I recently bought a 99 vert, no mods. I was just offered a brand new in the box K&N Filter FIPK for $100. What are your opinions about this set-up vs. others? How challenging is this one to install? (Looks like an involved process for a change-out) Thanks!

 

that price is great for any intake. the instal is as simple as loosening some clamps and pulling! go for it

 

I installed an FIPK on my car about a month ago. You do have a little cutting to do but it's not too much work. I think it is a quality setup and I paid about 3 times that much for mine.

 

It's a decent setup that is more of a semi-cold air system vs a true cold air system. Still, for that price, you can't go wrong!

 

I use it here in California because it has an Calif Air Resources Board approval/exemption number.

And.....sometime at smog check that may be very valuable.

 

We were having the same conversation on the Z06 forum and here is what I posted there... I don't have an axe to grind relative to K&N, but before you change to one, just know what you are doing....

K&N's are crap......Ok, that may be a bit harsh, but they aren't a good air filter. I would like to see all of the air filter manufacturers publish their ISO 5011 test results so that we could compare on an equal basis, what they are selling us. I am pretty sure that the K&N folks won't, because there filter really doesn do that well in the real world of quanatitive testing. There is so much misinformation out there, and a lot of PR and hype, that you have to figure that somebody is making a lot of money on this stuff. All I am seeing is 99% efficienty, yada, yada, yada......

Ok, all you K&N fans, before you start flaming, go here and read this entire technical report:

http://www.duramax-diesel.com/spicer/index.htm

What you will see is that most filters, even the K&N's will keep 99% of the dirt out of the engine, so the K&N claims are true. Problem is, a good paper flter will keep out 99.9% of the dirt (or put it another way, the K&N is passing 10 times the amount of dirt when compared to the paper filter) and while the flow restriction is indeed higher with a paper filter, it also had the capability to trap a lot more dirt than a K&N. What that means is that a K&N will give you some power while it is clean, but the trade off is passing more crap thru your enigine over time, and when it gets dirty it is pretty much worthless. Also the total amount of dirt the K&N can hold is a lot lower than a good paper filter. So if you want to use your K&N you should clean it often, since it will only go about half as long as a proper paper element. While lots of folks are saying they got this many thousand miles on their K&N's there are vey few that have used them for the kind of life where you will see a difference between a conventional filter and a K&N...

I plan on keeping my car for a long time, so I am keeping a good quality paper element in it, and changing it a reasonable intervals. If I give up a couple of horsepower doing that, compared to using a poor filter, that's fine. If I want more performance, there are ways to get it without passing more junk thru you engine and potentially reducing the life of the rings and valves....

 

Solofast makes a very interesting point. (Please read his research) If the AC/Delco stock air filter set-up allows for the very least amount of debris to enter the engine, and all other cold air systems allow for more debris to enter the engine, wouldn't the relatively small HP gain of a cold air system be an unwise trade-off for the filter protection of the stock set-up?

 

Yep, high flow air filters aren’t magic. They can’t pass more air without letting in more debris. So why would anybody use anything but a paper filter? Do yourself a favor sween and install that K&N, go out for a ride and lay into it a few times. That smile on your face when you feel the car pull just a little harder than before, that’s why somebody would install a filter that’s not paper.

 

I just finished cleaning my Halltech Warhead filter. It flows much better than the stock or Z06 box and I can vouch without a smidgen of doubt that this filter cleans VERY well. Not only was the inside of the filter spotless, but the inside of the airbridge, MAF and throttlebody were so clean, you could eat off of them. This is after 2.5 years and 12,000 miles WITH CAI blasting outside air at the filter. I am in the process of a procedural write-up about this, but I had to tell you guys that this filter is VERY good.

 

I've read that the Green filters are far better than the K&N and filter just about as good as paper with superior airflow compared to all.

Funny though how Green writes up to clean and reoil thier filters at 50K miles, but in the clean and reoil kit, they say to do it every 6k miles.

 

I read a comparison of filters a few years ago, and it was done by K&N, they obviously published it cause their fiter was on top, but they claim the more dirt in their filter, yes it flows less, but filters better because of the oil. The dirt sticks on the filter, and the oil film creeps, trapping more dirt. I have a K&N on my old vette, ('86) and it's true, the intake duct and maf and throttle body are totally clean clean clean.
I clean the filter and do stuff every thanksgiving 4 day holiday, so I have a reference date stuck in my feeble brain.
My '01 coupe still has the factory paper, I am going to change, and now theres so many filters out there, it's hard to know whats best.
I would guess that a few of the other manufacturers have bought a K&N, and done their own testing, and either are the same or might be slightly better. but without independent testing, who really knows for sure

 

yada yada, First thing I do is put in a "K&N". Your wrong here buddy,
a
paper filter will clog much quicker, and hold less dirt and the poor performance gets worse. I have clean oil a 3.5k, I never go further than that. There is no good intake that does have a K&N type filter.
Use your paper filter and read your "reports" who cares. And drive your slug. but lay off the K&N type as they are
the best performance filter for every day use, hell even the back of my Throttle blade was white glove clean a 17k..shezz

 

I put my K&N in the shed after trying a test... I put a light coating of heavy grease in the intake tube after the filter and drove it for a few oil changes and did the same thing with a stock paper filter. The difference in the amount of dust/grit collected through the K&N was shocking and I'll never use another one again. I'm assuming the K&N was oiled properly since it was almost new.

 

I just got the Accel Cool Blue for my Trans Am. Don't know much about it but it looks like all the rest.

 

Thanks for the Link Solofast.

I had heard this information before but never actually saw the test results.

 

Go with it here is mine:





Really felt a difference over the stocker! Much more crisp in the response!

Thanks,Matt

 

"Vette" magazine just did an LT-1 hop up project. One of the things they installed was a modified air box lid from MidAmerica, with both an OE Delco filter as well as a K&N filter. According to them, the K&N showed a "0" hp gain on their back to back dyno runs. Naturally, the open lid for the air box showed the most gain.

 

There's another data point.....

I'd be willing to bet that in most cases the increase in power is neglegible... However, since 99% of the people who buy a performance filter never put their car on a dyno they have no idea if they are really makinng any more power.

I saw a K&N add on TV the other night and the guys who had one in their truck were saying "you can hear the difference, it's making more power it goes wwaaaaaaa". What is is making is just more induction noise because there is no cover on the airbox, but if it's louder, it "feels stronger".....

To coin the old phrase, "there's a sucker born every minute"

 

Same thing as the $40 audio cables vs. the $5 ones.

 

So because some magazine but a K&N in the stock air box and did not notice a gain that means an FIPK will also show no gain? With the B&B Bullets already installed when the FIPK went on my car guess how much intake noise I can here? In my case FIPK = a noticeable increase in acceleration. Simple as that.