Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Three Wheeler & Super 3 Change of air filter

Thank you.

Make sure the bit you use is for stainless steel, you can start the drilling using the hammer application which helps the drill locator gain traction on the solid baffle at the front of the exhaust. Once traction gained revert to a slow speed non hammer drill application, don't apply too much pressure let the cutter do the work keeping it well lubricated with something like Tap Magic Cutting Fluid. This way you will preserve the cutter and be able to remove all 6 baffles with one cutter if you wish to remove all 6. The other 2 baffles at the rear of the exhaust have holes in them, from a noise performance standpoint I would remove the solid baffle first test run and see if that is what you like. If not then remove one of the holed baffles and test again before going the whole hog.

On topic with air filters, has anyone any experience with these?
I am presuming they fit the muscle filter but are and extra inch longer for more intake flow.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/High-flow-replacement-air-filter-1-for-stealth-air-cleaner-S-S-Cycle/263794230353?_trkparms=ispr%3D1&hash=item3d6b5c8451:g:yikAAOSwmypbO-z3

Interesting option, but really not required as both the factory and the "muscle" filter elements have enough flow to handle the engine, assuming an oiled gauze filter element a la K&N.

Per K&N's website, their particular filter medium flows 6.03 cfm per square inch. Measuring the muscle filter element I have, using the mean radius of 5.7"and subtracting .75" from the 2.25" filter height (as advised by K&N to factor in the rubber bonded edges) I get a total filter area of about 38 square inches, which times 6.03 gives about 230 cfm flow potential.

The engine's max airflow demand is about 183cfm. (engine cfm flow formula is cfm=Cubic Inches x RPM x Volumetric Efficiency ÷ 3456. I used 5500 rpm and .95%VE to get the cfm above. Could not find any specific data on the X-wedge VE% so used a reasonable estimate)

And from reading the forum, it appears few people rev beyond 5000 rpm so the typical engine cfm requirement is more like 165cfm.

So can't hurt to add the "deeper" filter element, but no point other than looks.

So are you saying that we would be just as well off with a Stage 0.5, keeping the factory filter and fitting straight through pipes?

Pretty much...but the factory filter cover seems to be pretty restrictive so some modification would be a reasonable idea to let some more air get to the outside of the filter.

Agreed.

Preferring the aesthetics of the factory filter, I've more than doubled the opening of the lower area of the filter cover, as well as cut down the upper arc of the alloy backing plate to exactly match the outer diameter of the filter element (which considerably opens up the top side of the filter). Theoretically it is still more "shrouded" than the open muscle element, but swapping from the muscle filter to the modified factory unit is undetectable to me from a seat of the pants perspective, as well as using the Dynolicious app on my iPhone.

Also, the filter fitted to the stock housing on my car as received is a 6.25" diameter, 2.4" tall oiled gauze type, so it has a useful area of 50 sq inches (about 300 cfm potential), or about 33% more than the muscle unit. So more area for the pressure differential between engine and atmosphere to work on, which perhaps explains why what remains of the shrouding is having no discernible effect.

Perhaps on a proper and well monitored chassis dyno you could pick out the difference in engine performance, especially at high rpms, but in the normal driving range (which I would define as up to about 4500 RPM) the performance difference, if any, has to be small.

I suspect that the louder intake sound from the open element makes people feel the car is faster

Now, the better flowing exhaust of the stage 1 (or any other high flow design) is the real deal in terms of enhanced performance and drivability...but that's well covered in other threads.

The stinger in the S&S covers is what makes the engine work so smoothly in my opinion. If you could add a stinger, as was discussed in another Thread on TM, then the oem filter that has the cover trimmed a bit would be perfect.

Thanks all for your feedback and comments!!

Regarding the "Bafflectomy" I actually burned and destroyed my Bosch drilling machine as it did not have the torque to be able to go as slow 130-150 rpms that you need to not to burn the hole cutter....But I had an old drilling machine from the 1960´s that was perfect for the job. My tip is to watch your speed and not overheat your hole cutter.

As I did not take a test drive with just the baffles removed I cannot say how much opening the air filter did, but the combo of both the baffles out and just cutting the air filter open it was a real transformation of the engine and drive-feel of the car....so much better I am only sad I did not do it earlier. I have also had the rotor/stator failure which was caused by heat earlier in the cars life and I can only expect that it would not have happened with a cooler running engine......

I still have not ordered my new air-filter, as I still cannot find if the Kuryakyn Mach 2 filter (zombie cover) will fit the X-Wedge in our configuration. All the reference on the Kuryakyn homepage is only to HD models and I do not seem to be able to find the info. I guess I have to contact to clarify this!

Lightspeed.....I actually like the look of your S6S muscle cover.....Maybe I will opt for that solution instead of the Kuryakyn one....Hmmmmm!!