So the creativity wheels really got turning last night and i decided that the stock intake design on my car is... well, shit. So i set about making a new one.

what was used:

2x 3"-3" silicon adaptors w/adjustable band clamps
2x breather filters
1x GIANT RICER AIR FILTER ZOMG
Stock MAF and housing
1 large bolt
elbow grease


old and busted


pretty large throttle body for such a weak motor


intake removed entirely


measuring and marking where we need to cut



finished product... I don't think it looks too bad for a DIY job

closeup of the filter. Those two smaller filters below it are capping off outlets from the PCV system that used to vent into the intake. Since I'm not really fond of a fine, oily mist shooting all over my engine bay I figured it was a good idea.

The total cost for the project was remarkably low. An off-the-shelf name brand intake for these cars are usually around $300(!!!) and i'm just not willing to pay that kind of money. We cut a correctly angled piece of an old intake my friend wasn't using, joined that using a 3"-3" silicon coupling and clamps, connected that to the MAF housing using an other one, and then just used the right stopper on the inside of the filter and tightened the shit out of the clamps. Had to put a bolt in there because the piece of pipe unfortunately had a vacuum line fitting that i didn't need, but that was easy enough to solve.

It cost about fourty bucks, sounds great, and makes noticeably more power. Plus I don't have that big, stupid engine cover to deal with any more.

Not bad at all. Good jerb.

very nice

lol, i didn't even know 5 cyl jettas existed

...where the hell have you been? The 2.5 liter inline-5's been out for like 4 years now.

they go pretty good as well. My mum has one of the prev gen's, and the sequential is fun as shit, and it easily spins the fronts off the line

Hell, my mom has the 2.5 5-speed and i have done more than one smoky burnout (don't tell her!)

Nice! I am a big proponent of not spending a lot of money on an intake. It's just such a waste of money.

Nice work.

The sound-for-money ratio is undoubtedly good for this, but I wonder if you've actually improved the power output of the car or if it's just the placebo effect.

clarkma you may be right - could just be the noise! if i get around to uploading it to Youtube, i took a fairly decent video with sound. I dunno, it feels to me like it pulls harder above 5,000rpm or so... but could just be the noise

I think I should make one.

you should! It's quite amusing for not a lot of cash

just make sure you mount the MAF the right way haha

do you still have that Mazda3, Moe?

nice job... and I thought my engine bay was dirty!

btw you should just ditch it and get C2 turbo kit... :-D

I doubt any intake on this car yields much of a gain. probably 1-2 hp for this, maybe 3-5 for the expensive name brand ones.which is negligible on anything but a full on race car.

I dunno... the stock intake setup on this car is a complete convoluted mess with lots of twists, turns, kinks and diameter changes. Maybe 7 horsepower, then haha

Yeah, I still have it. My best friend built an intake for his Crossfire recently, I'm waiting for him to get back, and we'll work on something for the 3.

I was trying to imply that he may actually have lost power. I mean, VW is not stupid and intake design is complex. Not saying you can't improve on what they did but the fact that b00st got gains from this is not a given.

I dont think he will lose power right off the bat. Maybe because air is being pulled in directly from the engine bay as temp heats up more hot air will be sucked into the engine. Again i am not sure how much this affect Jetta but i doubt it will be doing the engine any favours.

I would definitely try to find a way to put the PCV lines back to the intake. Also what did the vacuum line that you plugged connect to? I'd be really hesitant to disable these.

That's a pretty good point. There's a decent chance I lost power on my intake. But it's worth the sound:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38Dd9rNhVvg

yeah i'm trying to figure out to route both of those back into the intake, i've had a check engine light on a for a few days. The only unusual thing is that with the throttle closed, from 2000 back to 1000rpm the engine decelerates EXTREMELY slowly, like it's stuck. Doesn't happen all the time but it's unusual.

the left line was from the PCV, i believe the right line is related to the secondary air injection system - which is what the check engine code is related to (SAI: excessive flow rate detected, lol.) I gotta fix it... CEL is annoying.