After seeing limited intake options for the DE5 Integra Type S, I decided to go a little fancy and purchase the ARMASPEED carbon fiber intake for the FL5 Civic Type R. I’m by no means the first person to install this intake on a DE5 Integra, and I hadn’t heard of any issues run into by the couple others that have done it. The intake shipped from Taiwan, door to door, in less than a week. Very impressive! The shipping packaging was excellent. Heavy duty corrugated box on the outside, secured with heat-staked straps. They shipped via FedEx and provided full tracking information.
The intake itself is beautiful. The heat shield and connecting tube are all gloss carbon fiber with a traditional weave. The kit included everything that’s required for install. Some OEM fasteners were used, and three rubber grommets need to be transferred over from the stock airbox. The only wiring that needs to be touched is for the MAF sensor harness. There’s a plastic guide that routes it around the stock airbox, which has to be removed. That was the most time consuming part of this project and I ended up purposefully breaking the tabs to get it apart. Not a big deal since that part is only a few dollars from Honda if I need to ever replace it for some reason. The rest of the install was straight forward and simple, and took around 25 minutes to complete.
Sound on the intake is, as expected, excellent. When under boost, all of the turbo inlet sounds and recirculation valve sounds on throttle chop are easily audible, even with the windows up. With the windows down it’s even better. Being as tis car is a manual, you can summon that sweet recirculation valve noise with a clutch-in rev and abrupt throttle chop at high RPMs. It sounds amazing.
At $800, this intake isn’t the cheapest option, but it’s immediately available with fast shipping, and it’s much more aesthetically pleasing than a plastic intake. Now if only someone would make a carbon fiber hood for the DE5 I’d be all set.
