Sprint Filter P08 Air Filter for Road & Track – Yamaha Tracer 9 / GT (2021–2024) SM212S

A Tracer 9 from these years is a used motorcycle now. The model has moved on, the book value has come down with it, and the maintenance schedule has not moved at all: the same intervals, the same consumables, the same prices as when the bike was new. Every recurring item therefore takes a larger bite out of what the machine is worth. The Sprint Filter SM212S is the one line on that list an owner can close for good. It is a dry polyester element for the airbox of the 2021 to 2024 Tracer 9 and Tracer 9 GT, bought once instead of budgeted for.

Key Features

• Dry woven polyester in one layer, from threads that start at 22 microns in diameter
• 80 microns of filtration and 5,050 litres per square metre per second of flow
• About double the filtering area of the performance elements it sits beside
• No oil at any stage, so nothing can migrate onto the intake sensor over a long touring day
• Uses the series airbox exactly as it is: no cutting, no adapters, no fuelling changes
• Blown clean and refitted for the life of the bike, with a two year warranty behind it

The bill that ignores depreciation

Depreciation is the loudest number in used bike ownership and the least useful, because nothing else on the machine responds to it. The filter interval certainly does not. Tracers cover ground and their owners keep them a long time, so service intervals come round quickly and the paper element repeats far more often here than on a bike that only sees weekends. Count the services still ahead of a 2021 machine rather than those behind it and the arithmetic reverses: the reusable element is dearer once and free afterwards, the disposable one cheap once and charged again every season.

What actually improves

Not the power figure: a filter sitting in the standard housing cannot make a standard triple faster, and an honest description says so early. What changes is the shape of the restriction over time. A paper cartridge is at its best on the day it is fitted and closes up steadily from then on, and because that takes months it never announces itself. This element starts low and is returned to that same figure every time it is cleaned, so the week before a service breathes like the week after one. Retention is not sacrificed for it: the P08 holds back 93.13 per cent of 100 micron particles, against 76.42 per cent for four layer oiled cotton.

Care and cleaning

Because the element is dry, servicing it means removing dirt, not replacing chemistry. Air comes first, aimed outward from the clean face so debris exits the way it entered. Water with a mild detergent follows when a hard season calls for it, rinsed thoroughly. Then the SM212S dries in open air alone, never over heat and never near a flame, and it is refitted only when dry through. The maintenance leaflet is in the Downloads tab.

Fitment & Compatibility

For the Yamaha Tracer 9 and Tracer 9 GT, 2021 to 2024. The same element is listed for three motorcycles sharing this airbox, the MT-09 / SP and the XSR 900 being the other two; the complete listing is in the Fitment tab.