I was reading about using a breather filter on the intake and leaving the hose from the valve cover hanging there. I was thinking of this only so oil wouldn't get into the intake and gunk up and reduce efficeny of the engine. But couldn't you take the hose off completely and put a filter on the nipple where the hose came from(valvecover) and where it goes to (the intake) or wouldn't this work. I know in the winter it would take alot longer to warm up but in the summer would it be useful at all? It seems like a good idea to me since oil/oil fume could reduce effective octane from what I read. Even if there were a filter of some sort in the hose that would be better than oil getting into the combustion chamber.
Breather Filter?
- Thread starter purelux
- Start date
I talked to my friend who has a turbo awd talon and has rebuilt the turbo and done other various overhauls. And he said that using a catchcan or breather filter and capping off the intake end of the tube is very common. Mainly on turbo or other ho small engines as they commonly experience blowby moreoften as well as the oil vapor that all cars have. I figure that putting a filter where the tube entered the intake would take in some hot engine air so the temp would be similar to pulling in the crankcase air minus the oil vapor and possibly very trace amount of oil. Then the other breather filter on the crankcase. Then in the winter cut the tube and put an inline fuel filter in the middle as the outside air even under the hood would extend warm up too long in the winter months. The way I figure it burning the crankcase gases is only going to hurt performance and mpg as well as cause worse emmissions. As the crud will accumulate in the engine as wll as the cats reducing their efficency. And if burning it supposedly is so much better for the enviorment why do we have landfills. If it is better for the enviorment to burn or incenerate contaminets and whathaveyou why don't we use trash>energy powerplants. These are used in japan and even featured in simcity3000 for those into pc games. The filter on the crankcase/valve cover is catching everything and if it's thrown out or cleaned depending on filter. Then there should be no problem you could even take the filter element out and incenerate it if that is so good for the enviorment.
kevin 86 tc rebuild or sw
New LVC Member
i did that for a little bit on my 400,000km towncar and i got alot of blow by and oil vapours coming from there, eventually steaming out of the front fenders and leaking onto my exhaust and filling the passenger compartment with smoke. but it did consume less oil. :BangPepsi2185 said:
Pepsi2185
LVC Mafia Henchman
- Joined
- Mar 30, 2004
- Messages
- 573
- Reaction score
- 1
What i ended up doing is just leaving out the filter. Suckin that oil right back in!! so many miles it doesnt matter and no cats anyway. Probably has worse emissions than my neighbors 66 dodge coronet. Theres so much oil coming in there i would be changing the filter every oil change anyway. Im waiting for her to break down but she wont quit.
Topcat
Active LVC Member
You guys have lost me .................
The breather filter is the inlet side of "crankcase breathing" the PCV valve is the suction side ... You need to have the filter to vent the PCV... Closing off this system either end or both will cause the crancase to build up preasure and increase oil "burning" consumption...Race cars not using PCV system put 4 Vent filter caps up high on tubes off the valve covers .This prevents excessive crankcase preasure from pushing oil into the vent filter...
If you are filling vent filter with oil then PCV is possibly NG or the drain passages in the heads , under the valve covers , are plugged , and the oil in the valvecover is not draining back into the oilpan quickly enough... There is a baffle in the valve cover to prevent oil from exiting the breather tube under normal conditions..There is no benifit to removing any of these items and they are not used in engine heating process...Putting the vent filter in the air cleaner puts it higher than the valve cover helping to keep any oil that might exit the valve cover below the filter ...
I hope this shed some light on your problem
The breather filter is the inlet side of "crankcase breathing" the PCV valve is the suction side ... You need to have the filter to vent the PCV... Closing off this system either end or both will cause the crancase to build up preasure and increase oil "burning" consumption...Race cars not using PCV system put 4 Vent filter caps up high on tubes off the valve covers .This prevents excessive crankcase preasure from pushing oil into the vent filter...
If you are filling vent filter with oil then PCV is possibly NG or the drain passages in the heads , under the valve covers , are plugged , and the oil in the valvecover is not draining back into the oilpan quickly enough... There is a baffle in the valve cover to prevent oil from exiting the breather tube under normal conditions..There is no benifit to removing any of these items and they are not used in engine heating process...Putting the vent filter in the air cleaner puts it higher than the valve cover helping to keep any oil that might exit the valve cover below the filter ...
I hope this shed some light on your problem
Last edited:
What I ended up doing which I apparently forgot to post here. Was to use an inline fuel filter between the pcv and the intake. So the flow isn't disrupted but any oil and oil vapor which overtime would inevitably be drawn into the intake and gunk up the engine and be burned to some extent is filtered. Any pcv system will allow oil vapor and nearly all cars will have to some extent oil drawn in i.e. blow-by. Espically on turbo or high revving vehicles watch some small engines hondas, toyotas, focus etc... will have some noticable blow by at high engine speeds. I noticed this as near my house the highschool here has a large driving cource which they set up a road coarse on. And I noticed that on the cars which hold the gears longer rather than upshift and immediatly ds noticable blue smoke at high engine speeds. The cars were by no means old or high milage either. While this is a more extreme example a car with a lower rpm powerband and rev limit like a cv could still benefit. If you can cut oil fume/oil it is effictivly like using a higher octane. Also a lower sulfer gasoline will help efficency both against knock and keepin the engine/cats clean.
kevin 86 tc rebuild or sw
New LVC Member
purelux said:
thats brilliant
Topcat
Active LVC Member
kevin 86 tc rebuild or sw said:
Only on a car that has no heavy blow by , and even then the filter element will clog , from the oil vapors that normally pass harmlessly though the intake system ..The clogged filter will cause the PCV not to function and crankcase pressure will increase blow by , may even suck the filter into the intake...On extreme compression ,high RPM motors , or supercharged (& Turbo) motors the problem is solved with increased venting , not filtering..
Not really it would be nearly impossible for the filter on a clear glass replaceable inline fuel filter to be sucked in on my car. Also as long as I keep an eye on it it won't get that clogged. I also can see by the very small amount of oil in it that there is air flowing through it. Also the pcv system is set up with a failsafe of the intake (drivers) side turns into the exhaust. Also putting breather filters on and capping the inlets on the t-body and intake tube disrupts the air flow. Normally it gets air from the elbow of the intake tube which goes in the drivers side valvecover thru the crankcase and out the passenger side cover and thru the pcv then into the intake. This way oil vapor and oil don't sludge up and etc.. and cause corrossion or clogging and whatnot. If you vent both sides the pcv system is eliminated and emmission system effictivness of the car is greatly reduced. Also the heat drawn thru the pcv normally into the intake and taken into account in how the car is tuned to run has been changed, espically in the winter causing increased warmup time for the engine. I have had this setup in for about 3-4 months and just changed the filter and have had no problems and the engine doesn't run poorly as if the pcv were non functional which if the filter clogged it would be.
Topcat said:
Topcat
Active LVC Member
No further answer , does not constitute acceptance of your theory or practice , just no desire to argue... :givemebee