Trouble Removing stock air filter. The clips are easy, but couldn't open the box easily to remove the filter. The Owners manual has you disconnect the connector, but that will not help without disconnecting all the harness clips. Anyone have a trick? May be I was just being too careful and had to push harder.

 

There's a trick to it, try doing a search. I had a difficult time when I first checked mine to make sure there wasn't any oil there and have forgotton the trick, so I'm holding off on removing the filter completely to test if an aftermarket intake will work or not. I think there's a good description in a thread about the oil problem.

 

If you find the trick, post it here.

I've tried to look at the air filter due to some oil underneath that appears to be dripping out. I can't get the airbox open.

Tried yanking and pulling and...nothing

- it's the airbox I'm talking about...

- get your mind out of the gutter...

 

Here's what worked for me.

Removing the factory airbox:

• Disconnect all vacume tubing and electrical connectors connected to the airbox
• Loosten the clamp on the acordian tube and push the tube as far back as you can
• The airbox has 4 "posts" on the underside of it that fit into holes underneath where it mounts. Using a pry bar, pop the top two posts (corner of the airbox by the front edge of the hood) out of their holes.
• Slide the pry bar down along the underside of the airbox (down and toward the rear of the car) and applying gentle leverage, pop the bottom two out of their holes
• Leave the pry bar in place to prevent the posts from going back into the holes, grasp the airbox from the sides and lift it to the rear of the car and up. You have to fight against the tension of the accordian tube a bit, but with patience and a bit of a struggle, it will eventually come out

Hope this helps... it's what worked for me. If someone has a better/easier method, please post it up here.

 

There is a thread on how to remove the airbox cover, with pics, somewhere here...

https://www.rx8club.com/showthread.p...pen+air+filter

I believe I used that method (pushing the filter box assembly back out of it's grommets) when I was checking my filter for oil (which there was none) and it wasn't too bad.

 

Yep, that's the thread. Thanks sferrett!

 

Now with clear instructions, I did two runs, one normal, and one with the filter removed. It could just be expectations, but the run w/o filter seemed better and I think my car may benefit from an aftermarket intake. Now which one?

 

typhoon baby!