I've been checking Ebay for intakes, and I've come across two. One is a straight chrome pipe, the other is the standard plastic k&n kit, with the bulge. Which one should I go for?

The chrome one looks nicer, and is cheaper. And the person has a 99.3% feedback, versus the other persons 99.2%. Big difference, right? lol.

Something is telling me that the plastic one will get colder/more outside air (it looks like it reaches away from the engine further). But that straight chrome is hella sexy. [8D]

If there isn't really a difference in performance, I'd go for the cheaper sexier one.

 

Think about which one is going to have the biggest cross-sectional area throughout the tube (I would have just told you to go for the K&N, but I like to give reasons why) . Needless to say, it's not as pretty, but you're going to be able to shove more air through it because it has "the buldge" which makes up from some of the lost tube diameter as it goes over the top of the radiator. It also has a small plate that helps seal the filter off from the engine bay, so it's picking up only cold air from in front of the tire, but still under a splash guard so you don't have to worry about getting water in the intake.

 

Didn't think of that.

And it is still a vast improvement over the price of a new k&n from their website. lol.

 

or you could say it takes more time to fill up such a big volume of space

 

You most certainly could say that it takes more time to fill up a larger volume, but I would doubt that before you start your car your K&N intake is going to be a perfect self sustaining vaccume. Plus, the extra microsecond that it takes to fill out the extra volume of the larger tube will be more than made up for by the extra flow that tube provides. If we were looking for how long it took to draw air in from the outside the volume could become a factor, but the simple fact that the intake tube is always going to be full of air negates any issue with how long it takes to fill out any extra volume. If everyone were looking for how long it takes to fill out an intake tube we would all have coffe stir straws for intakes.

 

so your telling me i'm the only one with a coffee straw intake?