Cabin and engine air filters........net

May 30, 2025, 3:08 PM

Ok, so I have always bought and installed wiper blades, and cabin and engine air filters myself. They're cheaper on Amazon and you can get better quality. New 25 Camry has 20K miles now so I figured I'd change the air filters. Already changed the wiper blades.

So since the late 1990's I've known....cabin air filter is in the back of the glove box. Remove the cover, replace the filter. Simple. Last Canry they added an interior cover as well, so remove TWO plastic covers. No big deal, interior cover snaps and unsnaps easily.

Enter the 2025 model. Pretty much the same, only instead of easily snapping into place for the interior plastic panel, you pinch one end then remove it. Fine. Removed factory cabin air filter. IT HAD NO INDICATION of air flow. Luckily the tray it sits in, also a new brilliant idea, does have a label and arrow showing "up". I'm going to pretend that's also the direction of air flow. Ok, replace filter in tray hoping it is ok. Insert tray. Plastic panel WILL NOT CLOSE. Take out flashlight because they did away with glove box lights. Standing on head now WILL NOT CLOSE.

Break out youtube. Find video, watch some indian guy do EXACTLY what I did, cover easily snaps back on. So I'm thinking maybe the tray is mislabeled, so I turn up to down, even though it was up when I removed it. Still won't close.

Go BACK TIO YOUTUBE. Go to next video, and this is a Pakistani guy I can't understand. THIRD video is a MURICAN who speaks the King's English. In HIS video he gives a lot more tips and tricks. FFWD to the part I'm stuck at. He then mentions you have to APPLY UPWARD PRESSURE to the filter tray as you insert it, otherwise it will not insert fully and the cover won't snap closed. FFS, ###, sunnova.....mother####### #####. Noticed the filter tray inserted further in with UPWARD PRESSURE. Then the interior cover then snapped closed easily.

Engine air filter was easy because the cheap plastic brackets haven't broken off yet, so it was simple.

So it's gone from removing one plastic panel, to removing two plastic panels, to removing two plastic panels and a tray. Just learned the airflow goes DOWN, which is the opposite of the UP ARROW. Makes perfect sense. Fuggit, it's staying in their upside down.