Bobby,
I vaguely remember one of the car magazines ran a test on a vehicle with and without an air cleaner - don't remember anything other than the results which showed the combination WITH made more HP. Plus the fact that some tracks are dustier than others (like the 2.8 mile trip at Route 66
) make me think that having an air cleaner makes sense. Obviously there's more to it than just bolting one on, and an open element has got to be better than the stock single snorkel, just part of the tune-up! It just has to look like OEM, whatever that is today!!
Lew