K&N RU-2805XD Air Filters Protect Off-Road Vehicles in the Cruelest Conditions

The K&N RU-2805XD universal air filter is tough enough to take on the cruelest conditions and can be cleaned to take them on again and again.

If you own an off-road vehicle, then you are aware of the Baja 1000. For those of you who are not, it is an off-road race through the desert on the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico. First ran in Tijuana, Mexico on October 31, 1967, it calls for drivers of off-road motorcycles, all-terrain, and four-wheel drive vehicles, buggies, and more to race in a 600 to 850-mile loop starting and finishing in Ensenada or running “Point to Point” for 900 miles from Ensenada to La Paz, Mexico.

The K&N 99-5000 air filter cleaning kit restores the high-performance filtering capability of the RU-2805XD from the harsh effects of dust and sand.

The National Off-Road Racing Association (NORRA) organized the event from 1967 to 1972 and it became extremely popular after ABC’s “Wide World of Sports” assigned Jim McKay to cover the 1968 event live.

The event became a phenomenon that attracted famous racers like Parnelli Jones and Mickey Thompson and movie actors including James Garner, Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, and more to compete. Moreover, the race has been featured in a number of movies including the 1982 film Timerider and the 2005 documentary Dust to Glory, which followed competitors running the race.

Due to the oil crisis in 1973 and concerned with the cost of gasoline, racers stopped competing and NORRA dropped the race despite promises from the federal government of Mexico that it would keep fuel prices stable.

In response to the shutdown, Baja California governor Milton Castellanos assigned a non-profit Mexican organization called the “Baja Sports Committee” (BSC) to organize the event and it was renamed the “Baja Mil” (Baja 1000). The BSC organized a race from Ensenada to La Paz, but it proved too much to handle and it gave up the race. The Mexican government then requested that the Southern California Off-Road Enterprises (SCORE) take on the responsibility of organizing the race and the group still has control of it today.

In an effort to create great video moments and to provide more entertainment for spectators who lived near the course, other spectators have been reported to have created booby traps, blocking river flow, or burying and hiding obstacles and racers are cautioned to beware of large crowds that collect in remote sections of the course. Racers have been injured and vehicles damaged as a result of some of these so-called booby traps. However, competitors have adapted. Many of them pre-run the course before the race to determine where the “booby traps” are so that they have an advantage over the competition. Still, racers communicate with each other using on-board radios to warn others of the existence and location of the obstacles.

The conditions during the race are considered very harsh due to vehicles kicking up excessive amounts of sand into the air. The sand can cause problems to engines and high-performance air filters are required to protect engines and assure that competitors stay in the race.

If you have ever raced or would like to race the Baja or other off-road contests or if you just like to drive your motorcycle, ATV, buggy, or four-wheel drive vehicle through desert or other similar harsh conditions, then you better be using a high-performance air filter to make certain that you won’t be spending thousands of dollars fixing a damaged vehicle.

K&N Engineering offers the RU-2805XD air filter, which is specifically designed to handle these conditions. It’s able to protect the engine because of its deep pile design that includes extra fine weave grade cotton on alternate geometries to capture sand, dust, and other impurities that could cause problems for your engine.

The filter was specifically designed to handle conditions one would experience in a Baja 1000 racing event. Teams that have raced the Baja 1000 have had the RU-2805XD filter on their vehicles during its development. Moreover, K&N engineers tested the filter in K&N’s own dust retention laboratory under the ISO 5011 test protocol.

The filter can be cleaned and reused in your vehicle so that you can enjoy tough off-road experiences over and over again without the need for buying a new filter. All you need is the K&N 99-5000 filter cleaning kit to restore full capability back to the filter.

The outstanding protection and the fact that it can be washed and reused multiple times makes the K&N RU-2805XD the air filter you want on your car when you have to drive to hell and back.

To find a K&N universal air filter in just about any shape and size use the K&N Universal Air Filter Search by Dimension tool. You can also view all the K&N performance products for any vehicle by using the Search by Vehicle tool and you can find a local K&N retailer by plugging your location into the K&N Dealer Search as well.