What is this plastic reservoir on drivers side

Good day
99 Hiace L178
Looking up and fwd from behind the drivers tire I found the chamber for the air filter, just outboard of that is a broken plastic reservoir, any guesses what it might have been for?

I hope you have the rest of the air filter housing which is not attached in your picture!
Is that the windscreen washer reservoir?

Hello

No it’s part of the air intake system. See:
https://toyota.epc-data.com/regius_ace/lh119v/114894/engine/1703/

While this is for my van I expect yours is the same. Do tailor this site to be exactly for your specific model (based on the VIN) so you can find out what everything is. It’s a great site and will teach you a lot.

As you can see from the pictures the intake is rather complicated. I’ve no idea why Toyota made it so but it is fantastically engineered with water drains and anti-suck flaps to stop water getting in where it should not, plus various anti-vibration mounts.

With everything working properly I see no reason why the Hiace cannot ford to the depth of the air intake behind the driver’s door, which is probably what the engineers were thinking but yours is currently picking up every bit of road muck and sucking this straight into the air filter. Not good.

I think you should take the opportunity to examine the entire air intake system. You might be surprised but not pleased to discover other problems that compromise the air quality or prevent filtration or drainage.

You’ll have to take the driver’s seat out to replace this part and it’s worth cleaning out the whole lot. It’s probably all very dirty and doesn’t your van deserve this?

Also, the corrugated hose that sits upstream of the cast aluminium piece is a common failure point (ask me how I know) and allows hot, unfiltered air within the engine bay to be used over cool and filtered air from outside that the system is designed to use. Finally if this is poor and the lining has started to break down there is a danger that pieces of hose will be sucked into where they should not be. It’s an expensive OEM part but a suitable length of modern silicone hose will cost ~£20.

HTH

Fantastic answer HTH,
First time i've see that link for parts.
thanks tons.

The plastic reservoir and complicated intake is all about intake noise and anti resonance in air intake , and as someone pointed out the air filter cover is also missing that will make the all lot redundant .

thanks for the extra info. The air filter cannister/cover is intact, i removed it to change the filter.

My plastic reservoir (or whatever it is?) is cracked also.

Is it really part of the air-intake system? If so is it essential to get it replaced? I presume wading into water up to this depth could be damaging?

Yes it is part of the air intake, reduces induction noise not essential but not a good idea to get water in the intake , a simple repair with duct tape or glue is quite adequate if beyond repair there is an Hiace breaker in Bradford UK.

Thanks JT69. It's good to know about any breakers in the UK as opposed to having to import from Japan, so I will give them a call.
Do you have their details by any chance?

Have not actually used them yet just a phone number from a friend , will pm you please let us know if they are any good

Thanks for the PM. Think I might try and repair it first. Looking on ebay, there is one in japan for approx £350 - so duct tape it is!!!