This cold air intake is
NOT designed for a body lifted S10!
Can this system really be modified to compensate for the 1"-2" of misalignment caused by a BL?
The answer to this
? is pointless since you are still trying to make something fit where it was never intended to be used.
It is not K&N's fault that you are installing one of their FIPK's on a vehicle it was never intended for!
Let's take a look at the design and see where it could be improved.
All of the tubing ends including the TB hat should have a retention lip built in to help prevent the pieces from separating.
The adapter that bolts to the TB should also have a retention lip for the same reason.
I would still like to see K&N come out with a new TB hat that simply bolts on using the factory t-nut.
The t-nut design makes the hat very easy to take off when you need to do maintenance.
I also thing the TB hat should have some sort of flex tubing just like the OEM TB hat.
The engine does move around a little due to torque loading so a flexible section in the intake tract will allow the system to move with the engine instead of against it.
The heat shield design is kind of pointless since the air filter can still draw in plenty of hot air all around the shield.
An enclosed box that connects only to an outside air source (Volant makes a good one) would make this a true cold air intake instead of a true hot air intake.
Maybe K&N could make and sell a special adapter for those of us who do have a body lift.
Does anyone else have ideas to help improve the design?
It is better to approach K&N with design improvement ideas that will benefit everyone rather than to just say that their product is defective and that they better do something about it (this is more of a threat than a solution)
Back to the 3 links that
HenryJ posted!
I read all of them and noticed that some people having the same problem had broken motor mounts.
If you have broken motor mount or one that is starting to separate then no matter what you do you are going to have problems with your FIPK.
Once again this is not K&N's fault!
It also appears that the earlier designs did not have a retention lip built into the TB hat and the rubber coupling was made of a different material which caused loosening problems.
The FIPK on my CC had a retention built into the tb hat and the upgraded rubber coupling so this might explain why I had absolutely no problems with pieces coming apart with over 90k miles of use.
For those of you who have the separation problem, maybe you should request that K&N send you the updated parts to see if that's what your problem has been all along.
Sorry I made this post so long, I just wanted to state the facts about this problem and offer some possible solutions.
Steve