Filter me this

I’ve been sneezing my absolute head off recently without really knowing why. Suspecting something in the car might possibly be doing it, I began the hunt to see if the Stagea cabin filters were actually filtering and not taking the decade off..

Luckily checking out your cabin filters in a C34 Stagea is a pretty simple (albeit dusty) job. It does involve emptying your glove box though so expect to find all of those things you forgot you stashed in there a long time ago.

The Stagea cabin filters are behind here. Thankfully unless something is fiercely stuck, you should have them out for inspection in under 10 mins. And even better, the only tool you’ll need is a screwdriver!

To free the glove box lid, gently push on each side so the little rounded bit comes past the guard. Once you do both sides the glove box will drop down.

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The lid is still suspended by a few things. Squeeze the grey clip at the end of the wire to release it from the back.

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Next we need to remove the black plastic backing to expose the Stagea cabin filters. There’s four phillips head screws on the bottom section and four up the top. 20160312_120830 (1)

Again there’s a couple of things keeping the black plastic from completely dropping to the footwell. To remove the glove box light, just twist the fixture out. To remove the wire hardness, just leverage the clip out with a screwdriver underneath.

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This will now leave you with a bit of space to get the grey Stagea cabin filters out for a quick look. Gently pry the top one out first but be aware of any clips at the top that might be holding them in. They are a little flexible which makes it a bit easier worming them out from the bottom of the dash. Once you’ve got the top one out you can undo the clip at the bottom of the second filter and push it up to work it out into the sunlight.

Behold, a Stagea cabin filter which I suspect came with the car back in the year 2000 and has never been removed since:

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From here you’ve got a couple of choices – attempt to clean it yourself or find a replacement to put there instead. If you’re going down the DIY route you could try a gentle wash with soapy water remembering to make sure it’s well and truly dry before you pop them back in. The alternative is to buy a new set and the while finding an exact replacement is difficult, apparently the [easyazon_link identifier=”B0010EEO0W” locale=”US” tag=”theworsdjever-20″]Pathfinder filter[/easyazon_link] (for an R50) fits perfectly even if it is a little thicker than the stag version.

Once they’re back in, do the steps in reverse to get your glove box back where it should be.

On a side note, as dusty as mine where and as messy as I got in cleaning them I didn’t sneeze once. So it’s probably not the car causing it. The mystery continues…

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