Racing

One might consider a paved road course or oval track as a clean air zone. After all, how much dirt and debris could be hovering above an asphalt track?

Subscribing to that theory, a road racer may elect to forgo an air filter in favor of large volumes of unrestricted air. However, testing the theory using an air filter enclosed in a vented housing should dispel the myth. The filter and housing will trap particles of loose trash kicked up by other race cars during the heat of battle. Dirt, small stones and pieces of shredded rubber expelled from soft compound racing tires can be found inside the housing after even a short race. Once a driver, car owner or engine builder realizes just how much trash is thrown around during a normal race, few would expose their expensive engines to unfiltered air in future events.

Whenever possible, performance enthusiasts should install a K&N 360 degree totally open-element filter. A correctly sized conical or round filter will deliver 100 percent air flow with no measurable restriction. And, as we have learned, providing the engine with all of the air it needs promotes optimum performance. In a high speed application, a K&N filter will straighten the air which counteracts turbulence. Straight cut velocity stacks, for example, pose a unique problem. Exposed to the outside air, velocity stacks experience a phenomena that actually hinders performance at high speed. We are referring to stacks and air horns that protrude through the hood and extend into the air stream so the direction of the air rushing over the car is at a perpendicular angle to the length of the tube.

Air moving rapidly over these stacks create turbulence inside the opening. At high speed, the rushing air tends to create a partial vacuum inside the tube. The condition is counterproductive to air flow. The phenomena also effects open carburetors not running stacks/ram pipes. This principal is of course how a paint spray gun works, in the case of the spray gun we are trying to get something out, but in the the case of the engine, something in. The higher the ground speed, the greater the problem. Vacuum created by the engine is trying to coax air into the cylinders and the high speed air flowing over the open end of the stack is causing resistance in the wrong direction..

Reversion creates other problems. In an automotive application, reversion refers to reversed air flow, or in simpler terms, it's when air in the intake runner reverses direction for a split second. The condition is caused when a burst of pressure escapes into the intake runner from the cylinder during valve opening, and after it has closed. Studies have shown reversion creates resonance shock waves inside the tubes which exit the open end of the tube at various rates depending on engine speed and runner lengths. It has also been proven that these shock waves interfere with each other when the stacks are in close proximity. Installing a free-flowing air filter on top of each stack or over the carburetor air horn eliminates these conditions.

How? The solution is simply explained. The filter creates a plenum over the opening. Air entering the filter is slowed, smoothed and straightened. The filter then becomes an endless source of calm, clean air. Shock waves dissipate within the confines of the plenum without interfering with the shock waves emitted from an adjacent stack.