What will a K&N filter do for my car?

DubTony

I'm fitting a new air flow sensor at the weekend, and figured I might just stick in a new air filter while I'm at it.

What sort of increase in power can I expect (if any) from a K&N air filter in my BMW 323ci (year 2000) with 100K on the clock.

colm_mcm

Presume you're talking panel filter as opposed to induction. you might see another 2 or 3 bhp compared to the standard filter.

I'm a fan of performance filters, not too keen on induction kits.

Barr

I installed one in an FTO I had once - found the mpg went to crap and put the standard airbox in after about a week.

colm_mcm

Barr wrote: »

I installed one in an FTO I had once -

What one did you fit?

Barr

colm_mcm wrote: »

What one did you fit?

It was an ITG - good sound though with a decat

colm_mcm

I heard where an ITG was shown to reduce bhp by 2 or 3 on a rolling road compared to standard setup.

then I heard last weekend of a GPX showing 209bhp with an ITG and Blueflame exhaust.

DubTony

Thanks, I think...

Way to hijack the thread lads. Ah well, if you can't beat 'em, might as well join 'em.

Mine was a lowly 1994 GS. A measly 1831 cc - Tiptronic no less. No fancy filters or exhausts, but it held it's own (kinda) with GRs and GPXs. And it regularly hit the limiter ... well after 180K I might add.

Barr

Theres no shame in a GS DubTony

That suprises me about the ITF filter tbh , I always though there would be a minimal gain.You would definately have to mate the filter with a good s/s exhaust system to have any benefit

Neilw

colm_mcm wrote: »

I heard where an ITG was shown to reduce bhp by 2 or 3 on a rolling road compared to standard setup.

then I heard last weekend of a GPX showing 209bhp with an ITG and Blueflame exhaust.

Was it an ITG panel filter or an induction kit?
MIRA did some independent testing on ITG's and the results were very good.

http://www.chippedire.com/download/mira.pdf

10-10-20

I personally wouldn't install one.
The high performance filters simply allow more air through by increasing the filter particulate size. In other words, you'll get more crap into your engine.
There is good reason for why the manufacturer chose the filter type for your car, so adding one which has less ability to filter is asking for trouble.

Granted, you won't have an issue day-1, but some day...

colm_mcm

was an ITG induction Neil. I have a D'Cuatro panel filter, Blueflame quads and a decat in mine, must get it dynod soon.

The GS is kind of the poor relation, but it's still a nippy car.

10-10-20 wrote: »

I personally wouldn't install one.
The high performance filters simply allow more air through by increasing the filter particulate size. In other words, you'll get more crap into your engine.

I'm not sure that's true.

Neilw

10-10-20 wrote: »

I personally wouldn't install one.
The high performance filters simply allow more air through by increasing the filter particulate size. In other words, you'll get more crap into your engine.
There is good reason for why the manufacturer chose the filter type for your car, so adding one which has less ability to filter is asking for trouble.

Granted, you won't have an issue day-1, but some day...

Bit if a sweeping statement there, have a look at my previous post, the one with the mira test.

Neilw

colm_mcm wrote: »

was an ITG induction Neil. I have a D'Cuatro panel filter, Blueflame quads and a decat in mine, must get it dynod soon.

The GS is kind of the poor relation, but it's still a nippy car.

I'm not sure that's true.

Some induction kits are not very well designed and will reduce power, I had a neuspeed induction kit on my own car and it felt down on power. Refitted the standard airbox and the pep was back.

Have a performance filter in the standard airbox now and it's all going well

10-10-20

I've a K&N filter here for my car - I can see through it.
It's holier than the man in Rome.

And besides, in what decade was that report made? '77?
Complete with handwritten superscripts!

Neilw

10-10-20 wrote: »

I've a K&N filter here for my car - I can see through it.
It's holier than the man in Rome.

And besides, in what decade was that report made? '77?
Complete with handwritten superscripts!

The oil in the k&n is whats used to filter out particles, if it's not oiled properly it wont filter correctly. I've had k&n's in every car I've previously owned and never found them to be "holier than the man in Rome"

colm_mcm

Neilw wrote: »

Some induction kits are not very well designed and will reduce power,

Have a performance filter in the standard airbox now and it's all going well

It's the placement of the induction system in the engine bay that messes things up, you need a proper cold air feed to make it work.

Neilw

colm_mcm wrote: »

It's the placement of the induction system in the engine bay that messes things up, you need a proper cold air feed to make it work.

Yep, the neuspeed one I had didn't have a proper air feed. Had a metal heat shield that was as much use as an ashtray on a motorbike

Stevie Dakota

I took my K&N out of my old BMW after reading up on it, not convinced by its filtration. It made the car more noisy, not any faster.

DanGerMus

To be fair the difference they make would be hard pressed to be measured on a rolling road test.

If you want a tangible performance upgrade then you have to spend some bucks, maybe a Supercharger then you'll know all about it.

DubTony

Could I get one of those supercharger things on ebay? Would it be easy enough to fit while I'm putting on the MAF?

DanGerMus

This is not a super charger!!!!

http://cgi.ebay.ie/NEW-BMW-E30-E36-E46-E39-TURBO-SUPERCHARGER-INTAKE_W0QQitemZ220407285276QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM?hash=item33514c461c&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1301|66%3A2|65%3A12|39%3A1|240%3A1318|301%3A1|293%3A1|294%3A50


This is a supercharger
http://www.koperformance.com/BMW/turbo_superchargers/vf_engineering/vf_enginnering_supercharger_for_e46_323_and_325.htm

DubTony

aa- haahh!

Thanks


:D:D

gunhappy_ie

the power gain from a k&n alone would be minimum unless the particular model car has a very restrictive intake. You will see and possibly feel power gains if you added a performance exhaust.... And dont mean the back box that argos sell ! You need full system....preferably stainless A k&N on its own will however give you a "meatier" induction roar that i personally love !

DUBLINHITMAN

gunhappy_ie wrote: »

the power gain from a k&n alone would be minimum unless the particular model car has a very restrictive intake. You will see and possibly feel power gains if you added a performance exhaust.... And dont mean the back box that argos sell ! You need full system....preferably stainless A k&N on its own will however give you a "meatier" induction roar that i personally love !

id rather have no noise and some bhp added
panel filter all the way for me , i drive a evo 9 and wouldnt put any induction kit on it ,,
btw i'm 30 years old and have had numerous cars dc5 type'r civics ek4 ek9 evo 3 ,7, 9 ,

ive tried induction on them all and the only gain i got was a spoon drop in filter on the dc5 and kn;N panel filter on the evo's ..

my friend has a altezza and orderd a apexi inductin kit and on the box it stated will decrease bhp bye 3-5 bhp ,,

just my thoughts its not about noise its about performance ..

JHMEG

I had a K&N drop in panel filter. mpg was already bad, so the K&N made no real difference. I thought the engine was able to breath a bit better from 7500rpm to the 8500rpm limiter tho, than with a paper filter from the motor factors. But that could have just been in my head.

HungryJoey

The real reason most people get worse MPG out of these filters or Induction kits is because to get the "bwarrrppp" sound or to see if it really makes a difference in performance - you hit the gas more resulting in poorer MPG.


Performance wise its probably not going to add much BHP if any at all, and in some cases with the whole "heat soak" IE. bad placement you can even loose a bit of power. Usually though they help the engine breath a little bit better and don't restrict airflow as easily.

In reality though if you dont want it for the noise but performance stick in a decent panel filter or a Cold Air feed & filter.

cianclarke

I've been tempted by a K&N myself, but after reading this thread - although I'm doubting the dangers, the benefits don't seem to be worth it, and I don't really want any more noise.. I'm already driving what people will probably see as a cock-mobile!

gunhappy_ie

DUBLINHITMAN wrote: »

id rather have no noise and some bhp added
panel filter all the way for me , i drive a evo 9 and wouldnt put any induction kit on it ,,
btw i'm 30 years old and have had numerous cars dc5 type'r civics ek4 ek9 evo 3 ,7, 9 ,

ive tried induction on them all and the only gain i got was a spoon drop in filter on the dc5 and kn;N panel filter on the evo's ..

my friend has a altezza and orderd a apexi inductin kit and on the box it stated will decrease bhp bye 3-5 bhp ,,

just my thoughts its not about noise its about performance ..

Its possible that the decrease is due to the kit leaving filter in a bad position in engine bay of the car. I agree with more power over noise but IMO alot of the kits are designed to look good and are priced accordingly. Not many people are going to fork out if a kit is multiple times the price it is now because the kit includes all piping needed to relocate the filter to cooler spot ie the front of the car. Its the same for my legacy (or any turbo/supercharged car).... 2 turbos really keep the things hot under the bonnet. Sure i can buy a 500 blitz induction kit for it that would allow more of the wrong type of air into the engine ( hot air) because of its location and it most definatly would lead to a power loss. To do it right the kit would need replumming to the front of the car.

Dabko

Stuck k&n air filter into 2ltr mondeo tddi, done a grand job. Extra poke from turbo higher up the revs & still getting 53mpg (mixed driving). Have gone 15k miles since too with no issues.

mickdw

Do not fit an oiled air filter with modern Maf sensor setup or you will need a new MAF very often. Any oil contamination getting at the reading wire of the MAF sensor will reduce its ability to do its job and turn it to scrap

Neilw

mickdw wrote: »

Do not fit an oiled air filter with modern Maf sensor setup or you will need a new MAF very often. Any oil contamination getting at the reading wire of the MAF sensor will reduce its ability to do its job and turn it to scrap

That's an urban myth, sure maf's die with standard paper filters. K&N did a lot of research into this including covering a maf in filter oil and it still didn't fail. It's luck of the draw with maf's

urbanmick

Hi all, while browsing the web i was intrigued by your thread & refreshed by the level of educated sceptisism about induction kits.
firstly i should mention i am the Irish distributor for itg but this is not a shameless plug on my own behalf, i welcome your debate as there is a lot of mis-information going around so if permitted by mods i will answer any of your questions related to itg air filters in this thread.

as a motor enthusiast of some 12 years prior to my dealings with "itg" i had tried all the so called power giving induction kits & came to the same conclusions that many of you here have reached .....for the most part they dont work or you sacrafice some of the ability to actually filter the air travelling into your cylinder. It would be pedantic to argue rolling road figures as there are far too many variables but For arguements sake while a filter may give a gain of 1 to 30 bhp(some claims are incredible) initially due to its filtering abilities or lack thereof, it may allow larger particles through, leading to all sorts of wear/hot spot attributes on cylinder walls pistons & valves which after time could result in 10...20....30 bhp loses.

itg have 3 levels of foam available
F1, or the same foam they supply to formula 1 teams like Renault etc.(special order)
TC, or touring car foam which again is only recommended for track use.(special order)
TF, or trifoam which is recommended for road & even Rally use, this will filter particles of less than 20 microns which could not be boasted by rivals. the design & structure of the "itg" pro filter means it will not suffer "dust load up" anywhere near to the same extent as some others meaning the pro filter is estimated to be good for 60,000km. Rather than claiming added bhp to your vehicle its claim is that it will not cost you power. I realise that mira report was done way back in the [EMAIL="80@s"]'80's[/EMAIL] but i believe its result to be still valid today. where filters suffer from dust load up, air pressure is lost & therefore bhp is lost.
With the limited exception of the maxogen kits "itg" supply filters to profesionals who will decide where & how to gain power through tuned intake lengths & position
"itg" do not market themselves in the way some shameless companies do. imho itg's racing heritage & integrity are beyond reproach & their product is of the highest quality.

mickdw

Neilw wrote: »

That's an urban myth, sure maf's die with standard paper filters. K&N did a lot of research into this including covering a maf in filter oil and it still didn't fail. It's luck of the draw with maf's

Its far from being an urban myth. Ive seen many cases of MAF needing cleaning due to an oil coating in cars with oiled filters. Compare cars with oiled air filter and without and you will see the difference.
Also, see various articles by diagnostics expert in Car maechanic magazine. He will always comment on the problems related to oiled filters and MAFs

Neilw

mickdw wrote: »

Its far from being an urban myth. Ive seen many cases of MAF needing cleaning due to an oil coating in cars with oiled filters. Compare cars with oiled air filter and without and you will see the difference.
Also, see various articles by diagnostics expert in Car maechanic magazine. He will always comment on the problems related to oiled filters and MAFs

I'm not a believer Every car I've owned (driving 12 years) has had an oiled filter in it and I've never had a single problem.
Might be possible if the filter is drenched and over oiled. I think it's just a cop out to blame filters for causing maf failures. Maf's die on perfectly standard cars too, how is that explained?

mickdw

Neilw wrote: »

I'm not a believer Every car I've owned (driving 12 years) has had an oiled filter in it and I've never had a single problem.
Might be possible if the filter is drenched and over oiled. I think it's just a cop out to blame filters for causing maf failures. Maf's die on perfectly standard cars too, how is that explained?

In many cases its dirt particals hitting the reading wire of the MAF causing it to be damaged. This is down to carelessly replaced airfilter, lack of airfilter replacement, crack in intake pipe after filter, or just a failure of the meter itself.

Neilw

mickdw wrote: »

In many cases its dirt particals hitting the reading wire of the MAF causing it to be damaged. This is down to carelessly replaced airfilter, lack of airfilter replacement, crack in intake pipe after filter, or just a failure of the meter itself.

Then who is to say it's not one of the reasons above that a maf fails on a car with an oiled filter