aftermarket k&n filters

[Lowery Noles]

Hey folks, Heres one for ya. I got my 01 sport trac back valentine day of this year from my wife. After about first few days of driving the Check Engine came on and I was afraid she had gotten a lemon. So I took it to the Ford Dealer and they hook it up and said that I had a leak in the Air intake gasket cause by the oil that came from the air filter. They gave a repair price of $400.00 give or take. But I decided to go to Advance Auto Parts get the gasket set for around 15.00 bucks and about 2hours on sat. fixed it myself. So keep a check on how much recharging oil you put on your air filter before it cause your gaskets to shrink too.

Have a great ST day.

 

[EddieS'04]

Too much oil will mess up the MAF. Not any intake gaskets. Ford Techs dont like K&N. They blame alot on them. Especialy warranty work. If you get to much oil on the MAF from the filter. You can clean it with contact spray or CRC makes a Cleaner now.

I have no doubt the gaskets fixed the problem. The K&N oil wasnt at fault.

 

[Ed C]

I had mine for a long time and never had a problem. This is my third car with a K&N filter. I'm running K&N in my wife's Honda also and it's been running like a charm since I installed it, about 75,000 miles ago. I don't think the filter was the problem.

 

[Richard L]

I had two Sport Tracs over the past 8 years and both had K&N filters and I never had any problems.



It is possible to over-oil them and that excessive oil will coat the MAF sensor wire causing inaccurate air intake readings and CEL's.



Since you are only required to clean the K&N once every 50K miles under notmal use, I suspect that people having prolems are cleaning the filter much too frequently. This leads to the over oiling and excessive wear on the gauze filter material.



Since I used the same K&N on both of my Sport Trac's only had to clean and oil mine once. I had the drop-in OEM style K&N and I would clean and oil it, wrap it in paper towels and set it on a small stack of newspaper to drain and wick out all the excess oil overnight. About every 10K miles I would remove the filter, lightly brush off any obvious leaves, bugs and dirt, clean out the air box and put the filter back in again.



I have never hear of the K&N fileter oil causing an air intake leak, or gasket damage. That is pure BS and I would have told the Tech at the dealer just that. There may have been a leaking gasket, but it's pure BS to claim that it was caused by the K&N filter being over oiled.



...Rich

 

[Johnny O]

I just got a new K&N last night for my '08 and on the sticker and everywhere else it says "K&N filters will not void manufacturers' warranty".

I had one two trucks ago in my '02 Ranger and I'd clean it once a year unless I went 'froading and it was covered with mud. My son's Mustang was bought used and had a K&N in it, I clean it once a year too.

 

[Richard L]

JohnnyO,

The K&N filter will not void the warranty, but over-oiling the filter will require cleaning the MAF and Ford will usually opt to replace it with a new one rather than clean the old one, since they require about the same amount of labor, but they make a nice markup on the price of the new MAF sensor.



Also, I doubt that his 2001 Sport Trac was still under warranty, so this is not a warranty issue, just the fact that the Ford Tech is full of BS.



...Rich

 

[Johnny O]

Also, I doubt that his 2001 Sport Trac was still under warranty, so this is not a warranty issue, just the fact that the Ford Tech is full of BS.

No doubt. That's why we're here. Happy to help.

 

[Michael Cacioppo]

Excess oiling could foul up the MAS, but will not screw up a gasket. The mechanic is either lying or stupid. Use another mechanic next time.