flyboy320
Veteran Member
This is the second season/winter my car has seen, and so far I haven't experienced this issue (I live near Toronto, so the car does see lots of cold winter temperatures). What I did last year and this year was to completely block off the front grill (upper and lower) with pipe insulation, as well as remove the intake snorkel and block off the air vent that the snorkel attaches to with metal tape (see attached pictures).
I always thought this would help to increase the temperature of the air intake to above freezing. My thinking was I believe the main reason we see the IC icing issues is because of the build up of ice in the IC when driving whenever the air temp is near freezing, which causes all the moist air (mostly from the LP EGR) to freeze up on the inside of the IC. When the car is parked and either the heat from the engine or the surrounding air melts all this built up ice, it then gets sucked up during the next engine start, we then get the hard start or in bad cases hydro-locked engine.
So my whole point of blocking the front grill and trying to get warmer intake air from the engine bay was to avoid below freezing intake temps so no ice would form. To verify this I purchased a Polar FIS advanced module (sort of like a scangauge II) which allows me to monitor many things, but one being the intake temperature (I'm assuming you can also do this with a VCDS cable). So for the last while I have watched the difference between the outside air temperature, and the intake temperature. I find when driving in the city, or stop and go traffic, and once the car is warmed up, there is about a 25c temperature difference. So yesterday it was -10c outside, but intake temp was +15c. I find when on the highway the temperature rise is about 15c.
So in my case it seems to be helping blocking the front grill and removing the intake snorkel as it for the most part it keeps the ice from forming in the IC and subsequently melting and pooling in the intake hose.
Just thought I would throw this out there as I know some people have scoffed at the dealers removing the intake snorkel until they can install the IC kit, but I think doing this along with blocking the front grill can in fact help.
I always thought this would help to increase the temperature of the air intake to above freezing. My thinking was I believe the main reason we see the IC icing issues is because of the build up of ice in the IC when driving whenever the air temp is near freezing, which causes all the moist air (mostly from the LP EGR) to freeze up on the inside of the IC. When the car is parked and either the heat from the engine or the surrounding air melts all this built up ice, it then gets sucked up during the next engine start, we then get the hard start or in bad cases hydro-locked engine.
So my whole point of blocking the front grill and trying to get warmer intake air from the engine bay was to avoid below freezing intake temps so no ice would form. To verify this I purchased a Polar FIS advanced module (sort of like a scangauge II) which allows me to monitor many things, but one being the intake temperature (I'm assuming you can also do this with a VCDS cable). So for the last while I have watched the difference between the outside air temperature, and the intake temperature. I find when driving in the city, or stop and go traffic, and once the car is warmed up, there is about a 25c temperature difference. So yesterday it was -10c outside, but intake temp was +15c. I find when on the highway the temperature rise is about 15c.
So in my case it seems to be helping blocking the front grill and removing the intake snorkel as it for the most part it keeps the ice from forming in the IC and subsequently melting and pooling in the intake hose.
Just thought I would throw this out there as I know some people have scoffed at the dealers removing the intake snorkel until they can install the IC kit, but I think doing this along with blocking the front grill can in fact help.
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