I personally stay out of the water and mud as much as I can and still got mud on my filter and sucked a little water in a few times. Anything you can do to get rid of the stock intake is a good thing on the XK. A CAI will help a snorkel will eliminate this unless you drive in a lake. I for now just put a filter right on the inlet that attatches to the throttle body to get me by for the time being. But if you off road you need to do something IMO