jwgroovin

Not too shabby! The sound with the Hushpower muffler is really nice and deep and a good scream at WOT. I gained both hp and trq back that flew the coup after the BOSS intake manifold was installed. I'm still held back by the low stock 3.31 gearing, but wanted to test one thing at a time.

Run 1 is C&L cold air kit and BAMA tune that came SCT tuner from AM.
Run 2 adds BOSS manifold and custom tune.
Run 3 adds the o/r h-pipe.

Ignore numbers, just the relative gains (and losses):

RobDis

I really want the Boss manifold but not if it means losing that much torque! Maybe my thinking is flawed in that regard, but even adding 1 turbo seems like it would be a better upgrade than the Boss manifold. I know the turbo is more expensive and at just under $500 the intake is a good mod, but why would you sacrifice so much torque loss for 8 HP? Or am i reading the numbers wrong? Please understand that I'm truly asking these questions because I am a noob when it comes to performance mods, not trying to second guess your decision to add the boss manifold. Its something I've been wondering about and trying to decide how I want to proceed when I start modding mine.

jwgroovin

The S197 4.6 and 5.0 changed up the game a bit. Intake manifolds provide HIGH rpm gains, and are mostly a racing mod, or for the street guys that love to rev the crap out of their engines. Very early in the s197 life cycle, there was a lot of misinformation about going NA and the value of various bolt-ons. Several of us were able to demonstrate that for racing applications you could really push the cars deep into the 11s, assuming that was your goal. The 5.0s are the same: off the factory floor, the low end torque and power is perfect for the street. Start racing the car and you need to think a bit differently.

In general, for most folks, the BOSS manifold is NOT a street performance bolt on--you need the gear (3.73s and higher) to get the most out of it. I am posting this for real world numbers. I'm sure folks will chime in with different results, challenge everything, yada yada, but I race my cars and get the most out of them. I hate seeing folks throw money away at the expense of being a mod queen.

That said, FWIW, the BOSS intake sure looks really cool under the hood. For $370 (my price), the upper RPM gains are where I want to go eventually.

It's my opinion, with my results. I'll be adding 3.73s later. Note that this thread was to show how the h-pipe brings back some of the power lost in the low end. it's all about balance and personal goals...

RobDis

I see what your saying. After commenting here I read the other thread and saw the opposing views. Now I can see that the loss isnt so great with the gains at the higher RPM's. I would like to do some performance mods but I dont plan on tracking the car at all so this will more than likely not be on my list. Thanks for explanation though, sometimes on the forums someone genuinely asking questions to gain knowledge can be mistaken for trolling. Thanks for posting your numbers as well with the dyno sheet! Its helps us that are just getting into this to see the real world effects of adding these components to our cars!

Big Poppa

What about a Boss intake and a blower plus long tube headers? That should give you the best of everything, I think. Or am I just being a mod queen, lol.

jwgroovin

Sorry, I should have specified the NA route. A blower alone on the 5.0 is a spectacular upgrade. Improve air fuel on top of that, yep, it's gonna run. Upgrade the heads, cams, it's quickly becoming unstreetable. A mean track beast once you get the power to the ground though. But that's money no object. For the NA route, it's looking like CAI and full exhaust with LTs (and custom tune) are the best power mods. TBs, intake manifolds, just aren't going to improve anything for the street...

zilla8

Great info on the Boss intake and dyno results.I think the boss intake is still a good set up with the right gears and a few other mods to take advantage of the short runners and high rpm design.

When I bought my car I said I would not go FI and that lasted for almost a year

Kona Blur

I'll be dyno'ing mine next week with boss mani, CAI, tune, and catback w/ x-pipe, but I'm running 3.73s... It'll be interesting to see how they compare

FastRedPonyCar

simply from looking at that graph, it seems like the stock intake and just a tune would be the best setup for a daily driver. It makes the most power of the 3 all the way up to 5500rpm

blackgt87

So glad someone brought this thread back up, this is exactly what I am experiencing.

I added the boss manifold with stock cats and felt a drastic loss of torque but not very much hp gain up top. My butt dyno is obviously calibrated similar to this one lol.

I had planned to add an O/R x pipe to make up for some of the torque loss as well as make the manifold work better up top. It looks like that will get me going back in the right direction.

FastRedPonyCar

My plan is to get the bbk shorties and see if the car can run properly without a tune provided that I keep the stock cats and see what the dyno reads. From what I've gathered, shorties/longtubes yield bigger gains across the power band and will facilitate more top end power should one also add a boss intake.