My 69 Series 2 has been upgraded in its past to the triple carb setup. However, I’m not a fan of the stock air filter and have ordered three K&N round /chrome air filters. I realized that I needed to come up with a solution to the breather pipe connection but have been at a loss for how to manage that.
This past weekend I visited with a friend who has built a solution using rubber hoses, two tee fittings, and one elbow fitting, a bunch of jubilee clamps and steel gas line hose to feed into the back of each of the three K&N’s from the breather pipe. While this works and performs the required function, I’d like to make my version be a bit more elegant (and maybe shiny)
I’ve thought about using thin wall 3/4" aluminum tubing, but finding the tee’s and elbows has proved challenging. Is anyone aware of an aftermarket solution to this issue of piping the breather tube to the individual air filters?
Well Bob, don’t get a little filter and put it on the end of a hose. It will cover the entire engine compartment with a fine oil mist. It holds dust like you wouldn’t believe.
What don’t you like about the stock filter can, plenum and individual trumpets? Works pretty good and you just hook a breather hose to it. Easy peasy.
Bob - I’m doing the reverse on my E-type - going from individual filters back to the stock setup. It had these filters installed on the dual strombergs, when I received it. I’m not sure what brand the filter housings are, but they came with connection points for the breather pipe. Yours did not, I take it?
@ryaskovic Like a lot of things in these Covid days, the K&N filters are backordered and not here yet. I know that the back plate has an opening for a breather, but I don’t think they come with any hoses or attachment to the existing breather pipe. Unless these is some other method, I will probably hook something up like what you are showing.
It’s a polite term for dumping the vapors etc below the engine into the air flow moving under the car. Often they vented from the side of the crankcase but could come from the XK breather.
There are some design considerations in where & how the road draft tube terminates as you want it to vent but not overly suck the pressure. Done incorrectly it can empty a crankcase (extreme example).
Just in case you aren’t aware of this, be prepared to find that your mixture may be off when you change from the stock air cleaners. You may need new needles for your SUs. Good luck.
Actually the original design of the XK engine used a draft tube. Not sure when they started to feed it back through the intake, but the cars in the 1950’s used draft tubes. My 1959 MK lX had one.
The draft tube is the least of your problems! The K&N filters will cause disruption to the air flow into the carbs because the edges are not profiled. More noise, less performance.
Best option is to use stock S1 intakes (hence no draft tube issues) and fit a Mangoletsi (ITG) filter:
that’s my solution. Expensive, but I had no factory air cleaner setup so it would have been the same price to replace that. ITG is well known in the performance market, especially for air cleaners. This air filter looks really nice when installed.
David, that is the right set of needles? The UEs. Anything else to do to the carbs to fit the Mangoletsi Air Filter?
No, just the needles. The free flow of air leans out the mixture hence the UE needles (stock needles are UM).
There is another, cheaper, option which I use albeit before the Mangoletsi became available. The ITG Maxogen JC60-99 (102mm o/d) pushes inside the stock plenum and costs about $110:
Don’t forget the ITG filters need maintenance - wash them in soapy water and then spray with the special ITG oil.
