I have been seeing all the cowl intakes for the 4.0 posted and got the crazy idea to maybe make one for my 2.5L. The crazy part is it is an 85xj and the 2.5L has a carburetor.

Getting rid of the big metal air cleaner under the hood would make things look a lot cleaner and probably let the air circulate better around the intake and exhaust to help keep that area cooler. Might also gain a little tiny bit more power from the intake air being cooler too, but I doubt it would be noticed lol. Mostly I just like tinkering with things and it could be fun to try

Question is, what size hose/pipe would I need? Everyone says you need 3" for the 4.0L but with nearly half the displacement could I get by with 2"-2.5" pipe?

In my head so far is the idea of taking a PVC 90* elbow sized to fit the top opening of the carb, drill a hole in it and extend the bolt that holds the air cleaner top on so it goes through the hole and use that to hold the 90 to the carb. Then it would just need tubing or pipe to route to the cowl where I could attach a cylindrical air filter. I just don't know how much clearance I will have between the carb and hood for the fitting.

Looks nice in my head, but probably will look goofy as all get out in practice

 

Look around http://www.ramairbox.com/

 

Those look cool, but they are made mostly for V8 engines and I would need more room under the hood. Would need a custom one to fit the small diameter of the 1bbl carb that is on the 4cyl.

I would actually like to get the filter part out from under the hood to make it less cluttered.

 

I would say 2.5" piping would be good. Bigger is better for air flow.

 

See if you can find a carb hat for a 1 barrel and use exhaust tubing,pvc looks ghetto and might not like the under hood heat after a while.

 

2.5" is probably fine. Remember when you stick the filter in the cowl you create quite the maintenance annoyance and it can get filthy/clogged easily.

Is this going to be winter-driven? I don't know much abouy car setups but don't they need some minimum warmth to atomize the fuel well?

 

On this one the manifold is heated by the water that flows through the heater core, small tubing going from the water pump to the bottom of the manifold and over to the heater core, so once you get it going it warms up pretty well. I though about the possibility of carb icing, but last winter when it was -10F it started and ran right off even though the little flap that should let air come up from the exhaust manifold wasn't opening.

If I run the tubing across the firewall like the Specter(?) kits, then I can jump the tube for the inlet of the PCV up to the tubing. Using exhaust tubing would look better, but I think I will do PVC first, to see if it will work since it is cheaper and easier to work with. If it works well, then can maybe fab up something in metal. Flexible exhaust tubing would probably look great.

I guess I could go with a military look and run the tubing up through the cowl and add a filter above the cowl cover, but since it is a DD I probably won't do that. At least not yet

 

Oh well then. I was on the mobile app before and didn't notice you were in Kentucky. You should be fine lol

Hehe you wouldn't be the only one with poop pipe for an intake (myself included). I think black ABS looks close enough to factory air plumbing. Then again... some aluminized tubing with those blue silicone boots would go a long way to make your carbed AMC 4-pack look like a turned-up turbo race Jeep... hehe

Ah but it's been done! (At least one TJs, anyway. XJs cowls are a little more cramped but since your firewall is pre-4.0L you may have more room than most) http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f9/tj...airbox-473981/

 

Go on YouTube and search for bleepinjeep. He has a really great video on a PVC snorkel that uses an inline air filter that would work pretty well with your setup.

 

That or the ones with the clear dust catcher bowl like on a tractor but that would probably stick up too high.

Only paid $500 for the Jeep so might as well experiment all I can.

Now you got me thinking, little stack like that on the outside, then just inside fab up a small airbox and use the smallest square filter I can find. Maybe something about the size of a shoe box or smaller, would make changing the filter easier. Box attached to the firewall maybe, would keep it dryer than in the cowl. Lots of ideas coming now.

 

Cool video, even has the snorkel cap we are talking about above ))