cooling and airflow questions

I changed over to an "open" system in my 88 4.0L early last winter and bought a three liter coolant bottle at Napa... I have it just sitting below where the old pressure bottle was located. tonight I was thinking that the level of coolant does not change much in this bottle. I was thinking of replacing it with a 1 liter Nalgene bottle with some brass fittings for the hose? and relocating it to inbeteen the airbox and the fender well(creating a shorter hose line) currently there is approx 4.5 ft of hose going from the filler neck around the hood latch and back to the overflow bottle.

Also I am thinking of imodified intakes... I would like to free up space under the hood... on my 88 renix there is a hose from the manifold to feed warm air up to the box... how affective is this? I purchased a new hose two months ago to make sure it worked... also should I say that I live in Wisconsin and many mornings when I go to work it is sub zero(with wind)...