Having used K&N filters (and never had a problem!), AND having looked thru these filters outside...and had a problem (just see too much sky!) , I compared the K&N air filter to a cut up Napa Gold oil filter I had on my workbench, and came to the following conclusion: Any dirt or sand getting thru the air filter is sandblasting my top end, THEN getting blown out my exhaust. What isn't blown out the exhaust is trapped in the oil after grinding the rings a little, which is then filtered by a PAPER oil filter. Sooooooooo...looking at silicone levels in a UOA seems like it might be misleading at best, and maybe a complete waste of time at worst. Most of the junk that came in thru the air filter has already been filtered by a paper oil filter numerous times, or simply blown out of the engine already. Comments...?
K&N filters...and silicone levels?
- Thread starter geeeman
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From what I've learned at this site...filters are not 100% efficent. They may claim sub 20 micron filtering capacity...but it might only be able to filter out 5% of the overall sub 20 micron particles, and miss the other 95%.
Plus that silicon has to reach the filter before it gets filtered out...imagine the nice job it does when it tries to squeeze between a bearing on the way to the filter...
Plus that silicon has to reach the filter before it gets filtered out...imagine the nice job it does when it tries to squeeze between a bearing on the way to the filter...
Patman
Staff member
You also need to look at more than just silicon numbers in the report though, but all of the wear metals together. Someone like Terry Dyson could easily interpret your UOA to tell you if you're getting more engine wear because of dirt ingestion. I'm letting him decide for me whether or not to keep the K&N in my Corvette or not. I'm changing the oil tomorrow, and will get the UOA results before the end of the week. If Terry says the K&N is causing me more engine wear, I'll be putting in an OEM AC Delco filter.
I assume this is the reason for the K&N Filter oil, thats what traps all the small particles.
Patman , out of all the posts I have read on the K&N filter yours makes the most sense.Do a UOA and let a Oil professional make the call! Takes out all the guess work.
Patman
Staff member
Yep, and the results are in, I did a 5000 mile interval and saw 7ppm of silicon, which is less than I used to see in my last GM vehicle when using an AC Delco air filter. And the wear numbers overall were spectacular! I'm keeping this filter for sure.
Here are the results:
5000 miles on oil
Aug7-Oct 11 (2 months)
37,000 miles on engine
German Castrol Syntec 0w30
K&N oil filter
K&N air filter
Daily driver, lots of full throttle
9 quarter mile runs, 10 dyno runs
7L oil capacity
no top up oil
Onboard computer said it had 39% oil life left
Iron 8
Lead 1
Aluminum 3
Copper 2
Chromium 0
Nickel 0
Titanium 0
Tin 0
Silver 0
Vanadium 0
Silicon 7
Potassium 0
Sodium 0
Boron 5
Barium 0
Manganese 3
Calcium 2419
Magnesium 101
Moly 26
Phosphorus 737
Zinc 831
Sulfur 2420
Oxidation 56%
Nitration 39%
Sulfation 42%
Fuel 0
Water 0
Glycol 0
Viscosity 11.5 cst at 100c
TBN 6.2
Nice results. I am really not suprised. Ive been saying it all along.
This is the 6th or 7th good UOA we have seen with the K&N drop in air filter, further prooving that there filters do the same job a paper air filter does.
This also shows that the ISO 5011/SAE J726 test results posted on this forum are false in all its content.
When a test shows a paper ACdelco passing no dirt at all, but then a puralator paper, which is practically the same pass 5 grams of dirt, you know you cannot believe anything on that test.
Nice UOA.
This is the 6th or 7th good UOA we have seen with the K&N drop in air filter, further prooving that there filters do the same job a paper air filter does.
This also shows that the ISO 5011/SAE J726 test results posted on this forum are false in all its content.
When a test shows a paper ACdelco passing no dirt at all, but then a puralator paper, which is practically the same pass 5 grams of dirt, you know you cannot believe anything on that test.
Nice UOA.
I honestly don't think it would really matter with a box filter element anyway. Most stock paper airfilters are sandwiched into an extremely restrictive intake system, which is all but isolated from an exterior air source. Most have a variety of covaluted bends and twists and dump into large air spaces, to try and reduce idle and wot noise, prior to ever even reaching the air filter element.
A better comparison (if you really wanted to look at filter efficency) would be open conical air element filters from the wheel well, paper vs foam vs cotton gauze. Since those elements are directly exposed to exterior elements, the filtering ability of the filter would show drastic differences if one media was letting a sizable amount of more dirt in vs another.
I'm not debating on the K&N's filtering efficency here, but agreeing with you that the test methods need to be adjusted.
A better comparison (if you really wanted to look at filter efficency) would be open conical air element filters from the wheel well, paper vs foam vs cotton gauze. Since those elements are directly exposed to exterior elements, the filtering ability of the filter would show drastic differences if one media was letting a sizable amount of more dirt in vs another.
I'm not debating on the K&N's filtering efficency here, but agreeing with you that the test methods need to be adjusted.
crossbow ,you just described my cold air intake.It has a conical K&N open element air filter pulling the air from the wheel well directly behind the front tire splash gard.Thats how I ended up with 35ppm of silicon with a clean filter. Once it got dirty the silicon went down to 17ppm.I`m not sure that any filter would work in that kind of enviroment.I tried going back to the stock system but really noticed the lack of power.The K&N was reinstalled last week.
Ya thats exactly what I'm talking about. Have you thought about replacing the K&N with a baldwin conical paper filter, or maybe an SnB? I'm about to put my new cold air intake on and will be running a baldwin paper filter in the winter (then taking it off) and running an SnB the rest of the year. (When debris isn't anywhere near as bad as the salt/sand)
Would be interesting to see if your silicon levels dropped significantly if you swapped to a non K&N based conical filter on the end of your intake.
I'll be willing to do the same comparison myself, but it'll be almost a year before the data's ready.
This would help reinforce that some standard box type stock air intake systems don't provide enough "exposure" to really show whether one filter is more efficent then another in regards to overall efficency. (Aka it wouldn't matter that much what you use)
I would be afraid to use a paper conical filter because of the possible waterspash exposure.Blackstone universal adverages for my truck are 12 ppm of silicon.
Patman could give lessons, folks. This guy really knows how to take care of a vehicle.
Good Job!
Bob W.
RD4K:
I thought you got angry and quit? Personally, I think you are a good resource and I am glad to see you are back.
However, I think the name calling ("You are the product of a group of incredibly paranoid people who honestly have never even seen inside an engine before in there life") is probably less than optimal.
Bob W.
If I read your UOA right you only had 4 ppm of silicon.Thats awesome! My CAI sits below the engine bay. If you crawl under my truck you can touch it.It gets lots of cold air and also lots of dirt.Cold air = H.P.
Yeah, I am still here, I will try to keep my posts to a professional level.
I personally do not see much dust in my area, so I have been cleaning the K&N every 30-50k miles. Sometimes i will begin to see the edges of the cotton begin to turn white again, and in that case give it a mist of oil.
Glad to see you are back.
So, how often do you clean the K&N's, assuming that the filter is being used in normal driving conditions? I was thinking around 10-12K miles, but I really have no idea if this is too much/too little.
Thanx
Bob W.
I use a drop in K&N filter on my Hemi Durango and all of this talk got me nervous. The Blaskstone report came back on 3000 miles of Napa Synthetic 5w30 a few days ago and I am way below average levels on silicon and engine wear. One thing that no one has touched on is that K&N filtering ablilty actually increases as they accumulate dirt. Over clean and you could be doing your motor a diservice.
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