What does the IAT sensor do?

 

Intake Air Temp. It senses the temp of the air that comes into the manifold.

 

How Often Are These Supposed to be changed?

 

Ok, so if I got an open element I would need one with a hole for the IAT? Do most open elements come with a hole already?

Hey Kuruption, where in southside cali do you live? We are having a 3rd gen meet up in the Clovis/Fresno area. I remember you now, you were gonna sell your Iroc cuz of gas prices. Glad to see you are keepin it.

 

Change when faulty.

I believe your IAT is located in the intake plenum for TPI. What setup do you have?

 

Im 10 Minutes from Long Beach. 562 area. When is this meeting hapnen?

 

Interesting thread. The IAT is an aread I have had a lot of experience with TPI engines. It's located on the underside of the intake plenum. Gotta take the plenum off to replace it.

HOWEVER...... a handy performance-oriented modification to make can save you the work and make some more power, too. I simply buy a new IAT sensor, screw it into the air filter housing area wherever's convenient and then extend the IAT wiring harness over to it. I don't even remove the old IAT since it's just acting as a vacuum plug once you do this- no reason to mess with it further.

WHY do this? Well, spending a lot of time with a scan tool I discovered that the stock IAT location is like putting it in an OVEN. That sucker BAKES in there! Not unusual to get IAT readings over 130* on a 70* day! Relocating it over into the much cooler air box area would show temperature drops of easily 20-30 degrees. This helped the car be much more consistent making power whether the engine was hot or cold. Before the mod the engine would have a rather significant dorp in power when it got fully warmed up.

HOW to do this? Drill a hole wherever's convenient near the air filter to put the new sensor into. An open element conical you can often just drill a hole through the rubber end cap and stick it in there, for instance. Reuse the wiring plug off the old sensor and extend the wires over to the new one. It takes maybe an hour to do everything.

 

But if you relocated it, isn't that trying to fool the ECM? After all, the IAT senses what the temp is in the manifold which is the air going in to the cylinders. As such, it will alter the fuel to adjust. What is seems like you are doing is telling the ECM you have cooler air than there really is. You should address it in the EPROM instead of trying your tricks. IMO.

 

I have an 84 Z. It is carbed.

 

My mistake- thought we were talking TPI. You don't have an IAT that I'm aware of. I don't recall seeing one on my 85 Carbureted motor. If it's got one it's gonna be in the air cleaner base.

On a TPI moving it's location isn't fooling the ECM- it's giving it a more ACCURATE picture of how hot the air in the intake actually is. When it's in the plenum a lot of heat seems to conduct/radiate into the sensor element from the hot aluminum all around it and artificially raise the reading.

Other/later GM engines put the sensor outside the engine in the intake bellows or air filter housing, by way of comparison.