The Roof Scoop on the STi.
 

You know what I'm talking about, what does it do???

Well, in actual rally cars, I know it's used to get air flowing into the cabin, those cars get super hot when they're driving, so it helps cool it off. On a regular street car? I don't know what it would do... if it was functional, I'd assume it did the same thing, brought air into the interior of the car, but I don't know if those are functional or not.

As far as I know they don't have a function for non rally cars. It's for the "rally look".

They are functional. They bring cooler air from outside the car into the engine bay. Usually in cars with functional scoops, you see the intake or airbox very close to the scoop, so it can get the coolest air into the engine as possible. Remember, the coller the air going into the engine, the better your car will perform (to a certian extent). While it is as obvious to cops as a spinning license plate or a ferrari emblem, it is well worth it, imo.

willravel I think what your talking about is the hood scoop... I don't think stock stis have a roof scoop. But yea they function to channel air into the cabin because the car probably wont have any of those creature comforts since its a race car.

Yea, if your talking about factory STi's, they dont have roof scoops. Rallys STi's do have ones as explained in above posts.

the hood scoop on the sti brings more cold air to the top mount turbo intercooler.

the roof scoop is not present on the sti sold to the public. the function of the roof scoop was mentioned above.

One puts a roof scoop on their car when they remove the air conditioning system. I have a friend with a WRX that is the fastest street-driven WRX in Colorado and he has a functional carbon fiber roof scoop.

There are a few mid engined cars that have engine air intakes on the roof as well. (the McLaren F1 comes to mind)

Oops. Read the post too fast. Yes, I was describing the hood scoop. The roof scoop is meant to be a very light weight replacement for the car's ac, as it simply redirects air in from the roof. It makes for good strong air circulation in the cabin to keep the drivers cool. They are usually used in rally.

I think it'd be pretty badass if the market STI had the hood scoop rather than the a/c. It would suck in the warmer days but the car would be one step closer to the real rally STI

i've never actually seen an STi with a roof scoop, other than the real rally cars. can you even get them on an STi aftermarket?

Thanks for the info guys. The reason that I was asking is that the WRX STi GB8 is the main car I use for Initial D (an arcade racing game with an upgrade system). After winning a race against my friend's RX7, it gave me new aerodynamic intakes (lost the traditional WRX scoop and got the indented scoops instead) and since then, I've been complaining about how ugly it is. I then got to wondering about its purpose (obviously none in the game), and thought I'd bring my question here. Thanks.

Woohoo, the Initial D game is awesome....and so is the series. DVD #10 (the TokyoPop American Releae in english) comes out this month i think. Happy.

The roof scoop is standard on the WRX STi Type RA Spec C sold in Japan as a basically a starting point for building a rally car. It is pretty stripped down so it has no AC. As far as I know it only comes with a regular WRX rear spoiler and not the large box one on normal STi's

Other then cooling the inside of the car, some cars ( mostly mid eng cars) have a roof scoop that is channled to the radiator behind the driver. ive seen it on some off road race trucks also they hang the radiator in the rollbar

ive seen roof scoops on race versions of MR2's and mid/rear cars like that. They look cool when they serve a purpose.

Beat me to it......you can buy those roof scoops and glue them on your self.

Ive seen a couple folks install aftermarket ones, and actually cut there roof and run a duct to make it work......but it takes alot of balls to cut a hole in the roof of a new car.