Just looking for something cheap to replace the stock airbox. Let me knwo thanks.

 

Some people on here have made their own, k&n makes drop in filters for the air box but i don't think anyone makes a cold air intake. They haven't made that engine in a while and it was never a performance oriented engine in the first place so it probably wouldn't be profitable to sell one. Overall it would be a waste of money, you won't notice any performance improvement.

-Jon

 

K&N does make a kit the get rid of your stock air box. I would not call it a cold air intake b/c it does not draw cooler air from the outside. It does help add a little performance. It is $200 though.

I would not put in a drop in filter from K&N.

 

While I totally respect Ford4ever, his experience, and his opinions, this is one time I have to completely disagree.

K&N does make an FIPK for your truck (K&N FIPK #57-2503), and it will make a huge difference. The 4.9L really benefits from adding an FIPK! I was amazed after installing one in my truck. Several months later, I had an idea, and reinstalled the stock airbox, and could tell right away. With the FIPK, I noticed the biggest improvement on long uphill grades. In cases where I used to have to downshift to 4th, or even 3rd to make it over the top, I could make it easily in 5th after installing a K&N FIPK. I modified mine slightly to get more cold air, but even without doing that, there was a huge improvement. I believe there are pics of what I did in my gallery.

Avoid spending money on a drop-in filter.

 

I don't remember there being a kit available when i had my 4.9L but that was quite a few years ago now. Was your truck mostly stock when you installed that FIPK? As you know if you have upgraded throttle body, exhaust, chip, etc a cold air intake will make quite a bit of difference because your stock air box was a restriction in the system but any stock vehicle that i have installed a cold air intake on there was no real noticable difference. I put quite a few bolt-ons on my 4.9l and none of them were really worth the money. It was better suited as a long lasting workhorse than a high performance truck. You may feel different but i wished i hadn't spent the money. With all the bolt ons it did make noticably more power but not enough in my opinion to make them worthwhile. Not like my mustang for example that went from a stock 14 second car to pulling the front wheels off the ground for under $1000 worth of bolt ons.

-Jon

 

I bought my truck in August, 1996, and that Christmas, a buddy of mine that worked at Hawaii Racing got me my FIPK. It was the first mod, of any kind, that I did to my truck. I was blown away by the difference it made. I had more throttle response, it revved quicker, and it gave me more top end.

Several months later, I got the bright idea that maybe the reason the stock airbox made the truck slower was because the air had to travel in a U through the box. I tried pointing the airbox top the other direction, so the airflow would be in a straight line, and reinstalled it. I instantly noticed a big difference. It felt like I was towing a small trailer, or like my e-brake was dragging. I really noticed the difference when I went to L.A. over the Conejo Grade. With the stock airbox, I always had to downshift into 4th before I was halfway up the grade, and usually had to go into 3rd the last 1/2 mile before the summit, and was doing around 50 mph by the time I got there. With the FIPK, I never had to take it out of 5th, and was doing over 75 mph by the time I reached the summit. And that was loaded down with tools and an air compressor, and a 2.2L core I was taking back to Coast Engine Supply.

I made the mistake of telling everyone how great the FIPK was, and started twisting arms to get others to buy one. That's when I discovered that they didn't make as big an improvement on all vehicles like it did on my truck. In fact, while everyone noticed at least a little improvement, no one gained as much as I did, except a buddy with a 1996 4.9L F-150. His results were the same as mine.

I'm not entirely sure why, but the FIPK really does wonders for trucks with a 4.9L in them. V8's don't respond nearly as well, but it depends on the driver.

The second mod I did was to install a JET chip, and I had great results with that, too, although the results might not have been so good if I still had the stock airbox installed. I dunno.

FWIW, they may not have listed it for the 4.9L when you looked for one. I think the one I got said it was for a 5.0L, but it fit perfectly. I know that now the FIPK for speed density small blocks and the 4.9L share the same part number, so they figured out at some point that the V8 version would fit the 4.9L too. I just don't know for sure if I figured that out before they did.