Is our air intake pipe behind our headlight? My ranger had it right behind the headlight and a couple times I almost busted my engine from water getting thrown up into the intake. I see some people with pics running through water and I think to myself "arent they scared to suck water into the motor?"

 

It draws air from the fender. I have seen some guys on here going much quicker than I would. I have had my 06 to the bottom of the grill before moving slowly with no problems. The problems come when you go flying into the water pushing it places it shouldnt be on the engine compartment

 

I used to take my friends suzuki samuri with a huge lift a 35" or 33" super swampers though small lakes/swamps in Florida where the water would almost be up to the top of the hood and it wouldnt suck anything in it. I guess since it was carburated it had the intake up high in the engine compartment. you would think an FX4 would have the intake up high also like a jeep wrangler or something like that. I just dont want to suck water in my engine. I have also been in my friends toyota tundra one time when he sucked water and blew the motor. It scares me to death!

here is the suzuki I was talking about..

 

It's a lot more difficult than you think, water has to hit the top of the hood, drop or drip onto the intake (unless we're talking factory intakes), soak into the padded intake filter, it's pretty difficult to draw any drips out of a hardly splashed filter, all of which is pretty unlikely but of course possible. I used to place my shirt over the intake before hitting the puddles but my shirt was relatively unsplashed by the end of the day.

 

i use a k&n with a splash gaurd and when i know i am going threw water i use a water proof pre filter, works great

 

Yeah it's not as easy as it seems and it would take a good amount of water to do any damage. The stock intake sucks air from the driver side front fender well at a pretty good height and it would take some major splashing from driving through water too fast to get up in there and cause a problem... not saying it's impossible though. Your biggest concern is driving through water that will put the intake entry point under water.

Look at vehicles with functional ram air scoops in their front end or hoods. They drive through the rain with no problem.