Frank Langer
1984 Ericson 30+, Nanaimo, BC
Hi,
I changed the Racor primary fuel filter, secondary fuel filter and replaced the electric fuel lift pump on our 1984 E30+ today, and was a bit surprised at what I found.
The Racor filter had been replaced two years ago, 311 engine hours ago (total engine hours now are 1023). The clear bowl never shows any water, and when I emptied fuel from the filter, I found a small number of dark particles each about 1/16" in size which the filter had filtered out. The inside of the filter showed a small area of brown discoloration on one side of the inside of the fuel filter, otherwise it looked white and clean.
When I emptied the secondary fuel filter, there was no sign of any particles or impurities, so I kept it as a backup spare in the event of an emergency.
The filter inside the electric fuel lift pump had only collected a very small number of pin head size particles. I was replacing it because it was at least 25 years old and I am told that these engines will stall if the fuel pump stops working. So I cleaned it up and am keeping it as a spare backup as well, in case the new one fails for some reason.
I had expected to find more "crud" in the filters after two years and 311 engine hours. My conclusion is that given that the engine has run properly for the past two years and the fuel filters looked cleaner than I had anticipated, the interval of two years and 311 engine hours between filter changes doesn't seem too long. I don't think I would leave it longer (the secondary filter has a note on it to change it every 200 hours, the Racor every 500 hours but my engine manual says to change them at least once a year), nor do I think I would do it more often. I try to be very careful as to where I get fuel, and always add Biobar to kill algae critters and Stanadyne; I am considering changing to Startron.
On a related topic, I do change the oil and filter about every 75 hours, about twice per season, as I think the quality of the oil does affect engine longevity.
I would be interested in what others think on this, and how often you change these filters.
Frank
I changed the Racor primary fuel filter, secondary fuel filter and replaced the electric fuel lift pump on our 1984 E30+ today, and was a bit surprised at what I found.
The Racor filter had been replaced two years ago, 311 engine hours ago (total engine hours now are 1023). The clear bowl never shows any water, and when I emptied fuel from the filter, I found a small number of dark particles each about 1/16" in size which the filter had filtered out. The inside of the filter showed a small area of brown discoloration on one side of the inside of the fuel filter, otherwise it looked white and clean.
When I emptied the secondary fuel filter, there was no sign of any particles or impurities, so I kept it as a backup spare in the event of an emergency.
The filter inside the electric fuel lift pump had only collected a very small number of pin head size particles. I was replacing it because it was at least 25 years old and I am told that these engines will stall if the fuel pump stops working. So I cleaned it up and am keeping it as a spare backup as well, in case the new one fails for some reason.
I had expected to find more "crud" in the filters after two years and 311 engine hours. My conclusion is that given that the engine has run properly for the past two years and the fuel filters looked cleaner than I had anticipated, the interval of two years and 311 engine hours between filter changes doesn't seem too long. I don't think I would leave it longer (the secondary filter has a note on it to change it every 200 hours, the Racor every 500 hours but my engine manual says to change them at least once a year), nor do I think I would do it more often. I try to be very careful as to where I get fuel, and always add Biobar to kill algae critters and Stanadyne; I am considering changing to Startron.
On a related topic, I do change the oil and filter about every 75 hours, about twice per season, as I think the quality of the oil does affect engine longevity.
I would be interested in what others think on this, and how often you change these filters.
Frank
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