I replaced the original filter that came with the CT Icebox with a K&N filter. Last night, I cleaned the filter and when I was reassembling it, I noticed a fitment issue where I was able to pull away the plastic elbow piping from the filter easily when it was all assembled. Take a look at the pictures. The filter only goes into the elbow pipe approximately 1/4 of an inch. When I looked into the elbow piece, you can see cut marks into the plastic and it's pretty deep - look at picture #4. So far, the fitment between the 2 pieces hasn't come apart by bumpy roads or anything but I'm still concerned. I'm thinking that these are my options:

1) Purchase a clamp and tighten up the connection and hope it holds. My concern is that since it's plastic, it can crack when I tighten it.

2) I leave it alone because it's either normal or use the reasoning "since it's been fine for almost 2 years like this, it should continue to be fine".

3) Purchase a new elbow pipe (if I can) for a better fitment or sand down the interior of the existing one to get rid of the cut line. The problem can be seen in picture #3 though. The filter doesn't extend past the airbox that far out anyways so I'm not sure how much of a better fitment I can get.

What do you guys think I should do? Anyone else had this issue? Thanks guys for any help you can provide.

 

Looks like it was glued together. Am I correct?

 

They weren't. The blue highlight on the plastic of the filter's edge came about because I sanded it down a little.