Fuel System: Oil bath air cleaner

[Chris_Dresbach]

Last night I was fooling around with my car, changed the points, and put the original OEM "Oil Bath" air cleaner back on it. This is the first time I've used an oil bath. I'm just looking for a general opinion, do they work well? So far so good.

[Tom Bredehoft]

They work far better that a paper filter, only thing, you gotta keep the oil level up. No problem, just don't forget to check it quarterly or so, depending on miles driven.

[FlatheadGeo]

I had an oil bath air cleaner on my '40 Nash Lafayette. As Tom B said-'works better than a paper one' and never had any debris in my carburetor!

[rockne10]

Oil bath was generally distributed in areas with dry and dusty climates prone to greater ambient particulates. Service is more involved than replacing the filter but needs done less often. Given an option, I think I would choose the oil bath.

[BobPalma]

Agree with "all the above," Chris.

But remember, you have to dump the oil, clean what will be the accumulated dirt out of the bottom of the reservoir, and refill with fresh oil roughly every quarter, depending on the environment in which the engine is operated. BP

[53k]

Last night I was fooling around with my car, changed the points, and put the original OEM "Oil Bath" air cleaner back on it. This is the first time I've used an oil bath. I'm just looking for a general opinion, do they work well? So far so good.

My '53 Commander came with an oil bath cleaner. I took it off and put on an aftermarket dry air cleaner. Probably my imagination, but it seemed like the car performed better. I later put on a NOS dry air cleaner that I got at Standard Surplus back in the late 60s or early 70s (for $5.95 including the element). I have never put the air bath cleaner back on to compare.

[DEEPNHOCK]

Back during the Mt. St. Helens eruption, the oil bath air cleaner equipped vehicls were still running when the paper element veicles were shut down.

Higher maintenance/labor with an oil bath air cleaner.

[FlatheadGeo]

Jeff,
Anything worthwhile is worth the extra effort. I would guess that most of us are more picky with our antiques than our modern cars, which IMHO are really worthless. Having issues with an '07 Saturn that I am making the last payment on this month!

[N8N]

Much to my surprise when I got it home, my '71 Porsche 914/4 (Type 4 VW engine) had an oil bath air cleaner! so they're not as obsolete as you'd think; and apparently Porsche saw fit to keep using them presumably through '74 at least.

nate

[studegary]

Much to my surprise when I got it home, my '71 Porsche 914/4 (Type 4 VW engine) had an oil bath air cleaner! so they're not as obsolete as you'd think; and apparently Porsche saw fit to keep using them presumably through '74 at least.

nate

Nate - 1971 is 40 years ago!

[57 Silver Hawk]

My Hawk has oil bath air cleaner, too. The reason they used it because there are many states as dusty areas especially central and western states while much modern roads in northeast during 1950's and 1960's. I am now using dry air filter cleaner. Here's attached map from my '56 shop manual.



Steven Barker

1957 Silver Silver Hawk
1967 Corvair Coupe
1969 Corvair Coupe

[N8N]

Nate - 1971 is 40 years ago!

That may be so, but I don't consider that an old car. To consider it to be so would imply that I am old and clearly that is not the case!

[jclary]

My '53 Commander came with an oil bath cleaner. I took it off and put on an aftermarket dry air cleaner. Probably my imagination, but it seemed like the car performed better.....

Not intending to make any accusation here, but....when I was young and thought I knew everything (dumb as a rock!)...I would take the oil bath and dry filter off anything that ran. I loved hearing the carburetor "sucking air!" That is what made me think it "performed better!"

It was similar to those (future deaf) rock musicians who seemed to think that the quality of their music automatically increased with the volume.

I had one of those "road to Damascus" realizations one night after one of my buddies attempted to "Peel out", driving his daddy's four door Buick, in front of a crowd gathered at our local hang-outs (Ledbetter's). One of our more level-headed "good 'ol bubbas" blurted out, "if it ran as good as it makes a racket, wouldn't be so embarrassing!" That forever changed the way I eased away in my '60 Pontiac.

[studegary]

That may be so, but I don't consider that an old car. To consider it to be so would imply that I am old and clearly that is not the case!

To me, over ten years old is an old car and over 25 years old is an antique car. This only applies to cars, not furniture, buildings or people.

[N8N]

To me, over ten years old is an old car and over 25 years old is an antique car. This only applies to cars, not furniture, buildings or people.

I've bought one new car in my life... I think the next newest car I've owned compared to date of purchase was an '88 GTI 16V that I purchased close as I can remember in late 2000... current ride is a '93 F-150.

Now it does creep me out a little bit when I see "historic" plates on an 80's Cutlass, or like I saw the other day, a Datsun 510... I say to myself "that's not historic, that's a used car!"