They made it into a 2000 Ford Focus, a 2005 Subaru Forester & a brand spanking new 2012 Suzuki SX4. They leave mouse shit everywhere, they literally take dumps non-stop. They even brought the poison I spread around the house into the cabin air filter these fucking little pricks.
It’s an all out war and I’m not taking prisoners.
First, I gave them back their poison, have fun not coagulating bitches.
Second, all of these cars have a path that allows a small rodents into the cabin. The Focus & the SX4 was through the cabin air intake. I still don’t know how they make it into the Subaru.
Here’s how to upgrade a 2012 Suzuki SX4 to have an armored air intake.
Pro-tip I didn’t know, most cars’ cabin air intake is somewhere right bellow the windshield on the passenger side. Usually you need to remove the piece of plastic that is between the windshield and the hood as pictured bellow.
A close up of the air intake and how completely unprotected it is.
Now with protection, it looks pretty bad but it has done the job so far.
Back in business
Here’s how to access the intake from the inside, it gives you access to the air filter. You just need to remove the glove box first, no screws need to be removed.
It’s pretty lame to post my dumb hack online but I’ve had an incredibly hard time finding any information about cabin air intakes for cars so I hope it’ll help someone.
2016-10-17 edit: Commenter André shares the picture of his setup. Ingenious use of self drilling roofing screws!
André: ”we added a few more screws after this was taken to mold the wire mesh tight against the opening”
Ok ben my dad took the front cover off under windshield wipers and sealed it like you did and then in the very back where spare tire is took off panels on both sides of inside and found 2 vents where they were coming in and sealed those also.So hopefully this takes care of the problem and thank you soooo much for your time and if you run across any other places please let me know and my email is k****@gmail.com also 👍👍👍👍👍😀😀😀😀you are my hero lol
thank you soo much as i have a 2013 suzuki sx4 crossover and have seen yellow straw back behind my glove box what appeared to be nesting material but never saw droppings and thought it may have been where i hauled straw before ad didnt think no more of it until i recently went to look for a jack and saw stuff looked like pillow batting in the spare tire area but no droppings again so im starting to think now it is mouse nest or the starting of one before i dismantled it but how would the mice get in my spare tire area as i see no holes at all?
There may be other points of entry, this is the one that “sealed” the car for me. Is it possible that your mice are getting through the hole pictured in this post (which does lead to behind the glove box) and then moving around freely in the car, picking the spare tire area as a home?
ben idk for sure about the entry in the pic as your talking about but im going to have my dad check this for me as im sooooo freaking out about the fact that mice have been or may still be in my car as i didnt think they could even get in a newer car but i didnt know where to start to look until i googled and found this info!!!! can u tell me how to get off the black cover thats under the wipers as my dad had looked at your pic yesterday and then looked at my car and said it looked like it was riveted on or something but im literally scared to drive my car until i can get to the bottom of this lol but i have not seen droppings no where is whats strange and if they were to get into my main inside area and then to the trunk idk how they could got down in my spare tire area as i normally keep cases of water and pop in the trunk to where its heavy and would hold down the cover over the tire area so im not sure but any more info u would give me is greatly appreciated and my car is 2013 sx4 crossover……thanks kim!!!
Kim, I don’t remember doing much more than pulling on it but it’s been a few years :). I don’t think there are screws or anything, maybe a few rivets indeed but they’re probably pressure fitted so pulling strategically where they are should do it. I still have the car so I can go take a look, I’ll let you know when I have.
You definitely don’t want to be driving when a mouse shows up at your feet :).
Well I just had to write to add my thanks to your post. We had been dealing with mice in our SX4 ever since we move to the country. They never made it inside the car, but used the air cabin filter as an outhouse. Made for a nice smell in the car, especially when the weather was damp. The only way we could deal with it until reading your post was mouse traps under the hood. But that never got rid of the problem long term.
So we did what you suggested except we used 1/2″ square wire mesh that we screwed around the air intake opening. We then dismantled the fan assembly to clean it as the cabin filter was regularly chewed through. It was AWFUL. Totally caked in wet sh*t. Had to bleach it, but the smell still stuck around for weeks.
Anyhow thank you thank you thank you. We do appreciate the effort. And I have a photo I can send you of the wire mesh option should you wish to contact me at my e-mail.
Very cool! Thank you for dropping a note 🙂 It makes my day every time I know this helped someone. It’s definitely the time of the year where mice look for winter shelter. I just kicked one out of my toolbox :. 4 years in, they haven’t made it back into the SX4 though!
I sent you an email, your picture would be a great addition to this page for others to see.
Take care!
thank-you times a million….I had mice in my 2012 sx4 too this fall! I trapped 4 in the car. They stored cat food in my headliner. ….you can imagine what it sounds like when I go around sharp corner or stop fast, and left pee and poo trails all over my dashboard and the coffee cup I left in the car one day while at work. I put wire in the engine intake as they got into that filter too. Was trying to figure out how to screen the filter side when I found your post so guess what I am doing tomorrow!
Wow I love to know that this post which I thought was pretty useless actually helped someone 🙂 Thanks for leaving a note. I haven’t had a single mouse since I locked up this entry point. But I went after them outside the house pretty aggressively too. Definitely take a look at the cabin air filter as you might want to replace it if they were using this entry point. You can find them on Amazon fairly cheap. Good luck!