Oh you silly air box

It's no wonder you found what you did; the engine air filter belongs in the air box, not on top of the inverter...

 

It doesn't look like "nesting material". Maybe just ingested. Lots of trees and debris from them on the road?

 

I'm wondering how it got in there past the air filter...

 

Isn't that -before- the filter?

 

Yes, it's before the filter. Looks like it went through a big cloud of maple tree seeds.

 

Air flow is from the underside up through the filter.

@Acadianer I'm guessing you're parking outdoors, and get a lot of overnight dew. That said, what the hell is with Toyota's bolt specs:

 

any turds?

 

"Rust converter" to the rescue!

They used to use Cadmium plating and they lasted. It's carcinogenic and so now banned, and zinc doesn't last as long (if used at all).

 

My PiP came from up north and has lots of rusty bolts, too. Also the connectors on the inverter. I cleaned them as well as I could and used POR-15. That was about 5 months ago. So far, so good.

 

Same area on our 2010 "garage queen".



But yeah: Toyota bolt rust resistance is garbage.

 

Looks good, @Mendel Leisk. Do they salt the roads in B.C.? Or are you able to not drive on them when they are salty? Then again, if you're near sea level, I don't remember Vancouver getting much snow. Mine isn't all that bad, but I also treaded several places under the plastic radiator cover.

 

Frustrating: seems like the banning of certain bolt coatings is leading to use of more toxic aftermarket remedies? And retro fixing this is never ideal. Better to do coated fasteners in a factory under controlled conditions, when everything is readily accesible, vs daubing on chemical, just where you can reach, after the rust has started.

They salt pretty liberally up here, by no means as bad as back east though. Where things are really sand-pounding bad rust is the rear suspension. The bolts, the suspension frames, especially the welds. The frames look like they have a token coat of black paint, definitely no hot-dip galvanize. And all the bolts happily blooming rust.

I took off a few plastic panels in vicinity of rear suspension, and the small bolts were almost rust welded on. Reinstalled them after an oil soak. Seems to me this at least is something they could have done at factory. Over regulation is creating a mess.

I brushed and applied a wax/oil solution to everything I could get at, it is what it is.

 

With one older rust-prone vehicle I had once, it wasn't unheard of for me to take something apart, then stop at the hardware store for some stainless bolts and nuts to put it back together. They're cheap. Seems quicker than trying to clean up/coat some original bolt.

Not something I would do to replace some class-10.9 load-carrying bolt somewhere, but small bolts holding covers on stuff, sure.

-Chap

 

Hang around on street corners looking to score some of dos cadmium coat bolts.