| | One of the things I've been meaning to get for my car for the longest
time is a K&N rechargeable air filter. I finally broke down and
ordered it after having changed the air filter twice in my car over the
course of a year last week, and it came in today.
Why a rechargeable air filter?
If you look at the air filter in your car, it very much resembles a
coffee filter on steroids. It's made of paper with a rubber surround,
and fits in a plastic box inside your engine. There are a couple of
things that the K&N filter solves -
- Try putting your
hand on the other side of a coffee filter (or the air filter in your
car, for that matter) and blowing through it. You don't feel much on
the other side, right? Well, instead of your hand, when installed, on
the other side of that air filter is your engine. The K&N filter
is made of synthetic materials that allow much more air to flow through
to the engine. More air to the engine means better combustion - fuel
will burn more completely.
- Once a paper filter element is
"done", it's done. You have to throw it away. The K&N filter has
recharge kits available, which are basically canisters of a special
kind of oil. This oil helps the filter do its job, and so you recharge
the filter as often as you would change your air filter.
Initial Impressions
- because more air is getting to the engine, everything seems to happen
just a little bit faster. Throttle response is better, it takes less
throttle tip-in to rev-match on upshifts and downshifts, VTEC kicks
just a little harder, the car doesn't complain nearly as much when
coasting in second...overall drivability is vastly improved, and the
car is quite a bit more fun. K&N claims fuel efficiency
improvements, but I'll have to wait to measure that until after the
first tank at least - I'm having too much fun driving the thing! Also,
the filter seems to have gotten rid of this whiny sound that the engine
would make at idle, although I'm not sure exactly why that would be.
Price and installation - for
my application, the filter was about $47 direct from K&N, with a
few dollars for shipping. Installation took literally less than five
minutes - open up the air box, take out old filter, put in new filter,
close up air box. If you have any trouble with this install, it would
have to do with the positioning of the air box under the hood.
Considering that a paper air filter for me costs over $20 from
AutoZone, the K&N is an incredible deal.
I save money on air
filters because I'm no longer changing them every 6k miles, I'm getting
better performance *and* better gas mileage, and the environmental
impact of my car is lowered (slightly) by using less paper filters -
this is a no-brainer of an upgrade, especially with the install as
simple as it is. Seriously, all of you guys need to be running K&N
filters if you aren't already. Order from www.knfilters.com. |
| | Posted 7/21/2007 10:21 PM - 150 Views - 2 eProps - 1 Comment
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