Date:         Fri, 5 Jan 2001 14:17:05 -0800
Reply-To:     Stuart MacMillan <macmillan@HOME.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Stuart MacMillan <macmillan@HOME.COM>
Subject:      Re: K&N
Comments: To: Bill Davidson <wdavidson@THEGRID.NET>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

Remember guys, the K&N has a much greater capacity to hold dust than a
paper filter.  It will actually build up a permeable layer of dirt due
to the oil on the medium causing clumping and actually provide more
depth filtration capacity. That is the purpose of the oil. It is
virtually impossible to clog, which is not the case with paper.  A
clogged paper element can allow dust to get past the seal or even tear.

I actually drove across Washington state the day of the Mt. St. Helens
eruption. It was a dumb thing to do, but I was not going to be denied my
vacation trip to Yellowstone, and you couldn't tell how bad it was when
we left Seattle.  The old '68 Westy I had at the time had an early oil
bath air cleaner on it, and it was lucky for me it did.

These work by directing the air flow down onto a pool of motor oil,
above which is steel wool mesh also saturated  with oil the air flow
through on the way to the engine.  The oil pool collects 99.9% of the
dust and the mesh the rest.  Too messy for modern cars, but it's the
only thing I've seen that is as good as K&N. I drove for over 100 miles
in a dust cloud so thick you could see.  I made it by cutting through
back roads to get around roadblocks and had the road to myself,
otherwise the dust rooster tail other drivers sent up would blind you.
When I got home there was 3/4" of packed dust under that oil pool!

There were plenty of stories of people changing their clogged air
filters only to find later that enough fine ash had gotten into the
engine to ruin it.

I put another six years and 50,000 miles on that engine!

--
Stuart MacMillan
Seattle

'84 Vanagon Westfalia w/2.1  With K&N
'65 MGB (Daily driver since 1969)  With two K&Ns
'74 MGB GT (Restoring sloooowly)  Will have K&Ns!

Assisting on Restoration (and spending OPM):
'72 MGB GT (Daughter's)
'64 MGB (Son's)

Stripped and gone but their parts live on:
'68 MGB, '73 MGB, '67 MGB GT