worldforgo

Ok this is weird. I was doing a check over on my 94 ES300 I have had for a few weeks now and when I went to go check the Air filter, i see there isnt one installed. Obviously someone forgot to put it in , and from the looks of the debris inside the filter box, its been a while since there was a filter.
My question to you all is should I be worried about the long term damage that may have been caused by this moronic mistake? I will be vacuuming out the box and placing a fresh K&N in there.
Anything else I should do?

PFB

At this point no one will be in any position to provide you with a meaningful answer. There are too many variables and unknowns. Just cross your fingers, and hope for the best. If however, your engine runs normally, than the odds are in your favor. Do however try and clean out as much of the debris that you can.

Regarding the K&N filter, if it was me, I would stay away from it, and stick to the OEM filter.

KLF

That is pretty maddening. Ya there's no way to tell if there is any damage done, not without tearing the engine apart.

Not waste your money on a K&N would be a good start. Stick with OEM.

Coulter

You should also change your oil ASAP, they would at least help flush out whatever particulates got in the engine without the air filter.

At the end of the day, there's nothing you can do but just drive it and hope for the best. I wouldn't spend any money or time poking around to see if any damage occurred, just not worth and you can't reverse anything that happened anyway.

I wouldn't worry too much, it probably just added some additional wear to an engine that's already has quite a few miles on it.