I know alot of you have them, but I was thinking about buying the K&N drop in OEM style filters for my 2001 5.4L Supercrew and my 2005 Freestyle. Any thoughts? Have you been happy with them? How do you clean them? They are about twice the cost of a normal air filter but if they truly last a million miles then they should be worht it...right?

 

I put a drop in, in my 01, 5.4 which I subsuquently gave to my son. I don't think the milage improved, but it may have been just a little more responsive and had a neat little whistle @ WOT. All in all not bad. I did just put in a K&N CAI in 07 screw, I like it! I've heard that K&N is not the best choice, but I have about 2k miles on it with no problems.

TT

 

I have had the K & N drop in since my truck was new, now have 48,000 miles. It is easy to clean, which I do about every 15,000 miles. Been told that is overkill. You wash it with a spray solution in a kit, then lightly spray it with an oil from the kit. No big deal. My truck uses almost no oil, barely moves on the stick in 4,000 miles.

 

I got a drop in from my Laser a couple years ago, didn't improve anything a normal person could notice, possibly more turbo noise but that would have been about it if anything. I later found out they don't filter as good as the originals and if you overoil them they can mess stuff up, that was $40 I was wishing I could have gotten back. I have ran regular filters on everything since and haven't had a problem with them yet. One advange to the K&N though is you get them wet wheeling they don't melt, but if you get them wet chances are you won't be caring much about your air filter either.

 

I had a K&N drop-in filter in my F-150 and I didnt like it. It fit very poorly and after about a year of using it I had a thin coating of dust all in the inside of the ducting from the airbox to the intake.
Compared to the OEM filter, the K&N fit my truck VERY poorly.
I didnt notice any MPG improvement with the K&N.
I like the paper OEM filter better. I think its easier to deal with. Every 12,000 miles I take out the old filter and put the new one in. It takes about 5 minutes and is a lot easier to do than the yearly cleaning and reoiling of a K&N.

 

I've got about 110,000 miles on my drop in K&N. I've only cleaned it a total of three times and have removed 'caked' on dust a couple of times with some additional oiling per the instructions when running in dusty conditions.

I've yet to have a MAF problem. I've yet to find any dust on the inside of the intake. I've yet to have any reason to take it out, other then to clean it...

I can tell a difference in throttle response and how the truck drives when I put the stock paper filter in during it's cleanings.. (it's seems sluggish and it downshifts more on the hills)

I take a couple of days to clean my filter. One day for the cleaning and drying of it. Then another day after oiling it. Then I put it back in. All the while, the paper filter is in and I can't wait to get it out!

Your results may vary, but that's just been my experience with it. I can't say I've gotten any 'better' mpgs with it, but that's not why I bought it... I also can't prove that it has a bit more power, but the towing of my trailer and less downshifting going over the same route tells me enough that's it's doing something...

Mitch

 

Same exact thing with me. The drop-in K&N fits poorly, and lets too much dirt in. I found so much dust in the intake tube after the air filter, just bad! Not just on my F150, but Jeep Grand Cherokee.

To the original poster: DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE, K&N has great marketing, but just not worth the extra 2 hp and issues of filtering and greasy MAFs.

 

I've had mine since it was 2 months old say in Dec. 1999 and never looked back. I clean it every 40k and it still worked fine. Absolutely no dust or oil on the MAF or anywhere else. When you clean, adding the right amount of oil is critical, but even still, let it sit and wipe up excess. I even had my original replaced (warranty) because of the bottom gasket. They fixed me up likadee split, too cool. I got K&N everything now, good stuff.

 

I bought two. I rotate them about every 50K. Put the clean one in, and clean and oil the dirty one and set it on the shelf until 50K is up. I currently have about 220K on the 97 5.4L. I've been running the K&N(s) since about 30K. Haven't had any MAF problems due to over-oiling, but it also sits on the shelf for quite a while before going into the truck. Engine runs smooth as silk.......

 

ive still got the stock paper one that came with the truck from the factory. i just take it out and go at it with an air hose (i hold my hand on the inside behind where i blow to make sure i dont blow a hole in it.)

 

I agree. Dont believe the claims of MPG and hp gains that K&N makes.