[rcweingart]

Yes, but a 100 micron strainer screen element is a suitable air cleaner for everyday driving.

Roush liked my idea so much that they are manufacturing stainless steel velocity stack screens identical to mine except that I use brass. Stainless is stronger but if a fiber gets loose, the engine is eating a piece of hard stainless. Brass on the other hand is soft and if a fiber gets loose, the engine is only eating soft brass.

I also have the push on K&N air cleaners but they don't look all that good. I also fabricated a cold air box that the bare velocity stacks just fit inside of whereas the stacks with the K&N's on them won't. The ducting to the cold air box is protected and screened providing preliminary filtering as well. There was a bit of debris in my filter screens before I fabricated the cold air box. However, there has been none since I installed the cold air box and I figure that the engine had been sucking dirty air from underneath the hood including air that got sucked up from underneath the car. Now the air supply is coming from the air inlet inside the radiator grill opening and I am not sucking in all that underneath the hood debris.

Trade offs, form versus function. The 100 micron screens work well enough in a non adverse environment so I avoid adverse situations such as a dust storm or off track experiences. If I find myself in such a situation, the cold air box comes off and the K&N's go on - but not for everyday driving.