I want to gut the air box out of my 98 SE, but what I was reading on everything is that in order for the intake with the pipe and cone filter to work well, I need a heat shield? So I have to custom fab one or is there somewhere I can buy one?

As far as I can tell, there'* not a whole lot of options "pre-designed" specifically for Bonnevilles regarding the rice pipe intake because let'* face it, to most of the world outside of BC and INTENSE, etc. A Bonneville is not considered a car that you would normally utilize one with. Specifically in some of the ones here I've seen, a different pipe has been purchased and then modified to fit the spacing needs of your year. Just about every heat shield for this application that I've seen here has also been 100% custom-made due to this fact.

Perhaps someone else can chime in with some suggestions/possibilities?

If you do an intake with a pipe like a CAI (Cold Air Intake) as we call it you will need to fab up a heat shield. If you just gut the airbox you don't need to make up a heat shield. And yes there is something you can just buy such as a FWI (Fenderwell intake), in my opinion one of the best ways to go for an intake. A place to find a nice FWI would be Intense-Racing.com or click on this link

Ed

Gutting the box is removing the excess innards.. rice pipe is just that.. a pipe and filter..

Which are you looking to do?

Moving to Performance and Brainstorming. Please don't post Peformance related topics in 92-99.

Sorry about that, I want to put a rice pipe with filter on it.

Like this:

But is this a bad idea without a shield?

That is a bad idea. Due to the shortness of the pipe, all you will do is pull in warm engine bay air temps. That will most likely hurt performance over the stock air box.

This is what I have done. No it does not suck water into my engine, at least not yet. The heat shield is aluminuim and the cone filter is sealed off from the engine bay except for 1/8 of an inch from the back of the filter. I figure if I ran into some deep water than the engine would pull air from that 1/8 inch space instead of turning my CAI into a huge straw. I gained some space by removing the PCM cover and making a smaller box for it out of plastic wrapped in thermal insulation. I also used the same insulation on the inside of the heat shield to aid in the prevention or slowing down of heat soak. I have a small hole on the bottom to let out any water although none has made it that far yet. As far as HP or torque gains...who knows. My but dyno says it improves my passing power on the highway. enjoy the pics!

The air will be drawn more from the shortest path possible. From your engine bay. That'* too far to pull air from anyway. The pressure drop across that length is likely hurting you.

There is no reason to seal, insulate, or protect the PCM.

I figured the PCM was well protected from the factory. I knew I was going overboard on protecting the PCM. as for the gentleman with the question about intakes... Intense FWI is supposed to be the best thing for our cars. about my intake, I know at idle you can put your hand over the inlet and you will feel alot of suction. I built it the way I did because I do mostly highway driving. I was thinking that if I am doing 65+mph then it would help to push cold air in. I understand what your saying though about shorter paths and resistance. Someday I will just put a 90 degree elbow on my TB and put a cone filter through the hood JK