USP Intake owners - check your fiter...

[B8_Jim]

So granted this intake is about 2.5 years old, but has been on and off the car - with a total of maybe 15,000 miles of use...

Was inspecting it and the top looked only slightly dirty...



...but I thought I'd take it off and clean it ...

once I got it off, the bottom looked like :



The element has partially disintegrated. Way past due for a replacement I guess. The reason for the post is that when installed, none of this was visible - the filter looked fine from the top - so take the filter off to inspect the whole thing. There was/is no damage to the mesh - it's just the filter element.

[lowjonathan]

yes, my CTS 1 year old 20k km air fliter suffer the same fate as well

i swop to blitz stainless steel fliter solved this issue once for all

[chopz33]

Guess I'll be doing this today. Thanks for the heads up

[jimrobbington]

Same thing happened to me, but I didn't make a big deal about it because I bought used and couldn't confirm it was the original USP provided filter. Definitely not happy with the way this dry filter wears, switched to an oiled filter after this. Yours is much worse shape than mine was too

[DGVR6]

USP running a dry filter?

[rtl5009]

Has anyone checked in on ecs filter over time?

[xuandatou]

Got 4 replacement filters from Roc-Euro during sales event and always replace it every 5K with oil change... just my 4 cents

[SwankP3RF3ct10n]

That's not a dry filter. It's a cheap copy of a K&N wannabe. Go find yourself a similar sized AFE dry one and be done with it. Might also want to call USP and let them know they may want to not be so cheap on the filters. That is a serious issue there... not only is the filter material pulled into the intake and then engine, but other foreign particles will now enter as well. Keep in mind that damage from debris and sand or anything else that's small enough to go through that can cause more damage to the supercharger impellers (due to close tolerances) than it would if the engine was NA. It's not a good thing to happen. Get a real filter.

[SteveYem]

Has anyone checked in on ecs filter over time?

No but I will be checking it when I do an oil change next month. I had the same issue on my CTS Turbo intake filter after ~9000 miles of use which was very disappointing. It would be nice to know the brand/manufacturer of these filters so we could all avoid them in the future.

[iviegatron]

Can a K&N air filter fit over the CTS Turbo intake tube? If so, would it affect the supercharger whine (sound level)?

[jonwoods]

The noise is fun, but I don't get why anybody would put a shitty filter in front of a $15000 engine. Even with the "good" filters, I've ruined MAFs with both the oil and silicone coatings they use. No MAF in the S4 of course - but still, lesson learned for me... Sucking chunks of cotton or foam through your super-expensive engine and supercharger (plus a bunch of dust, sand, leaves and bugs because the filter isn't a filter anymore) isn't going to be fatal, but it's also ranks a solid zero on the "good idea" scale. Sucking in chunks of the wire mesh could make for a super shitty day.

[jimrobbington]

The noise is fun, but I don't get why anybody would put a shitty filter in front of a $15000 engine. Even with the "good" filters, I've ruined MAFs with both the oil and silicone coatings they use. No MAF in the S4 of course - but still, lesson learned for me... Sucking chunks of cotton or foam through your super-expensive engine and supercharger (plus a bunch of dust, sand, leaves and bugs because the filter isn't a filter anymore) isn't going to be fatal, but it's also ranks a solid zero on the "good idea" scale. Sucking in chunks of the wire mesh could make for a super shitty day.

I think the point here being, we trust when a paid AZ sponsor offers a $300-$400 intake, that it should come with a quality filter...

I immediately switched to an oiled filter I have experience with once I noticed the condition of my own USP intake.

[rtl5009]

These cars are speed density, no maf. Perfect for an oiled filter

[Jay3.2B7]

Can I ask which filter did you end up using in replacement of the filter provided with the USP intake. Brand and style# as this would greatly help.

Thanks

[Jay3.2B7]

Any details on the part number for the upgraded filter?

[DannyDeez]

Checked my USP filter when I removed my intake yesterday. It's about a year old and still in excellent condition.

[08ISF]

Checked mine after about 6 years. There is 1 section with a little bit of damage? Would this need to be replaced?

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