K&N filter

But why Tony, why? Is it really going to make a difference?

You have a fantastic car, don't let yourself be suckered into meaningless improvements.

If you have money burning a hole in your pocket spend it on high octane gas. VP Racing gas stations in my location has 100 Octane. A 10% blend with

91 Octane makes the car far more powerful, and prevents detonation, than any air filter could ever dream of doing.

Basia

2000 Impreza L Coupe 2013 Forester XT

You can use it and it will not interfere with warranty, assuming you are using the element that fits in the stock air-box. Just be carefull you do NOT over-oil the filter. It will not give you any extra power, it will not give you better mileage, and it will not filter any better (or worse) than a stock filter. At the price of the K&N it will start saving you money in about 6 years or so unless you drive through a lot of dust storms and need to change regular filters more than once a year. My filters last me over 3 years here in Ontario.

I did have a K&N in my Aerostar.

If you are looking for ways to save money, I'd suggest replacing differential fluids with quality synthetics. Real synthetics, ester based stuff like Motul, Redline, etc. It will lower friction and save you some money over time.

I run Delvac gear oil in my Forester XT. Its a PAO extended drain oil used by truckers.

These newer Subarus are bigger and heavier but differential are the same size as they were

15 years ago! Did you know that changing differential fluid in a new car after break-in, anywhere from 500-3000 miles can supposedly double the life of the differential. Not that they break down frequently, but that is what I read somewhere. It is really good to quickly remove the metal junk from break-in in a new differential, and not drive with all these metal particles grinding the diff until 30, or 60k.

Basia

Had K&N on my old car. Well, stick with stock filter then. Locally highest Octane gas I can get is 95(Ethanol blended) or 91. Basically wife's car.

My Acura MDX has service reminder for every thing displayed on MID. I notice Subie does not have that feature. I'll just follow dealer.s advice(reminder) for servicing, Kids have been driving only Subie for years, Impreza wagon(daughter), WRX(son) since they learned how to drive. I am new to this smallish Forester XT compared to what I've been driving. I showed wife Bimmer X1 and Forester XT and she picked latter.(two dealers are side by side) Now I have to install remote starter B4 weather gets cold. Don't like much to stick my head under dash in tight spot. Probably new car buying is now over in my life time being on wrong side of 70, LOL!

Higher octane than required for your car also will not give any inproved performance or economy. Lower than required WILL reduce performance

I remember your posts here Tony from more than a decade ago when this group was very active. I was a lurker then, reading avidly anything about Subaru's, particularny Impreza's.

Basia

I notice manual says 93 or higher. My MDX runs poor if I don't fill 91 or above. This little car has pretty good MPG. Hope will get little better when broken in.

Really, my son's Blue Impreza had lots of mod. done by me. After all that he was going sround curve too fast smashing into the concrete barrier. Car took the impact hard causing total write off. So I got a Nissan Pathfinder 4x4, he complained it was too big for him, had another fender bender. His real driver training was over. Got WRX drove it well getting many speeding tickets. Now became mature driver, LOL. He is talking about Bimmer M3 now. Parent's nightmare is over. Daughter is very careful driver. She can drive pretty well anything. My SIL drives new trucks almost every other year for business use. So she has to know how to drive them as well.

Yeah, I remember that thread, ...son crashes an Impreza, I believe RS, or other highly modified, gets a new WRX :)))

You are a fantastic daddy Tony :))

Good for him.

Good luck to you, I enjoye many of your posts.

:))) Basia

Reading this, I'd say he is. We're about the same age but I tell people that I don't have kids, I have middle aged sons, and they have been buying their own cars for years.

As Clare mentioned, using higher octane than recommended will not improve performance. It will cost you more money and it's wasted money, IMO.

I used a K&N filter in my VW Eos for years. I decided against using one in my '14 Forester (2.5, not XT) and '15 Outback. I would save some money over time but not much when I consider the cost of the filter+oil+my time. I get good quality filters from rockauto.com at very reasonable prices. I prefer to just take out the old one and replace it with a new one without the hassle of having to clean and oil a reusable K&N filter.

I used those oil/foam filter with my '72 Fiat 124 coupes back in the old days. It replaced the ugly old filter housing with a spiffy chrome one. I don't see much point doing it with a new car - unless you plan on changing fuel induction to Weber carbs. That was always a cool setup - back in the old days. :)