps and plugs it's a 7.

The 181.00 with shipping was reasonable, and shipping took about a week.

In the box contained an Cone Air filter with built in adaptor plate (made of chrome'd Plastic) ,a 3" bent pipe with 3 hose outlets and one hole for a t connector, a 2 inch piece of 3/4 heater hose, and 2; 1-2foot sections of silicon yellow hosing, 1; 3" Silicon Hose, 1; 2-3" convertor Silicone Hose, 2 Hose Clamps, & 2 Business Cards.

What it could have used were some instructions. The install was pretty strait forward, but there were hoses that were unplaced.. and i don't know if i installed wrong but i needed to cap extra openings in the intake..

Instructions would have been helpful.. I'm sure on a 99 this would all have fit perfectly, but on my 91 it needed some re-working/figuring out.

I'm sure i could have just called Rallitek during most of the install but i don't think everyone can afford to call Oregon long distance repeatedly..

Also the stock subaru wire spring hose clamps will not work with the silicon hosing they give you, so be prepared to buy a bunch of adjustable hose clamps.

Again i had to make up/buy part to make my intake work. there is a pipe from the intake manifold that runs a large hose to the intake, this pipe is not able to be fitted in it's stock form to the Rallitek Intake. I had to buy a reducer nipple and run some silicone hosing to the intake pipe in the appropriate size.

One of the mounting holes from the air-filter adaptor plate to the MAF were drilled at a slant causing the intake hole to mis-align. 2 seconds with a drill and we re-drilled the hole thus eliminating the problem.

The adaptor plate hole were egsactly the same size as the stock box screws which caused the bolts not to fall thru the holes, but a requirement to thread them thru..by force..

All in all i found the intake generic at best, YES with some modifications it can be made to fit all years between 99-90..

All in all this Intake is a good buy for the money. With some instructions this can be a better buy.. heck a ONLINE install manual is better than the NONE there is now..

I will most likely buy their turbo version, and let you know how that goes.

I will post pictures soon.

David Carter
91 Subaru Legacy LS WGN FWD 2.2l
91 Subaru Legacy Sport SDN 4WD 2.2t

[David Carter]

OH also included is a mounting bracket....

Where it goes or attaches to i have NO IDEA.. it would be etreamly usefull... but.. but with no instructions...its placement iludes me..

David Carter

[David Carter]

OH and a sticker might have been nice.. Free advertisement i would think...

thats it...yeah i'm sure ..no more complaints..

David Carter

[Qman4x4]

David, I know Sean personally. He would be very appreciative if you sent this type of feedback to him via email or snail mail. I know he wants his products to be the best possible. The sticker is also a good idea. One he may not have thought of.( I have a few on my vehicles)

So call or mail him with this info and he can probably answer the questions personally.

Qman

In case you don't have it,

Rallitek
503-309-8645

[JasonGrahn]

OH also included is a mounting bracket....

Where it goes or attaches to i have NO IDEA.. it would be etreamly usefull... but.. but with no instructions...its placement iludes me..

David Carter

Have a pic of that mounting bracket? I think i know where it goes.

[David Carter]

I haven't gotten to write up any performance reviews yet so here goes:

So far its gotten rid of the low idle hesitation/hic-ups that are assoiated with DIY air intakes or adaptor/maf intakes..

Power so far isen't a sudden increase at a certain RPM, but a continuall increase thru-out the power band from idle to redline it seems stronger. I can only guess but an increase of 2-4HP can be expected, tourqe on the other hand is greatly increased also thru out the power band.. going up hills or over gravel seems to be more grabby, and urgent..than the stock boggy ride.

Noise at idle is non exsistant, at 1-2500 it's a low growl..pulling into the 3 to 5 it's a Roar with a definate Wooossshhing sound from air and small birds being sucked in, and from 6-redline it's a definate 747 that is more heard outside than in the cabin...

All i've done so far is daliy Driveing, and a gravel road out to the gun range which i do at full tilt..i can't say true track time.. but it has definately increased the cars capabilities.

With an full exahust system this setup is sure to scare M3's off the road..


David Carter
91 Subaru Legacy LS WGN FWD 2.2l
91 Subaru Legacy Sport SDN 4WD 2.2t

[David Carter]

Have a pic of that mounting bracket? I think i know where it goes.

It's about 5 to 6 inches long with a j at the bottom

It has holes drilled thru it and in the J the first hole is an oval.

I'm working on the photo part..

David Carter

[Qman4x4]

The "J" part should attach to the intake with a clamp. The holes are for mounting it to the car or engine. You can make bends in it to "customize the installation. You definitely want it set in one place. We put an intake on my daugthers car and the mounting point(not the bar) broke. Caused it to move around. We caught it before any damage was done.

Ken

[David Carter]

Well not so much the install but the finished product.

Other than installing the intake i ran breathers to the valve covers intead of recycleing them to the intake, and installed some more silicone hose to match what came with the intake.







There is a breather for each cover it's just the drivers side breather is not in any of the shots.. So far no complications/smoke or warning lights.

So i'll keep you up to date.

David Carter

[czo79]

I'm confused as to what you did to your valve cover breathers...on my turbo, I have the valve cover breathers with hoses hooked up to them, and K&N style mini-filters on the ends of the hoses, placed where there is cool air. The crankcase breather (not sure about my terminology) doesn't ever take air in, it only vents pressure out...so that I just have a big hose leading to somewhere the oil and crap can just drain out under the car without making a mess. Doesn't seem to cause any problems for me...
Is this like what you are doing?
Thanks
Micum

[David Carter]

Well, I just have a single 1 foot section of silicone pipeing leading to an oil breather for each valve cover.. I originally just wanted a breather on the spigot on the valve cover, but i would think during hard cornering oil would pour out. So i rasied it above the engine a bit so i'd have to practically flip the car to get oil to drip out.. I keep an eye on em to check for oil runoff.. but so far no build up.

I learned this trick on old DL/GL subarus. on hard cornering black smoke would come from the exhaust because oil the from breather pipeing was routed back into the intake..causeing oil build up in the manifold and causeing alot of oil to be burned off in the combustion chamber bogging the engine in harder to burn oil... doing the breathers stoped this issue.

I just brought that over to the legacy. So far i haven't had any problems.. i don't think it hurts the car, nor is it leaking anywhere.. it's just for ventilation/ release pressure from the valve covers.

David Carter