My wife and I just bought our middle age crisis dream car. We took delivery of
an immaculate 1996 C4 Corvette in Polo II green with just over 33,000 km on the
speedo. She's a beaut (and she's also 99.7% metric lol)
A free flowing K&N air filter is a cheap "horsepower" (ok, Americans do love
their horsey unit) upgrade and I found one in eBay for a decent price. I tried
to clarify the dimensions of the filter with the seller who advertised it as
"K&N 33-2035 Reusable 17.563"x10.625" Panel Air Filter for Corvette/Firebird."
There are 2 different sizes of filter for this car, so I saw this as an
opportunity to educate and advocate - Here's a copy of the email exchange -
ME: Hi - I have a '96 Corvette w/an LT1. I measured my current paper air filter
element and it's 45x27 cm and I want to make sure a 17.563" x 10.625" filter
is the right size. It's a shame Americans are forced to use such bizarre units
of measurement on a metric globe. My "yardstick" only does fractions! haha.
Anyway, your price is very good for this filter and if I know it will fit, I
will buy one from you.
REPLY: While 17.563 and 10.625 inches is not identical to 45 or 27 cm, it is
quite close 10.625 is 26.9875 cm and 17.563 is 44.61002
It is close, but not identical.
Perhaps you measured wrong? K&N does offer metric measurements, but they are
in millimeter, which I don't know how to convert that to centimeters, but maybe
you might, K&N says the filter is 446mm x 270mm
ME: Awesome and thank you for the reply - It was quite helpful, and I have
purchased the correct K&N filter from you. Just a little FYI - in the metric
system, there are no conversions - you just move a decimal point around. 1000
mm to a meter or 100 cm to a meter, so if the filter is 446 mm x 270 mm, it's
44.6 cm x 27 cm. I find most car guys use metric units since the US auto
industry has been at least partially or fully metric since about 1973. It's
universal, and so incredibly easy. As a sidenote, you may want to consider
displaying dimensions in mm's along side American "inches" if you sell
internationally as we are the last nation on earth to use inches as a primary
unit. Anyway, enough of my rambling. Thanks and looking forward to getting my
K&N filter!
So I guess my message here is - get loud, get bold, be unafraid and
unapologetically let the nation know - I Am Metric. We've got to change this!
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