Dusty roads of Wonder Lake summer working against your car’s filters

You probably won't have a dust storm blowing across

Wonder Lake like the one in the photo above, but there
is still enough dust in the air in and around town to
create a challenge for your car's filters.

Have you taken a trip away from Wonder Lake this summer? Perhaps you drove on summer gravel roads in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, Michigan or Minnesota. When doing so, you may have found yourself behind another driver, in which case you were probably driving in a cloud of dust kicked up by their tires.

Even if you haven’t left the area and have stayed fairly close to your Wonder Lake home, you’ve probably driven through some construction zones this summer. Once again, you probably found yourself driving through air rich in dust particles that surround and seek to invade your vehicle.

Cars today are fairly well sealed up. But driving through a cloud of dust is a serious way to challenge your car’s ability to keep the dust out. Inevitably, a percentage of the dust is going to win. And the more dust, the more particles will get in.

It’s one thing to have a layer of dust on your seats, dashboard and the panels inside your doors. Wipe the dust off and move on. You can even bring the car to a carwash that does the inside, too. But that dust doesn’t limit itself to coating interior surfaces.

Dust accumulated while you drive goes everywhere. And where there are filters, you’ll find something pulling the air or oil through the filter. As the air or oil are pulled through the filter, the dust lodges in the folds of the filter. Increasingly, the filter surface is blocked by dust.

There are a number of filters in newer cars. You might be surprised how many. Here is a list of the seven most common filters that are found in modern automobiles:

Oil filters
Air filters
Fuel filters
Transmission filters
PCV valves
Breather elements
Cabin filters

Oil filters clean particles out of the oil. If the oil filter is clogged with particles, the oil flow is reduced and the oil isn’t able to do its essential job of lubricating parts. That’s a big, big problem. If it’s not rectified quickly, it could lead to serious damage to the engine.

The air filter cleans particles from the air that mixes with the fuel that makes the engine run. Clogging the air filter reduces the flow of air in the mixture. The result is that the engine is running on a richer fuel mixture. Not good for the engine.

Fuel filters compliment the air filter ensuring a clean mix of air and fuel. The transmission filter cleans particles out of the transmission oil. The PCV valve (Positive Crankcase Ventilation) is a filter that cleans pollutants from the engine’s crankcase. The breather element performs a similar duty.

The cabin filter – that’s the filter for you and the passengers of your car. It helps to reduce the amount of particles that will coat the upholstery. It also ensures that you and your passengers aren’t breathing too many of those particles.

Whatever roads you drive on when you leave your Wonder Lake home, your car’s filters are working for you. Make sure you change them when needed so they can keep doing their jobs.

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