Ok, so my car is in the shop for the 2nd time in two months with the exact same problem. My car sucked up water and broke the mass airflow sensor. The first time this happened the dealer explained that it was just bad luck and even if I had a stock intake the same thing would have happened, so I just left my aftermarket on there. Well now it's happened again and it's another $600 bill. Again my dealer is dancing around my questions so I think I will just ask here.

So my question is

Is this happening because of my CAI?

Will this happen if I return to stock?

I have an extra injen intake, if I put a hydro shield on it will that be the best option?

I think it's ridiculous that I have to be paranoid about driving my car in the rain and I just want a reliable daily driver car at this point. Please help, thanks.

 

How do you suck up that much water? how deep a puddle are you driving in? I have sucked a little up due to no hydro sheild and the mass air flow just ***** out for like 5 minutes, then good as new.

Hydro sheild will block most of the water that splashes into the fender not the lake your drove into.

Stock should have an intake piece that gets air from higher up than the CAI, that why you dont have the problem when you are stock.

 

where could i buy a hydro sheild for my hahn intake. i need one baddddd

 

google.com is your friend, or ask the manufacturer.

 

I'm assuming the injen cai hydro shield would fit. Correct me if I'm wrong. It can be found on turbo tech racing. My personal favorite vendor

 

No that's the crazy thing about this because I didn't drive over any puddles. I was on the exit ramp merging onto the highway. I just gave it some gas to merge into traffic and it freaked out. There is no way there was a puddle on a descending exit ramp. I drove in a huge rainstorm the night before though maybe that started screwing it up idk.

Just found out the tow truck backed into my car and screwed the body work on the front end. This day couldn't get any worse.

 

All of the filters for the cobalt SS should be near the same I would think, so I dont see it being a problem, but I am not familiar with other intakes.

I know my K&N came with one but the damn Dry AZ weather made it crack and tear off when I took it off to clean the filter..

 

There should be no reason the CAI is sucking up that much water.

Check for a space between the headlight (bottom of the housing) and the bumper... any empty spaces?

Stupid question, but is the splash guard on at the bottom of the bumper?

what is teh car doing? It could be something else.

 

ok if it is not a puddle, then just buy a hydro shield and keep the CAI, it should solve it. AZ rain comes down hard and fast (when it actually rains) and I can gas the **** out of my car in the rain and no problems when I have the hydro shield.

His car seems to do the same thing mine did without it, stutters, bounces the RPM, shuts off...? will kinda of start but then will shut off?

 

That is exactly what it's doing.


Great response I'll be sure to check that out when I get my car back which is gonna be a while since its now going to the body shop!

 

Thats what happened to mine, I waited about 5-10 minutes, starting the car (trying to keep RPM's), letting it dry off, and it worked.. I never went to the dealer with mine and its still going strong.

Just remember, you will still need air openings somewhere. dont go sealing it becuase you could starve the intake or make it pull air from the fender hole that the intake drops through, then the CAI would be pointless since you will be getting above abient temps.

Hydroshield is your friend, spend the 30$ and try it.

 

Is there only one product)(hydro sheild) on the market for the injen?
http://www.turbotechracing.com/produ...dcategory=5611

or are there other options?

 

I installed a cai on my ss/sc there is a tiny space between the headlight and the bumper from the previous owner I guess, after I painted my rims I went through the car wash and my car started running like ****.....but, went away after a bit.

 

HELP!! i know this thread is a few months old, but I'm having almost the same identical problem. Here's what happened.

It was a bad South Carolina rainstorm and there were huge puddles everywhere. I was doing about 40, driving through, I would say, moderately sized puddles. They were a little bigger than your average puddle, but nothing dramatic. When I stopped at a light, (a friend of mine that was with me at the time pointed this out to me after the fact) I ended up at the bottom of a slight grade where water was pooling. When I went to take off, the car bucked for a few seconds (almost worse than someone who is learning how to drive a manual) and then sputtered and died. For almost 10 minutes I tried to restart the car, but it wouldn't keep running. Once it did finally start running, it would freak out and die as soon as I fully engaged the clutch. After about an hour of waiting for any water I might have sucked up to dry out, it was finally drive-able again. I took it directly home, but on the way there I got a check engine light. I noticed that my Fuel/Air gauge was reading a little lean, so i figured that was the problem. I took it to Autozone to have them run a diagnostics test on it, and sure enough, the PCM said the mixture was too lean. So its a day later now, and the car still wont rev past 3,000 without going crazy. If anyone knows what this could be please let me know...

 

I had this problem with my 2.2L with the Injen. It was absolutely horrible. Every time it would rain I'd shudder over the thought of going outside to start my car, or driving it.

2 years I had that intake, and never was I able to get the problem solved. I also had a raunchy gap with my headlight. I even had the body guy from my dealership I work at try his hand at it. It looked better, but water somehow still worked it's way in there.

I almost think it was the intake, and just the fact that it fit like crap. I don't know what else it could have been.

Same thing though, car would start, die, idle hunt.. And if I tried to drive it, it would buck like crazy, die out, etc. Only way to fix it was turn it on and rev the **** out of it to pass the water through the motor. I mean there is better ways yes, but when you're 2 hours from home, no tools, at 1am, you really don't have a choice.

I'll tell you though, even the slightest trip of water over the MAF can make it go out of whack. Remember, you're passing H2O directly over/through an electrical component, especially something as sensitive as the MAF.

 

So is the MAF ruined then? should I just try to replace it or is there some way to salvage the existing one?

A friend of mine also mentioned something about water maybe getting into the plug wires from the splash up. He said to buy some dielectric grease and seal the wires back up......is that a possibility as well?