The diagram below (click here for PDF, or here for SVG) describes the full assembly, with clip, inside the engine compartment. If the clip is omitted, we don’t need the voltage regulator or the thermostatic switch, because much less output is delivered into the engine.
The clip does need to clip onto metal. Some filters, like the ones for the Tahoe, have metal mesh holding them together; this is perfect out of the box. Where this is not the case, we will fold metal mesh into the filter.