Out of necessity, had to install an aftermarket intake hose on the car. The previously mentioned EL header install was a bit more of a tight squeeze than I realized, and the header pipe actually ended up contacting that little ballsack resonator that's right below the 90° bend of the stock intake hose (image below). A little bit of melting occurred before I realized the problem and I got a pinhole in that resonator from it melting through. Wasn't planning on messing with the stock intake, but also wasn't in the mood to try to find a right size cap to put in place of that part, nor try to get the part and most likely be told that it's only sold as a whole intake assembly, nor hunt down a replacement part secondhand, all the while driving around with an intake leak. I used a big zip tie looped around the sack resonator and the bigger box resonator that's adjacent to the airbox to pull the part away from the header pipe and keep it clear while I waited a few days for my part to show up.
Bought a Perrin inlet hose and got it installed, nothing new or cosmic to most folks here, of course. I know Mishimoto also makes a hose, and that was the original replacement part I had in mind, but the cost difference between the two didn't seem justifiable to me, so I went with the Perrin and saved myself about $50. I had to remove the pulley cover to access the PCV hose and the hose clamp at the throttle body, and that's about the only thing that made the 5 minute job a little longer. Of course the sound generator plumbing is mostly gone, too. I've seen a few people pull out the entire assembly up to the firewall, but the cap they provide you is meant to install over the piece of hose that comes out of the firewall and attaches to the frame down below the battery shelf, so that stayed in place and was capped as needed.
I got rained on during the job, so everything looks extra dirty and dusty under the hood, but the job's done, everything is running fine, and no more plastic is being harmed by hot exhaust components.
