Now now, lets not start the name calling, shall we?.

I have done extensive testing with twin digital temps. Heat soak is a problem but only on a hot day and if you are idling in traffic often. If you cruise more so than idle, heat shield does not make much difference.
My measurements say with headtshield, heat soak is gone within 2 mins from a stoplight /idle. Without a heat shield, it take 4-5 mins of cruising to clear this soak. So if you journey is within 5 min stoplight intervals, a car without heat shield will lose 10-15 HP due to heat soak.

When it comes to intake sound, yeah, Cone filter gives that great induction noise. But power really does not come on until fairly high RPMs > 4K and when you engine is modified with heatjob, headers, catback etc. Hard to measure this but butt-dyno says some improvement. Maybe the noise may distract but I don't have concrete figures. Mid-range torque seems stronger than stock. That helps with fuel consumption. Or was it a change in driving habit due to this change ?.
I think the work is done fairly nicely. Not quite stock looking. Anything thing with double clamps cannot be considered stock. But good strengthening. Remember to clean that foam often!. It junks up pretty bad over time. Enjoy it, you did that yourself and its certainly different. To some people, thats enough....