Hi Everyone,

Well, almost exactly 6 years ago, I installed the AEM CAI on my 2001 CL,
and posted the instructions here:

http://www.wizardsworks.org/chod/acura/cai/

All seemed well for the most part. I had cleaned the filter once before. (I don't
drive a whole lot).

A few days ago, I got out of the car while it was running to return a movie and thought, 'gee, the car seems quite loud today'. I popped the hood to find my bypass valve had almost split in half down the middle. the bypass filter was torn in two pieces. In retrospect, I should have changed the filter a lot sooner.

So I ordered a new bypass filter and picked it up. I also had the idea of taking the cone filter off, and putting it where the bypass filter was so that the car was at least driveable.

When I pulled the filter off, and the bottom tubing out, I was in for a big shock: There was a big nickel sized hole in the tubing. It was roughly where the blue dot is in this picture:



I was a bit freaked, as I had no idea how long that hole had been there. I had never pulled out the intake to take a look at it.

Here's a picture from underneath:


and from on top:


Here is what I think happened:
The top of the soft rubber mount may have separated.
You can see but bottom still screwed into the car (it's the round black thing in the top left corner of the bottom picture). (I might have just pulled it off when I was unscrewing it though)

It looks like the tube hit the bolts in the top picture. If it did smash into the bolt, and knocked a whole in the intake tube, I don't understand why my engine didn't puke when this big chunk of metal flew into the intake. But the hole is definitely in the right spot.

I had the idea of cutting off the bend where the hole was, and just sticking the cone filter on there. Here's a picture of what that looks like:



So I'm trying to decide between my options:

1) buy another intake, and hope this doesn't happen again.
It seems like a bit of a waste since It almost seems to work now.
Also I'm not sure how to prevent this from happening again.

2) Install the intake with this cut tube. I'm not sure how safe it is either - the filter is nice and close to that bolt too. I've flirted with taking that bolt off, but that's probably a bad idea.

3) Leave the cone filter on top, basically making it a short ram. That's been my temp solution so far. The good news is, the cone fits with room to spare, and I don't get ANY humming/UFO noise. The bad news is, there is too much room to spare. The filter is a good inch or two above the floor.

If you noticed that piece of string in the above picture, that's part of my ghetto temp solution supporting the filter. Without it, I'm worried I'm going to hit some pothole and the whole thing is just going to tear off. I don't see a good place to try to mount the pipe to on top.

Anyway, just wondering if anyone has any suggestions/comments.
Do I really need to trash it all and get an icebox instead?

- Frank

 

Personally I'd just do the icebox and call it a day...You don't have to worry about the bypass valve and its so easy to clean the filter as well as in a higher up location away from puddles.

Oh yeah, I've always wanted to say thanks for your CL FAQ, it was the first website I came across when I bought my car and it helped me a lot. Any chance your going to update it with more recent info?

 

Id get a new filter. When installing it try to make sure that every thing is mounted and angled as to where it isnt rubbing any thing. The hole i would try to slip a small piece of silicone hose over it and tighten it with a hose clamp