Factory 911, 914/6, 916 air boxes, How many different designs? Options

[horizontally-opposed]

Went to the dyno to do a first dial-in on the carbs and made 169.9 hp at the rear wheels with no air filters. Was pretty jazzed, and then the dyno operator said "Now watch when we put the air box back on...it'll be even nicer."

We lost 20 hp.

It was the end of the day, and I still need to finalize exhaust before we really dial the thing in, but we pulled the snorkel and air filter to do one more run. We gained 12 hp back, so 162 hp at the wheels. This from a 2.2 six with E pistons, a bit of compression, Solex cams, a bit of head work, headers, a single-tip Leistritz muffler (now a two-tip Dansk sport muffler), and Webers.

My question: How many variations of the factory air box were there between 1965 and 1973? Carbs, MFI, T, E, S, etc? I know there were metal ones and plastic ones (my air box is plastic), but I'm wondering if anyone knows a link that explains the variations, or can provide Cliff Notes from which to start my research? I'd love to keep a factory air box on the car, as I like the noise reduction, but would like to get some of that power back. Engine also feels hesitant past 6000 rpm.

I know, I know—rain hats. I'd prefer not to go that way. Thoughts?

[Eric_Shea]

I honestly don't know the answer. Here's some that I've seen:

Solex
Tall Metal w/metal snorkel. Metal butterflies holding snorkel on.
Tall Metal w/plastic snorkel. Metal butterflies.
Shorter metal w/plastic snorkel and breather tube. Metal butterflies.
Low plastic with enrichment and left facing snorkel. Seen both steel and plastic butterflies holding snorkel on. (-6 means it faces right)
Low plastic with enrichment and right facing snorkel plastic butterflies holding on snorkel.
Low plastic w/o enrichment, right plastic snorkel. plastic butterflies MFI
Low plastic w/o enrichment, left short snorkel with warm air flapper, plastic butterflies. Late MFI

MFI housings do not have the openings for the secondaries between the velocity stacks. They can be drilled out if you want a low plastic housing to fit a 914 w/o the cold start enrichment circuit.

Henry Schmidt told me to bore out holes in the backside of the filter console to allow it to breath better. This was for my 3.0 MFI in the 911. They have to be in the center round portion so the air still flows through the filter. Might be worth a try to watch the dyno numbers.

Odd because Bruce Anderson always touted that the dyno numbers were the same with the factory boxes. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/idea.gif)