A aftermarket intake will get you a reusable filter, a little bit of bling under the hood, and a louder intake sucking sound, that's about it. As others have mentioned, the stock RAM box is pretty kick ***, so there's not much the aftermarket guys can do.

 

There have been issues with the exhaust manifold factory bolts snapping. Stage 8 makes excellent exhaust manifold bolts, its what I've used on my Charger, six years, no issues with my long tube headers.

I encourage you to dyno your truck, you maybe surprised what your results will be, with, and without a K&N CAI. I've been around plenty of dissatisfied owners (On a Mustang Dyno) who thought a CAI would gain such promising numbers.

 

K&N is the way to go if you like sucking dirt into your engine. The reason they flow better is because their filter is more wide open.

This is a great article with actual testing
http://www.nicoclub.com/archives/kn-vs-oem-filter.html

 

Most average dyno techs can inflate the numbers to make it look good... and trust me, most do. (its called bragging rights) Take it with a grain of salt dodgeboy77... and trust me when i say, that the car industry is always lookin for the magic MPG numbers... so if the K&N (and the others) really made that much of a difference, dont you think the car industry would be using them (or similar design) to destroy their competition...? In the end, its all hype, just a marketing skill to sell sell sell. I`m a member on several other forums, seen tons of people dyno their CAI`s, the numbers went backwards on mpg, and also not much of any gains in hp/trq either... some actually went backwards in hp/trq.

 

you can't advertise incorrect things, it's false advertising. also the factory leaves out stuff on purpose so the aftermarket can make money (that's what sema is for). why do you think programmers are so popular? if the factory can do it why don't they?

 

Because the factory is tuning for longevity and emissions. Your tuner company doesn't care if the engine lasts.

 

the cortex has an engine warranty. i was being sarcastic, i know the factory tunes for warranty and insurance.