My engine tuner recommends me to get a K&N

[bowlofturtle]

So i asked my tuner before i go in to get my engine tune next weekend is there anyting i should get to give me more gains. After i listed my mods.

He tells me to get a K&N, dyno results favored the filter. I've been using purealotor cheapie $10 ones.

I know 50% of K&N complaints back in the day were for blown MAF's but we all can link that to people over oiling the filter. Then obviously it doesn't filter as good as a paper filter another reason why people down play them. I looked backed for some postings, i saw a raptor on here that sucked in water, that wasn't fault of the filter. I seen a couple other nissan owners that liked and used them.

At $35 after taxes i don't see me too loosing much here to test out. I'll get a UOA of this if i do pick one up.

Ive used paper filters all my life mainly because i got a steal of a deal. $5 air filter clearance for my car and i bought 10+. I just change them out yearly which for me is 10-15k. Price doesn't bother me at all, nor does the oiling because i'll just oil/clean it every spring when i put on the summer wheels.

Coming from someone who has dyno tuned over 30+ similiar cars to mines, plus the lost cost of $35 i dont see a reason not to try. Do you?

This is just a DROP-IN filter.

 

[LeakySeals]

You would need before and after UOA's to determine if your substituting efficiency for air flow and ultimately engine wear.

 

[Drew99GT]

There are better performance filters than K&N IMO. For a drop in, I'd look at AFE.

 

[heyu]

If your looking for performance K&N is good ,,If your looking for economy it's horrible ,,,,More air flow tells computer controlled engines MORE gas ,,I bought one and it was a flea market item after a 2 mile a gallon decrease with using it

 

[Lead Shoes]

Use an AEM dryflow

 

[bubbajoe_2112]

Been running a K&N drop-in for 120K miles on my 04 TL. The downstream side of my airbox is spotless as is the TB. Silicon levels over 4 different UOAs are all below average (FYI, I live on a dirt road with a 2-mile roundtrip before paved roads, PureOne oil filter with 7500 mile OCI). My top end was spotless during valve adjustment at 106K. And highway MPG has consistently stayed at or above EPA highway estimates (29 MPG). City MPG is pretty much in line with EPA estimates...

 

[scurvy]

Every airbox equipped with a K&N that I've opened has had dirt on the 'clean' side. Couple of dead MAFs, too, even with the filter used straight out of the box - i.e., no overoiling by the user.

Paper filters flow plenty of air & filter much better. IME there's zero benefit and several downsides to using one.

 

[Kiwi_ME]

Originally Posted By: heyu
...More air flow tells computer controlled engines MORE gas ,,I bought one and it was a flea market item after a 2 mile a gallon decrease with using it

Do you know what a throttle does?

 

[randomhero439]

I prefer AEM or AFE dryflow over a K&N

 

[heyu]

Originally Posted By: Kiwi_ME
Originally Posted By: heyu
...More air flow tells computer controlled engines MORE gas ,,I bought one and it was a flea market item after a 2 mile a gallon decrease with using it

Do you know what a throttle does?


Do you know

More air flow = more fuel ,( common Sense ) ,There is no way you can get equal OR better gas mileage with a less restricted air filter ,,I tried a K&N product myself and know for the fact i got way worse fuel mileage with it

 

[Bottom_Feeder]

Just imagine how poor your mileage would be without any filter at all!

 

[LeakySeals]

Originally Posted By: bubbajoe_2112
Been running a K&N drop-in for 120K miles on my 04 TL. The downstream side of my airbox is spotless as is the TB. Silicon levels over 4 different UOAs are all below average (FYI, I live on a dirt road with a 2-mile roundtrip before paved roads, PureOne oil filter with 7500 mile OCI). My top end was spotless during valve adjustment at 106K. And highway MPG has consistently stayed at or above EPA highway estimates (29 MPG). City MPG is pretty much in line with EPA estimates...

Whats the secret? Where do people fail?

 

[Jim Allen]

Are you talking a new drop-in element or a tuned system? In many cases, a drop in element isn't worth all that much more power (but that's variable according to the engine... some show almost none, some show more. In my experience, no more than about 5 hp). Better results come from a full, tuned system of some type. From the tuner POV, a free-flowing K&N may be the right choice... airflow over efficiency... if you are scratching for those last coupla ponies. In that venue, the K&N, or some other oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter, is a good choice.

On a daily driver that you need to last 300K miles, you may want the opposite, because the air filter is the main input to wear-producing contamination in an engine. A typical K&N is 98+ percent efficient on coarse test dust under ISO 5011 (about 95-97% on fine test dust) where a typical paper filter is 99 percent + (about 97-98% on fine). If you live in a clean environment, you will not likely suffer any noticeable bad effects of the time you own the car, but that difference in efficiency IS shortening the potential life of the engine. You just may not have the car long enough to need to worry about it.

Bear in mind that the first part to be hurt by excessive contamination via the air intake is ring sealing and compression... and cylinder pressure is a vital part of the performance equation. In other words, the engine runs, but compression is low and performance is lost due to poor ring sealing.

FYI, how much of a difference is there between 98 and 99 % in terms of how much dirt your engine will ingest? The lesser efficiency filter will allow about 45 more grams ( 0.1 lbs) to pass for every 10 pounds (4500 g) of dirt your filter captures. You can roughly use 45 grams or 0.1# as the amount ingested per percentage point in efficiency. This is per Parker Filtration.

To a large degree, you can have both worlds if you go to a more efficient performance filter, such as the Dry AFE or the AEM. They are both in the 99+ percent range on fine dust. They don't flow as well per square inch of media as an oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter but the mfrs. just add enough media area to compensate.

The MAF thing is a myth with only a few tentacles of truth entwined within. Don't worry much about it no matter which way you go.

Also, fuel economy won't change no matter what kind of filter is on it. Changes in the plumbing may raise or lower it a tiny bit.

If you get a K&N nix the idea of clean/re-oiling all the time. You'll do more harm than good. It's very easy to damage a K&N (or any OCG filter) by overcleaning. In improperly cleaned and damaged OCG filter could lose half it's efficiency if you damage or displace the cotton fibers. Wash them like you were washing a baby! NEVER blow thru them with air but let them air dry.

You were changing your paper filter way too often as well (unless total performance was your goal, though a cheap filter is likely to have been restrictive as well as inefficient). Filter efficiency increases as the filter loads up. Typically, a filter will improve 2 percentage points in it's life and do most of that in the early part of it's life. Another factoid is that 90 percent of the dirt that passes an air filter in it's operational life comes in the first 10 percent of use. The average usable life of a paper filter is around 60-80K miles. If you changed yours at 10K, you were barely getting out of that "heck-zone" before installing a now filter and going right back in there.

 

[coolbird101]

Originally Posted By: Jim Allen
Are you talking a new drop-in element or a tuned system? In many cases, a drop in element isn't worth all that much more power (but that's variable according to the engine... some show almost none, some show more. In my experience, no more than about 5 hp). Better results come from a full, tuned system of some type. From the tuner POV, a free-flowing K&N may be the right choice... airflow over efficiency... if you are scratching for those last coupla ponies. In that venue, the K&N, or some other oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter, is a good choice.

On a daily driver that you need to last 300K miles, you may want the opposite, because the air filter is the main input to wear-producing contamination in an engine. A typical K&N is 98+ percent efficient on coarse test dust under ISO 5011 (about 95-97% on fine test dust) where a typical paper filter is 99 percent + (about 97-98% on fine). If you live in a clean environment, you will not likely suffer any noticeable bad effects of the time you own the car, but that difference in efficiency IS shortening the potential life of the engine. You just may not have the car long enough to need to worry about it.

Bear in mind that the first part to be hurt by excessive contamination via the air intake is ring sealing and compression... and cylinder pressure is a vital part of the performance equation. In other words, the engine runs, but compression is low and performance is lost due to poor ring sealing.

FYI, how much of a difference is there between 98 and 99 % in terms of how much dirt your engine will ingest? The lesser efficiency filter will allow about 45 more grams ( 0.1 lbs) to pass for every 10 pounds (4500 g) of dirt your filter captures. You can roughly use 45 grams or 0.1# as the amount ingested per percentage point in efficiency. This is per Parker Filtration.

To a large degree, you can have both worlds if you go to a more efficient performance filter, such as the Dry AFE or the AEM. They are both in the 99+ percent range on fine dust. They don't flow as well per square inch of media as an oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter but the mfrs. just add enough media area to compensate.

The MAF thing is a myth with only a few tentacles of truth entwined within. Don't worry much about it no matter which way you go.

Also, fuel economy won't change no matter what kind of filter is on it. Changes in the plumbing may raise or lower it a tiny bit.

If you get a K&N nix the idea of clean/re-oiling all the time. You'll do more harm than good. It's very easy to damage a K&N (or any OCG filter) by overcleaning. In improperly cleaned and damaged OCG filter could lose half it's efficiency if you damage or displace the cotton fibers. Wash them like you were washing a baby! NEVER blow thru them with air but let them air dry.

You were changing your paper filter way too often as well (unless total performance was your goal, though a cheap filter is likely to have been restrictive as well as inefficient). Filter efficiency increases as the filter loads up. Typically, a filter will improve 2 percentage points in it's life and do most of that in the early part of it's life. Another factoid is that 90 percent of the dirt that passes an air filter in it's operational life comes in the first 10 percent of use. The average usable life of a paper filter is around 60-80K miles. If you changed yours at 10K, you were barely getting out of that "heck-zone" before installing a now filter and going right back in there.
Bravo! This post should be a sticky.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Jim hit all the good points. I would say forget the drop in, you will most likely see NO improvement over a good OEM spun polyesterfibre filter. Now a CAE might get you 2-5 % depending on OEM restriction as it should be tuned to resonate on the upper torque peak - you may well lose some low rpm torque though. My Honda VTEC would respond to a short ram K&N complete intake to the tune of 5% gain given it has its torque peak in the neighborhood of 5000rpm - but my engine isnt running 100% right now and I dont want it to grenade with an aftermarket intake. Also, I'm almost 60 years old and by right not allowed to have a CAE on a Honda.

 

[Clevy]

Originally Posted By: Brenden
Use an AEM dryflow


This is your best advice. And a drop in isn't going to do much if anything. Don't believe the hype. I've been into performance cars and racing all my life. A paper filter filters better. Period. Paper is only restrictive at wide open throttle and even then we are talking a couple hp tops.
My hemi had a k&n when I bought it. I bought a stock paper one a few weeks after I noticed the k&n in there. Believe it or not the truck was more responsive at part throttle with the paper filter.
Unless you drive with your foot on the floor non stop you will not get any significant gains using an oiled gauze filter.
My mustang has a monster 12" round Amsoil dry filter. I had it on my 2v and when I removed the engine last fall there was no dirt whatsoever in the cai whereas when I had a k&n here was always a fine layer of dust in it.
And before any of the comments come about properly oiling the filter I had been using oiled gauze for 15 years so I know I was doing it right,they just aren't a good filter.
The K&N marketing machine earns their salaries,no question about that .
The Amsoil air filters are tops in my book. No oil. Simple cleaning routine and it lasts forever.
Tell your tuner to stop drinking the cool-aid. Next he will suggest a superbird wing on a front wheel drive and a stage 3 clutch. Or the biggest [censored] can muffler on the shelf.
And no matter what he tells you those brand name bumper stickers won't make the car faster.
What kind of car are we talking talking about here

Edit.
Jim. I've personally seen maf's at the track coated in oil and the filter wasn't grossly overdone. In fact that's why I went with an Amsoil filter. I got tired of seeing dust in my intake so I oiled the filter with a few extra squirts and after 5 or 6 passes my idle went erratic and my car stalled. I didn't know what was going on. Luckily a mustanger was there with his trailer(test and tune night) knew exactly what was going on. He cleaned my maf with electrical contact cleaner while I used my t-shirt to absorb some oil out of the filter,so there is some truth to the maf issue.
Just my humble experience.

 

[heyu]

Originally Posted By: Jim Allen
Are you talking a new drop-in element or a tuned system? In many cases, a drop in element isn't worth all that much more power (but that's variable according to the engine... some show almost none, some show more. In my experience, no more than about 5 hp). Better results come from a full, tuned system of some type. From the tuner POV, a free-flowing K&N may be the right choice... airflow over efficiency... if you are scratching for those last coupla ponies. In that venue, the K&N, or some other oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter, is a good choice.

On a daily driver that you need to last 300K miles, you may want the opposite, because the air filter is the main input to wear-producing contamination in an engine. A typical K&N is 98+ percent efficient on coarse test dust under ISO 5011 (about 95-97% on fine test dust) where a typical paper filter is 99 percent + (about 97-98% on fine). If you live in a clean environment, you will not likely suffer any noticeable bad effects of the time you own the car, but that difference in efficiency IS shortening the potential life of the engine. You just may not have the car long enough to need to worry about it.

Bear in mind that the first part to be hurt by excessive contamination via the air intake is ring sealing and compression... and cylinder pressure is a vital part of the performance equation. In other words, the engine runs, but compression is low and performance is lost due to poor ring sealing.

FYI, how much of a difference is there between 98 and 99 % in terms of how much dirt your engine will ingest? The lesser efficiency filter will allow about 45 more grams ( 0.1 lbs) to pass for every 10 pounds (4500 g) of dirt your filter captures. You can roughly use 45 grams or 0.1# as the amount ingested per percentage point in efficiency. This is per Parker Filtration.

To a large degree, you can have both worlds if you go to a more efficient performance filter, such as the Dry AFE or the AEM. They are both in the 99+ percent range on fine dust. They don't flow as well per square inch of media as an oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter but the mfrs. just add enough media area to compensate.

The MAF thing is a myth with only a few tentacles of truth entwined within. Don't worry much about it no matter which way you go.

Also, fuel economy won't change no matter what kind of filter is on it. Changes in the plumbing may raise or lower it a tiny bit.

If you get a K&N nix the idea of clean/re-oiling all the time. You'll do more harm than good. It's very easy to damage a K&N (or any OCG filter) by overcleaning. In improperly cleaned and damaged OCG filter could lose half it's efficiency if you damage or displace the cotton fibers. Wash them like you were washing a baby! NEVER blow thru them with air but let them air dry.

You were changing your paper filter way too often as well (unless total performance was your goal, though a cheap filter is likely to have been restrictive as well as inefficient). Filter efficiency increases as the filter loads up. Typically, a filter will improve 2 percentage points in it's life and do most of that in the early part of it's life. Another factoid is that 90 percent of the dirt that passes an air filter in it's operational life comes in the first 10 percent of use. The average usable life of a paper filter is around 60-80K miles. If you changed yours at 10K, you were barely getting out of that "heck-zone" before installing a now filter and going right back in there.


Also, fuel economy won't change no matter what kind of filter is on it. Changes in the plumbing may raise or lower it a tiny bit.

I experimented on a economy vehicle AND Disagree ,,Do you work for K&N ? lol ,,Oh well I at least i tried this for real and know from experience that a computer controlled engine will signal more fuel to keep up with the air flow ,,good luck to you all and throw your money away lol

 

[Jim Allen]

Originally Posted By: heyu
[/quote]

I experimented on a economy vehicle AND Disagree ,,Do you work for K&N ? lol ,,Oh well I at least i tried this for real and know from experience that a computer controlled engine will signal more fuel to keep up with the air flow ,,good luck to you all and throw your money away lol


I resent the heck outta of being called a shill! Better you read a person's profile before you make accusations like that. There's no frickin' "LOL" in that for me.

On top of that, you're wrong. I've done a whole lot more testing than you, and on more than just my vehciles as well as a passle of research and consultation with the engineering staffs of car companies and aftermarket product manufacturers and there isn't a grain of truth in what you said. Earlier you said:

Quote:
Do you know

More air flow = more fuel ,( common Sense ) ,There is no way you can get equal OR better gas mileage with a less restricted air filter ,,I tried a K&N product myself and know for the fact i got way worse fuel mileage with it


This makes it very clear your understanding of air flow and fuel economy is limited. I'll start your education by offereing you this: Air Filters & Fuel Economy

 

[Clevy]

Originally Posted By: scurvy
Every airbox equipped with a K&N that I've opened has had dirt on the 'clean' side. Couple of dead MAFs, too, even with the filter used straight out of the box - i.e., no overoiling by the user.

Paper filters flow plenty of air & filter much better. IME there's zero benefit and several downsides to using one.


I agree. I used them for years. I speak from experience.

Originally Posted By: heyu
Originally Posted By: Kiwi_ME
Originally Posted By: heyu
...More air flow tells computer controlled engines MORE gas ,,I bought one and it was a flea market item after a 2 mile a gallon decrease with using it

Do you know what a throttle does?


Do you know

More air flow = more fuel ,( common Sense ) ,There is no way you can get equal OR better gas mileage with a less restricted air filter ,,I tried a K&N product myself and know for the fact i got way worse fuel mileage with it


Just because its less restrictive doesn't mean mileage will drop. That's absurd. Mileage drops because of the drivers foot. Period.
And in reality the air intake needs a slight restriction to improve velocity at part throttle. If your on the strip and your foots on the floor then that's less of an issue but at part throttle an engine is more responsive with a slight restriction. My mustang and chev truck both had less pull when the air box was free flowing.

 

[skyship]

Originally Posted By: Jim Allen
Are you talking a new drop-in element or a tuned system? In many cases, a drop in element isn't worth all that much more power (but that's variable according to the engine... some show almost none, some show more. In my experience, no more than about 5 hp). Better results come from a full, tuned system of some type. From the tuner POV, a free-flowing K&N may be the right choice... airflow over efficiency... if you are scratching for those last coupla ponies. In that venue, the K&N, or some other oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter, is a good choice.

On a daily driver that you need to last 300K miles, you may want the opposite, because the air filter is the main input to wear-producing contamination in an engine. A typical K&N is 98+ percent efficient on coarse test dust under ISO 5011 (about 95-97% on fine test dust) where a typical paper filter is 99 percent + (about 97-98% on fine). If you live in a clean environment, you will not likely suffer any noticeable bad effects of the time you own the car, but that difference in efficiency IS shortening the potential life of the engine. You just may not have the car long enough to need to worry about it.

Bear in mind that the first part to be hurt by excessive contamination via the air intake is ring sealing and compression... and cylinder pressure is a vital part of the performance equation. In other words, the engine runs, but compression is low and performance is lost due to poor ring sealing.

FYI, how much of a difference is there between 98 and 99 % in terms of how much dirt your engine will ingest? The lesser efficiency filter will allow about 45 more grams ( 0.1 lbs) to pass for every 10 pounds (4500 g) of dirt your filter captures. You can roughly use 45 grams or 0.1# as the amount ingested per percentage point in efficiency. This is per Parker Filtration.

To a large degree, you can have both worlds if you go to a more efficient performance filter, such as the Dry AFE or the AEM. They are both in the 99+ percent range on fine dust. They don't flow as well per square inch of media as an oiled cotton gauze (OCG) filter but the mfrs. just add enough media area to compensate.

The MAF thing is a myth with only a few tentacles of truth entwined within. Don't worry much about it no matter which way you go.

Also, fuel economy won't change no matter what kind of filter is on it. Changes in the plumbing may raise or lower it a tiny bit.

If you get a K&N nix the idea of clean/re-oiling all the time. You'll do more harm than good. It's very easy to damage a K&N (or any OCG filter) by overcleaning. In improperly cleaned and damaged OCG filter could lose half it's efficiency if you damage or displace the cotton fibers. Wash them like you were washing a baby! NEVER blow thru them with air but let them air dry.

You were changing your paper filter way too often as well (unless total performance was your goal, though a cheap filter is likely to have been restrictive as well as inefficient). Filter efficiency increases as the filter loads up. Typically, a filter will improve 2 percentage points in it's life and do most of that in the early part of it's life. Another factoid is that 90 percent of the dirt that passes an air filter in it's operational life comes in the first 10 percent of use. The average usable life of a paper filter is around 60-80K miles. If you changed yours at 10K, you were barely getting out of that "heck-zone" before installing a now filter and going right back in there.


A filter that is 98% efficient lets in twice the amount of dirt as one that is 99% efficient, BUT the figures are final filtration rates so the filter would need to be fairly dirty. That also assumes it is correctly oiled, which it never is.
MAF failures from oil contamination are a regular problem for some engines and a lot of K&N users either give up oiling the filter or change back to an OEM unit. A waste of money for some 1 or 2% gain in power and if you want more noise then a straight exhaust works wonders.
Air filters don't effect fuel economy for a modern ECU controlled DI engine.