Here’s a Reminder to Regularly Inspect the Filter on Your Air Intake—And How to Find the Best Replacement

For a myriad of reasons, my daily driver Nissan went from racking up a thousand miles a month…to less than a thousand miles a year. And admittedly, one of the side effects of this dramatic decrease in mileage is that I’ve been lax in my regular vehicle maintenance.

…Which I was reminded of when I noticed some odd burbles, hesitation, and erratic idle behavior from the engine.

I summarily popped the hood and discovered that the air filter element on my aftermarket performance air intake system had decayed significantly, right under my nose.

The problem stems from the fact that the intake was a true “Cold Air” design from Nissan’s performance division, Nismo, which put the filter outside of the engine bay, behind the front bumper. That meant that, in order to visually inspect the filter, I had to remove the wheel, pop out a bunch of plastic rivets, and pull back the inner fender splash shield—not a quick or fun job.

Worse yet, although I had been strict about regularly cleaning the air filter element while the car was eating up miles on a lengthy commute, now that it’s semi-retired meant that it’d been well over a year since I last inspected the air filter.

So I summarily yanked the wheel and pulled the fender liner back to discover that the filter’s rubber housing had deteriorated into a crumbled mess.

Worse yet, the fatigued material had actually torn a hole on top of the filter’s rubber housing, allowing unfiltered air to bypass the filter entirely.

Suffice it to say, no amount of cleaning would bring that filter back—I yeeted that sucker into the trash.

The good news is, I didn’t have to look very hard for a suitable replacement. In fact, after taking a few key measurements, I was able to find the best replacement air filter to match the original one that came with the Nismo intake kit from Nissan.

Turns out, Summit Racing has a lineup of Reusable Air Filters and it’s got one that’s near-identical.

You may appreciate this article: How to Measure an Air Filter Element to Find a Replacement One for Your Air Intake System

Swapping the intake element is as easy as undoing a hose clamp. That said, I also removed the intake tubing and cleaned the Mass Airflow Sensor as well.

Once installed, the engine fired right up with none of the hesitation or poor idle issues that began this saga.

A few weeks worth of driving have confirmed that those issues are now resolved. Admittedly, I didn’t do any advanced diagnostics, but my shadetree opinion is that those problems were a result of the ECU reacting to erratic MAF readings due to the inconsistent airflow through the crumbling filter (specifically, the big honkin’ tear on the top).

…But let my tale of woe encourage you to inspect, clean, and replace your vehicle’s air filter regularly to avoid these headaches before they start.