The task reminded me why I no longer like to work on cars.
Managed to remember how to get the top in the service position and unclip the 2 cables from the car to let the back portion of the top fold up to kind of expose the engine compartment area.
Found one difference between the factory soft top and the aftermarket. The factory top pivots had enough drag to once the top was folded to remain in place but the aftermarket top keep flopping down.
As expected the engine was dusty. I hate looking at the engine for that reason.
Got the air filter out. What a struggle. Of course as expected the foam sponge layer on top of the filter element proper had caught some leaves and of course in my struggle to remove the filter some of these fell into the air box. Had to wrap clear plastic wrapping tape around the handle end of a large screw driver to retrieve the couple of leaves from the air box. At my apartment complex there no electrical outlet for a shop vac and I don't have an extension cord nearly long enough to reach from my place to it just so happens the closest parking space which was open when I got home last night.
In the couple of moves since I last used it I misplaced the tube of Gummi Pflege so I had nothing to smear on the sealing foam to help the filter element slide into position.
Finally got the filter tray to slide all the way in so I could snap the spring retaining clips into position.
Got the engine compartment hard lid in place and secure then got the foam/carpeted cover in place over it and secure then the storage compartment that is accessible from between the seats.
Old filter didn't look too bad. Both the top foam layer and the paper filter element were intact. As I mentioned there was a bit of leaf trash on top of the foam but that's to be expected. My fingers picked up no dust from the air box surfaces I could reach. I didn't bother to remove the MAF as I was running out of daylight.
I'll drive the car now with the new filter in place and if the P1128 error comes back maybe clean the MAF. I don't look forward to fighting with the top and the engine compartment lids though.
Managed to beat the heck out of my arms and got the bruises to show for it. This is a real problem now because my doctor wants me to give blood at least 4 times a year. (I have too much blood (an elevated HBC reading and hematocrit reading) due to overactive bone marrow. I have no blood diseases as she tested/checked me for all of them. This excess of blood is a "middle age white man's disease".) The doctor would remove blood but she won't unless I have a bone marrow biopsy done first and I looked into this and the process hurts like the dickens. I still remember the extreme level of bone pain I experienced after I broke my right femur in 3 places and no way I'm having her drive a hollow needle into my hip bone to extract a bone marrow sample. So I refused to allow her to do the bone marrow biopsy. Then she suggested donating blood. This works real well and lowers the HBC way down below the high reading. Trouble is the last time I gave blood, back on May 6 I was almost not accepted because of the bruises on my arms. For some reason Red Cross now rejects a donor with bruises. It was clear the arms had no needle tracks -- the nurse checks for those. I told the nurse the needle used to extract blood doesn't hardly even leave a mark. She relented because she had not seen the video and was not current on this new restriction. The others there told me that any bruising sign was suitable to be rejected as blood donor.
Here I've been really careful to not bang my arms so come early July when I can next donate blood my arms will free of any bruises and danged if both aren't covered in bruises this AM. If the MAF needs cleaning or replacement this will have to be done at the dealer. I'm not messing with it here at the at house.
So now today I'll drive the Boxster to work and back and see what happens. The engine was running just fine before I changed the filter and last night driving it a bit after replacing the filter the engine felt just fine.