Thread: Plastic "cyclone" in Air filter housing TD5

Hi Philip. I just bought one of those cheaper snorkels as well. It looks to be just as good as my safari one on my D1.I haven't fitted it yet though. Did you have any hassles fitting it up? And could you post up some pics of it please? The Td5 standard filter set up gets dirty very easily I've noticed.
Thanks
Chris

Phillip
I have had dusting problems in the past. But ever since I cleaned out the rubber "ducks bill" on the bottom of the housing. It just pulls off for cleaning. This gets chock full of dirt and crud. Keeping this clean seems to aid keeping the dust out. As well I smear some vasoline around the mating edges of the box. Seems ok now.
Regards
Robbo

Originally Posted by PhilipA

I fitted a Ebay cheapo snorkel yesterday to my D2 TD5.
All went pretty well as expected including the usual drilling and filing.

The only problem I found is that the Chinese copy did not have the slots in the head "vent" extended far enough into the drain bulges to drain water, so I extended them upwards.

I did a google search of old posts and found some useful tips like sealing the little hose into the air cleaner , but nobody seemed to mention the plastic "Cyclone" in the inlet horn.
Has anyone ground it out and did it make a noticable difference to airflow, noise, or anything else?
Regards Philip A

Many have done it - a search of the forum throws up a few references and how to's but i wouldn't hack the airbox because the cyclone thingy is there for a good reason and that is to spin out heavy contaminants in the air stream (insects and water droplets etc). Think of it as stage 1 of a 2 stage filtering process to deliver clean air to your engine....

I have a MANTEC snorkle - very happy with it.

onebob

Hi Philip. I just bought one of those cheaper snorkels as well. It looks to
be just as good as my safari one on my D1.I haven't fitted it yet though. Did
you have any hassles fitting it up? And could you post up some pics of it
please? The Td5 standard filter set up gets dirty very easily I've
noticed.
Thanks

No more hassles than I would expect , and I think you would get with an expensive one. There is quite a bit of try and fit so IMHO you have to drill the big hole first and then fit the adaptor and see how the holes line up. In my case I had to grind quite a bit out of the rear of the holes. I ended up with the snorkel top about 5MM behind the A pillar but this bent into position.
The template on mine was a bit ambiguous , and I had to punch out the correct holes. I prayed the small pilot holes for the big cutout were correct and they were.
Regards Philip A

The dust extractor inside the airbox is almost necessary especially if driving on unsealed roads but when a snorkel is fitted the dust is no longer sucked in from around the front wheel. The improvement in performance once the significant restriction is removed is quite noticible.

Yes I noticed a bit of sand in mine from a Stockton Sand driver training day.
Sand is not good in an air cleaner.
Thanks Graeme, I will get to with my Dremel once I am back from my short holiday starting tomorrow.
I will not have time to show photos of my installation as we are packing at the moment.
BTW when fitting a snorkel it is probably an idea to buy a pack of inner guard plastic studs. I made up a tool and still broke a few. You can use a self tapper insted of the centre tensioner , but that may be hard to get out in future.
Regards Philip A

Originally Posted by Graeme

The dust extractor inside the airbox is almost necessary especially if driving on unsealed roads but when a snorkel is fitted the dust is no longer sucked in from around the front wheel. The improvement in performance once the significant restriction is removed is quite noticible.

Don't forget the water! consider that the air delivered to the airbox via the snorkle - dependent on the prevailing conditions - will contain some dispersed water (in rain the RH will be 100%) and with out your cyclone thingy to deal with it your probably dusty air filter will be totally exposed. I have seen them resemble a mud cake when dry and any performance gains and more will be lost until you change the filter.

onebob

I left the duckbill drain operational so water could escape, although most people sealed it to prevent water ingress when in deep water.

Prior to fitting a snorkel, mine's filter was full of dust by 5K kms but after the snorkel and removing the hyclone it was still clean at 20K kms and water was never a problem.

The V8s never had a hyclone and the last of the TD5s didn't either.