Hi Bryan and welcome.
Keep in mind that the Air Cleaners are not that exotic or precise filtering device and, as a steel wool mesh based maize, depend on a thine coating of oil to capture and hold rather large bits of air borne debris. Since steel wool is the cleaner's primary component, it is common for a petroleum-based solvent to be used for cleaning. However, when relegated to a confined space (i.e. my garage in the winter), I have also had great success using less volatile cleaning detergents (I.e. Dawn dishwashing detergent) to clean the air cleaner's mesh. It should be noted that when using any water drawn detergents, any remaining moisture should be allowed to evaporate before lightly re-oiling the mesh.
One last point. Keep in mind that the difference between work and a hobby is, if you have to do it … its work. To that end, most of us have spent substantial amounts of time pursuing a fictional conclusion to our Healey projects, only to come close before finding other paths of interest in this never ending story. I am not sorry to say that you will achieve many Healey milestones in your project but your enjoyment of the pursuit will continue.
Hope this helps,
Ray(64BJ8P1)