Wix air filter vs. Oem

Anyone know the reason for the the fiber mat on the wix filter?placing them side by side the only thing I see is that the wix is slightly shorter if you take the mat out of the equation. Just kinda curious if it is purely a spacer or if it is extra filtration

 

my wix filter didn't come with that fiber mat. weird.

edit: nevermind, i have a different engine.

 

I bought 2, about 6 months apart and they both have it. My part number is wa10085

 

Neither does mine.

 

I have the v6. I'd imagine that is different from the 4cyl

 

It seems Toyota has had both in the last few years. The OEM filter for my wife’s 4Runner had the extra foam on the top. Now they have a superceded part# that doesn’t have the foam. Parts department told me the old filter is no longer available. I do realize it’s a different engine, just something to consider. I’d imagine both are fine if changed on schedule.

 

I've messaged wix looking for an explanation. I realize it will work fine. Just curious why its that way

 

Prefilter, catches the large particles

 

I asked the same at the parts department. Just got a shrug. Figured it’s a cost savings method. I personally preferred the extra foam. Like @faawrenchbndr said, I thought of it as a prefilter.

 

It just kinda fell off walking across the garage after taking the picture. So for now I'll be running without it I guess. Atleast until I hear back from wix

 

I have a Fram filter that has this. It is a pre-filter with larger micron rating to catch larger debris with the pleats being a smaller micron rating to catch the finer dust and debris the pre-filter doesn't catch.

If it fell off that easy, then maybe it wasn't manufactured very well.

 

All I can comment when I ran wix air filters on my tundra, they never had that fiber mat. Imo, the wix is just as good, or better than the oem filter.

 

I have an acdelco air filter that also has that mat on top. It is a pre filter, specifically in Volkswagen land and older GM land it's refered to as the "cold weather" option. Aside from catching the big stuff I assume it will wick moisture a bit to prevent water ingress and saturation of the filter. I'm not an engineer though

 

I just put one of these WIX in my 22 V6, it also had the pre-filter on it.

 

This.

 

I use to run those pre filters on my snowmobile. They were to protect the engine from ingesting snow dust. Problem was, they collected too much snow dust and actually starved the engine of enough air, causing the sled to run like crap. Idk if the same is possible if you drive on a lot of dusty roads.

 

It came off , just running the pleated paper portion of the filter

 

My wix from last year had this. The new one I got a month ago did not. Weird.

 

I bought a Denso filter off of rockauto. A bunch of other sites sell this too for fitting the 3rd gen. It had the pre filter. Otherwise looked the same. I tore off the fuzzy dust catcher and put it in. Bottom filter is from dealer.