Have you ever dreamed of adding more horsepower to your vehicle at only a fraction of the cost? Driving the car ala Vin Diesel and having his car may be every boy's dream. Engine upgrades can actually cost a lot of dough because of the expensive aftermarket performance parts available in many of the car shops. Boosting a stock engine may be very complicated, time consuming and may alter the car's current gas to mileage ratio. The simplest upgrade you can do is giving that car 15 to 20% additional horsepower by altering the air inflow and the air outflow of the engine.

This system helps provides cool air to the engine which improves performance and fuel-mileage ratio. This system takes in air around the hood and induces it into the engine. There are three types of air intake in the aftermarket arena today, the open element car intake system, sealed car air intake system and the ram car air intake system.

The Open Element Car Intake system includes an air filter, pipe and silicon or rubber couplers which serves as an aftermarket replacement for the factory parts. This system uses the air surrounding the engine compartment.

Another type of intake is the sealed type, walls can be added to an existing open element intake system and make this a sealed type intake system.

The Ram type intake system is the most effective but risky to the engine. This type of intake sucks in cool air outside of the engine bay, exposing the intake to debris and other foreign objects.

In car shops, you can find a lot of air intake systems that are readily available and can be installed by do-it-yourself procedures. Top manufacturers have made air intake systems on almost all car models. For those models that does not have an after market air intake system, you can have it scratch built. Just provide a cone filter, polyvinylchloride pipes, rubber hose, and hose clips.

Now you have completed a simple upgrade to your engine. This upgrade can give that car the boost it needs at a very low cost. Just be wary of racing that ride on the street since it is dangerous and some of the engine parts are not yet built for high rpm boosts. You may destroy your cam shafts and blow your engine valves if they are still all stock or off the factory parts.