K&N not recommended by chevy!

GoldenCruze said:

I wish I could find those links now. There are studies that show that the K&N filters do let more dirt through than many other brands of filters. Whether or not that extra dirt causes harm to the engine is a different story. The job of a filter is to remove dirt, not pass air. So I opt for the brands of filters that are the best for doing just that, removing dirt. K&N's whole promotion is on providing more air for performance. That's great on the racing circuit where they regularly tear down and rebuild their engines between races. For my car with the recommendation of changing filter at almost 50,000 miles, I'll skip the process of cleaning and oiling a permanent filter. I have no problem if others like them. It's your car.

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I used a K&N one time, after a month, it blown the MAF on my TDI, i tought it was the age of the MAF so i changed it(135CDN$). A month later the MAF blown again, changed under warranty, I then changed the K&N with an OEM paper filter with prefilter and never had any other problem. Sure the airflow was better with the K&N... but this trick costed me 185$ in a month and half... My mechanics told me that this was due to the oil mist released by the filter itself that gets sticky on the MAF and other components so dust and dirt can easily stick to(like it's meant to be in the filter, stick to particles so the wont pass the filter). Sure it depends where is the MAF located, air pressure (Vaccum in the filter box to the turbo) and airflow . Many people recommend K&N for non-turbo setups only due to the pulsating airflow that help the oil fall in the tubing with the dirt. Imagine all those fine dirt and sand in a 150K RPM aluminum blower... add a little bit of oil in it and it comes pommice, sanding grease, tar or mud.... take a look to this test. This guy did a good test and tried to spread the results to get consistent numbers as much as possible.

Air Filtration Test

BTW Everyone has it's own opinion.
A little question IS ANYBODY HERE SPEAK FRENCH?

Eugene_C said:

I stopped using them when they kept causing my O2 sensors to malfunction. Just use a good paper filter. I think we need better paper filters not oiled ones that don't filter.

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I'm glad to hear someone that point in the same direction than me. I also think we need better paper filter, in my TDI i used to have a prefilter, it's like a foam or cotton on top that traps big particles, at mid life, we remove it to improve longevity of the filter. It was dark and dusty after 8000km. I don't know why it's not the standard(the foam prefilter). This over boosted TDI (150bhp/300+pounds torque) was sucking a **** lot of air and particles due to the positionnement of the intake port right above the front grill fascia. We need two stage filters on our cruze. I'll give a try to NAPA gold air filters, it looks like a good compromise between efficiency and air cleaning and it's cheap. How often do you replace the air filter on the cruze?
*****The filter on my cruze have the Prefilter foam... i'm happy!*****

Look at the filtration numbers done by a private lab and produce your own opinions and conclusions. I will NEVER run a k&n filter on anything I own. My 8.1 truck had one in it when I bought it, I got rid of it in favor of a paper filter within the first week. There is no noticeable gains to be had from swapping in a filter (1-3 hp? you wont notice that) so I will take the filter that filters much better.

Oh, and the dealer CAN void your warranty if they can prove that the part you added caused the failure or helped in the failure. Turbo goes bad bc of excessive amounts of dirt in it and running a k&n that filters. K&N claims they filter 99% of what the OE filters do. Some of the tests ive seen show 200-300% more dirt/dust makes it into the motor running a k&n. im sorry, that 1% is HUGE when it comes to the amount of dirt making it into my motor. My best suggestion is to take the time, check around and see independent tests and see what their results are. If you are fine with running a k&n after seeing the results, thats fine as it doesn't affect me...

whatsstuckk5 said:

Look at the filtration numbers done by a private lab and produce your own opinions and conclusions. I will NEVER run a k&n filter on anything I own. My 8.1 truck had one in it when I bought it, I got rid of it in favor of a paper filter within the first week. There is no noticeable gains to be had from swapping in a filter (1-3 hp? you wont notice that) so I will take the filter that filters much better.

Oh, and the dealer CAN void your warranty if they can prove that the part you added caused the failure or helped in the failure. Turbo goes bad bc of excessive amounts of dirt in it and running a k&n that filters. K&N claims they filter 99% of what the OE filters do. Some of the tests ive seen show 200-300% more dirt/dust makes it into the motor running a k&n. im sorry, that 1% is HUGE when it comes to the amount of dirt making it into my motor. My best suggestion is to take the time, check around and see independent tests and see what their results are. If you are fine with running a k&n after seeing the results, thats fine as it doesn't affect me...

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I'm pretty sure that if you could put end to end a K&N and a paper filter... I bet a 100$ bill(CDN$ that is) that the paper filter will still get as dirty within a week if not reddish 'cause of the oil.

As i said earlier, i'm pretty sure it's OK in a non turbo setup but when you think of that little turbine gasping dirt and fine dust... I don't even want to think of it. All my friends use K&N on their ATV Honda 450R and the performance difference is there, it's a fact... They also have a nylon type jacket over it to trap big particles, it's very obvious when the clean it. When you have a 91hp engine with high restrictions and 0.75 inch exhaust (ricer it is), 2-3 hp is a big increase. when you have a 8.1l... it's a whole other game! If the sound is sound waves that travels on the opposite side of the flow and they get through the filter that much... particles can also. Stay with your K&N if you want, i'm pretty sure you will not blow your engines but for me, it's still a no go!

I ran some of dodge's largest service departments for a few years, and worked closly with Cummins engineers resolving the dreaded DPF and Variable vane turbos in 2007 and 2008.Cummins noted in detailed testing that very fine micron dust woulld flow through the K&N filters and compromise both turbo and ring life in their 5.9 and 6.7. It might not be an issue with a 92 Saturn which is more of a lawn mower than a vehicle, but in a turbo application where the turbo is literally pulling twice the amount of air as a naturally aspirated engine, or in a diesel engine that has no throttle butterfly up to 5 times as much air, its a huge issue.Cummins has extremely exotic means of measuring the amount of particles in air after filtration, and when I was at their plant in Indiana, I saw first hand just how poor the K&N filters were.Face it, if you increase air flow, you cannot have the same or better filtration. Its impossible. For all of you who drink the kool aid by K&N, its your vehicle. However, take a white rag and wipe the air tract post filter, and you will see what I'm talking about