You'll want at least 6 inches of straight airpath with no discontinuities. Guys using them on flowbenches generally like to see a foot. I have never taken my MAF out, so I don't know if it has a screen or not. The screen cuts back on the straight flow requirement somewhatt at the cost of a minor restriction in flow.

Although, I do not have an SS, I'm assuming it is the same as the "basic" HHR's. If that is the case, you provided a COMMONLY STATED MISCONCEPTION. The air is "pulled from the front of the car, near the bumper/radiator area, between the fender well and other sheet metal TO THE HOLE UNDER THE HOOD where the hose to the air cleaner is attached. THUS, PULLING COOLER AIR from the lower front of the car.

Could a method be provided that pulls cooler air....you bet. But not from anything under the hood where temperatures COULD (remember your engine normally runs at 190-210) reach 250F.

Oh....the hole you observe in the tire well is to access a bolt in the suspension/cradle, I believe. Use a flash light and you will see.

I can definatly say through all the datalogging and tuning I do, even with the iat temps with the stock airbox reaching upwards of 150* sitting in the staging lanes at the track(never that high on the street no matter what the temp) that even with the stock intercooler, the iat2 temps on the cold side don't rise much at all above the ambient temps. if you want cooler air into the engine, buy a better ic or run meth/water injection to cool the charge temps. I can understand trying to flow more air, but trying to cool the air pre boost isn't going to make much difference. I've ran the car with the airbox lid off and on, changes the iat2 maybe 1-2*. still never had iats reach 150 with the lid off unless I was sitting in traffic for a decent length of time. I bought my hptuners used with 4 credits for 250 and its VERY simple to tune a lnf with the help of the guides nick from backyardturbo has created. the pcm will adjust ltft and stft to try and match the commanded afr. even with the car being stock, it has to try and ad some fuel under wot which makes the car show more kr. I am currently running running about 6* more timing and I run 20psi until 6k where it starts to drop off some since our turbo is so small. if anyone wants to pick my brain with any questions or see my logs, I will share them along with the program to view them.

sorry for the crappy posting quality, I am primarily on my phone when viewing.

Has anyone mounted a small electric puller fan on the backside of the intercooler? I've seen this done before on the Ford Lightnings. Sounds like a good idea, just a thought!

they have heat exchangers, not an intercooler.

Yeah I knew that I used to have a 2001 Lightning, I'm just so used to calling all of them "intercoolers". But back to may question, has anyone used the fans on the back of their intercoolers??