svwilbur, I've driven thousands of miles with oil bath air filters, and I would say that the chance of a fire is minimal, unless you fill the filter with gasoline.
Yessirree, gents, the military M-151 (almost a) Jeep used oil bath air filters at least as late as 1986, and probably later. I think the HMMWV was the first Jeep sized vehicle that used a paper filter, but I never drove one, so they might be oil bath as well.
