Stillen Gen 3 VS. Injen Long Tube Intakes - REVIEW
 

First and foremost, I in no way represent either company and have nothing against them, other than raw R&D. This thread is intended to illustrate the experiences I had with both intake systems and what you may encounter while installing such a system. I'll throw my opinions out there as well, which should be taken with a grain of salt. :thumbup:

Here are the two products:

Stillen: Part #402845 (Chrome only)
http://www.stillen.com/product.asp?i...W03&c=PE&m=all

Injen: Part #SP1987P (Chrome) SP1987BLK (Black)
http://www.injen.com/docs/other/sear...D=10&Eng=%20V6


These experiences cover the installation of both intake systems on an 08 350Z NISMO. Although there may be slight differences with a standard 07-08 Z, most (if not all) information will be the same, regardless of the HR model you have.


With the Stillen intakes, the entire system is secured by the throttle-body and a small strap that you have to somehow mount by drilling some holes in the core support and getting really clever. The straps only hold the intakes so well, and the intake tubes can easily move around. The system did not feel securely mounted at all. Also, you have to cut the horn wires, extend them, and, once again, get clever with where to mount them. I am very anal with mods and this was very annoying. Plus you only get three short pages of instructions and are left winging a lot of the install. The chrome tubing is VERY EASY to scratch and shows all defects. I guarantee that you will scratch things up. To be honest, the system sort of looks and feels cheap.

The Injen intakes, on the other hand, come with a lot more accessories to make the installation great! This includes a custom horn bracket to mount in the stock location (no cutting and extending wires) and a nice bracket that attaches right before the filters that you bolt to the top part of the core support where those plastic clips hold your bumper on (see illustrations below). Then you get seven full pages of instructions/photos to help you along the way. The 90 degree rubber tubing that passes through the core support is also a great addition, as it allows for better adjustment and flexes however you need it to. The black-colored tubing option is very sleek and looks more "professional" if that makes any sense.


Here is an additional writeup/review of the Injen Long Tube Intakes with some fantastic photos!


On a side note - I am using Injen Hydroshields with the Injen intakes, which are absolutely amazing. I have run the Injen intakes for a few thousand miles and the filters still look brand new. No more worrying about dirt and debris getting wedged between the fins/pleats of the filter. This is especially true for the Nismo, where the bottom of the filters are directly exposed to the outside elements. My Stillen filters got really, really dirty pretty fast and took a long time clean, when I was not utilizing the hydroshields. Plus, they are pretty damn good at repelling water for peace of mind. I'll never go back to an exposed filter.

What about sound/power?! By now, I hope you all realize that Nissan released these vehicles with amazing intake systems from the factory. Sure there is room for improvement, but not much. Intakes on the 07-08 are a mod for looks/sound over power. In a nutshell, both systems sound the same and "appear" to yield the same amount of power. What this means is I installed the Stillen intakes, dyno tuned them, uninstalled the Stillen intakes, installed the Injen intakes, and could not tell a single difference. I did not bother to dyno tune with the Injens, so feel free to speculate here.

Compare what comes with each kit:

Attachment 431051

Attachment 431052


Some installed shots (Note the mounting differences):

(Stillen)
Attachment 431053

(Injen)
Attachment 431054


My personal installs:

(Stillen)
Attachment 431055

(Injen)
Attachment 431056

Attachment 431057


Hydroshield:

Attachment 431058


Dyno Tune - Not really beneficial to the thread, other than the intake sound. Also, intakes get noticeably louder with a free-flowing, aftermarket exhaust, which I had during the video. I recently went back to my stock exhaust and they really quieted down.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8VFI3zl6qU

so looking back, would you have just stuck with the OE intakes rather than the stillen or injen? Also after putting the intakes on, did you run lean without a tune

Appreciate your thoughts, interesting take having owned both systems. Tough to say on the power side since there wasn't a followup dyno with the Injen's. What did the STILLEN intakes dyno for you, and did you give it 6,7,8 runs to allow the ECU to adjust?

Pre-filters are fantastic for either setup, and we have people that run them on the Gen 3's as well, mainly for, as you stated, additional filtration, etc.

But what many don't talk about, or have taken the time to dyno, is the power aspect with the pre-filters on. It most certainly will have a good impact on the power the intake is adding to the vehicle, regardless of brand. That being said I completely understand why you would insist on using them with the Injen's, at least with their newer intakes, it's printed on their tubing, which actually is their recommendation to remove the intakes during inclimate weather.

I personally have no complaints with the stillen g3 intakes. in fact i did a review of them a while back on here. gains were excellent, quality is there, and that was from the first week they were out until now.

I must disagree here. The Hydroshields are not as restrictive as the filters themselves. Let's use water passing through a hose as an example.

Let's say the filters represent a 1in. diameter hose. Since the Hydroshields are less restrictive than the filters, we will have them represented by a 1.5in diameter hose. By attaching the 1.5in hose to the 1in hose, the volume of water that can pass through the system is limited by the smaller of the two hoses; the filters. The air flow will always be limited by the most restrictive section of the system, so the Hydroshields will not affect power.

^ i will respectfully disagree with you, sir. your example applies to fluid flow through a pipe (or hose in ur example). for filter efficiency, we want to analyze fluid flow through different meshes and mediums. you have flow drops (and therefore inherently some pressure drops) across various sections of mesh in fluid flow paths. fluid being water, or air, or any other fluid.

an example similar to yours: put a 1/4" mesh screen under a stream of water. the water will slowdown a bit and pressure will drop. a few inches under that, put another mesh, say 1/8". the water will slow down further and drop pressure yet again. the result will be the pressure drop of both combined, more so of a pressure and flow drop than just the 1/8" mesh.

this example is more indicative and representative of fluid through an air filter than the example of water through different size pipe. they behave totally differently.

i'm not taking sides here, just stating my experience with the stillen intakes in my previous post, and now providing my humble engineering "knowledge" (for whatever it may be worth) based on my work and education and experiences.

http://i359.photobucket.com/albums/o...nstalled-1.jpg

That is my install. I tried to find a good place to mount the brackets, and that seemed to be a good place.

It is a good feedback from you since you have owned both.
I agree with you, OP, that the Stillen pipes are so easily scratched up. Even cleaning with microfiber towel, it still makes swirl marks.

Also, one side of the pipe is rubbing against the engine chassis. So I had to use a rubber piece and double sided tape in between.

And I do agree that our HR stock intakes are really efficient that we probably would not benefit much from CAI. Aftermarket intakes are mainly for "look" imo.

I had to do this as well. My only other complaint with the stillens is how easily they scratch. Otherwise, I am extremely happy with them!

Thank you for the useful information! That is a great way to look at it! I only wonder whether each throttle-body has the actual capacity to realize any restriction in the first place. Yes, only a controlled dyno comparison will expose the true answer, but the differences are so minimal, no one bothers to perform this test.

Thanks for the review, good read :)

Love my Injens too.. glad I went with them over Stillen. Both could use some work in the R&D dept. though honestly. The Injens too were a pain in the butt to install. Untuned, I gained 8 rwhp on a dyno from my Injens and I love the sound too! Search my name for more threads I've started about my Injens. =)

I would love it if someone could post a dyno comparison of these two intake systems on a stock car. Same car, same dyno, same day. Probably never gonna happen though :(

Also for the OP: how much did you gain when you dyno tuned the Stillens? Can you post the dyno?

What makes you think they would dyno any differently? They are essentially the same thing.

This may be a stupid question but are the injen CAI's CARB legal? (Cali legal for you non residents lol)

I heard that they werent, but most Injen stuff comes with a CARB number most of the time...figured i would ask...

Great post. Both companies make solid products that work and it is good to see an end user's direct comparison of both.

IIRC The injens use a 3in diameter pipe at the filters. So correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that any filter with a 3in inlet will work.

This. Really guys, the bottom line is they are metal tubes with a filters on the end. When you get past all the hype and marketing, it all becomes the same.

Here's my dyno tune if anyone was curious. I had other mods installed, so this isn't really beneficial, but it's all I took:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8VFI3zl6qU

Black Nismo ftw.

this is a pretty good read.