Increase fuel economy w/K&N style collector?

[gr8tires]

Have an '04 XC70 with 103K miles, using 87 octane. I'm content w/24-25 highway MPG at 70mph, but will I see significant MPG increase with a large air mass filter system?? Don't really need more power as advertised, but heck gas is creeping up.....
Thanx

[Stormin Norman]

Numerous studies suggest that, long term, a K&N air filter is bad for your motor due to the amount of dust, etc passed into the motor.

I would look for ways to improve the breathing with a conventional filter.

[Ipd-Lucky]

Air intake systems may increase MPG slightly but pretty small margins at best.

One of the best ways to pick up MPG in the order of 1-2mpg is with our ECU upgrades. Not necessarily the purpose of our tunes but they increase power through increased efficiency with in turns means better mpg.

[ss60]

What engine do you have? 2.5T ?

I've got a 2.5T engine, and got my MPG gains from
1. 0W30 Synthetic oil (quite a noticeable MPG difference)
2. 91 octane - goes a lot farther(higher MPG), so actually saves even though it costs more per fill. Not a huge savings, but still cheaper overall.

[Ipd-Lucky]

How much MPG did you see?

[ss60]

Quote, originally posted by Ipd-Lucky »

How much MPG did you see?

Lucky,
I was raised in metric countries... so I'm not sure what the 'MPG' numbers are, but originally (first year) my overall combined (city and hwy) economy was 10.8 litres/100km.

After changing to 0W30 synthetic oil (German Castrol) it went from 10.8 l/100km to 9.8 l/100km. So 10% improvement from the oil alone.

One year later I installed the IPD stage I tune, and it went from 9.8 l/100km to 9.2 l/100km! So between the two I gained over 15% - frigging incredible.

2.5T engine, with no other mods (i.e. no intake, stock filter, stock turbo, stock downpipe).

[Ipd-Lucky]

Nice, thanks for the great info!