Engine Manufacturer Warranty Denied for Fuel Additives?

Ok maybe bad logic.....

Here is my thinking.....

On the dual racor I run 10 microns in the first filter which then goes to the engine primary and secondary which are 10 and 2

If my first filter in the dual clogs because I am "over filtering" I switch to the 30 micron in the dual and then the engine primary and secondary filter it down to 10 then 2......


This way I always have a clean and clear 30 and 10 ready in the system.

I have it set up like this:

10-10-2
If the first 10 starts to clog I flip the dual rancor switch to
30-10-2


ok.....let it rip

First, thanks for sharing real onboard experiences, it seems you have developed a system that works for your application.

If your 10 micron on the Racor is backed-up and/or "over-filtering", why step-up to the 30 micron on the other side of the dual Racor and let the 10 micron on the engine be exposed to the same level of potential contaminates as the Racor, which is much easier to change? It seems the risk now gets transfered to the on-engine filter, albeit that it stills has additional protection.

It may be a small thing, and just comes down to a risk management approach?

The 30 micron is setup as a get home filter. He has it setup that way so that when it clogs at sea, he doesn't have to open his fuel system in a hot engine room, bobbing around in the ocean to change it. The 30 micron will has enough filtering volume for him to get home and all he has to do is flip a valve. A 30 micron filter will filter finer than 30 microns once it gets a little algae or restriction on the element.

It seems to me in my experiences lately, that since the US mandated low sulfur diesel on the water instead of the high sulfur, that what I'm seeing is that all of the algae gets broken up too fine by the lower sulfur diesel and it's passing right through 30 microns, and getting caught in the finer secondaries. BTW. If you want to clean some of the algae out of a racor housing stat, without having to take it apart, drain the housing and take the element out, pour some on-road diesel down the pipe the lid T-bolt threads into...let it sit 30 mins and drain.......it seems the ultra low sulfur diesel totally dislodges the algae.....

Some additives do in fact eat the algae and don't clog the filters......I like the power service diesel kleen "Clear tank diesel". Then constant use of the bio-kleen and no more algae.

So a get home system approach would allow you to pass dirtier than normal particles to reach the engine filters, in the hopes of making in back home to the dock before you clog the engine filters and then have to change them as well as the Racor' in your hot engine room underway in a sea?

May work for Bimini to Miami, but not on anything longer???

Capt J,

you read my mind, that is what what i was trying to say.....
thanks

The get home 30-10-2 is only until i can change the dirty 10 on the dual and then switch back to the 10-10-2

unless the fuel is complete sludge, most of the gunk seems to get stopped by the racor, eiter the 10 or the 30.

by the way, i did try to run it with the 2 micron in the racor, 2-10-2.....but the 2 seemed to clogg too quickly with larger particles.

10-10-2 and a get home of 30-10-2 seems to work great for me.

Standard protocal for most engine manufacturers and yacht manufacturers is to run a 30 micron primary and the engine manufacturers secondary which is usually a 10 or 2 micron depending on manufacturer........The 30 does filter down to less microns as it gets sediment on it, and catches most of the sediment and crap. You generally change your secondaries every 2nd time you change your primary.

I have been very lucky with fuel, I have not had to change a clogged 2 micron or a clogged 10 micron that was behind a 10 or 30 micron filter in the Racors....

It seems that most of the particles are larger than 10 microns, what seems to work for me is to catch as much of the big particles in the racors before the engine primary and secondary.

My engine primary and secondaries are the spin on type and would not be fun to change under way in a rough sea conditions.

BTW, i have tried to set it up to run as 2-10-2 with a take home of 30-10-2 but the 2micron as the first filter would clog up too quickly. So that did not work for me.

Filtering Organics

During my career I have been involved with many different organic, liquid and solids filtering/sizing applications. There are conferences on this stuff with all sorts of papers, books and Doctoral writings. One thread is common, perform size removal sequentially whether with clarifiers, filters, screens, sand beds or centrifuges. Bottom line, your sizing media or techniques should progressively remove larger followed by smaller and smaller. When doubt follow the brains, warranties and money.

Of course if your fuel is relatively clean any scheme can work whether toilet paper, paper towels or no off engine filters whatsoever. But one never knows when fuel can get dirty with proven grit removal techniques then needed. So why not do it an accepted right way to begin with?

SunchaserV

So you are agreeing with us on this thread?

Hi,

While this doesn't answer the original question it is a direct accusation of an additive causing major damage.

I found this on another forum.

I have just joined a boat which was trialling GO2. They had 10K euro damage to the fuel cleaning system just trying to identify what caused the problems, but GO2 was involved. The boat ran the whole of last summer without a fuel addative and a purifier after the purifier was removed for repairs. The fuel was all supplied by a very reputable supplier. Will keep this thread upto date as our enquiries continue.

I was surprised to see this amongst positive comments about this product. I was also very surprised that a supposed Chief Engineer would have to do 10k Euro damage to his Purifier while looking for his problem and then send it ashore for repairs. I am inclined to believe if an additive was going to damage some part of the fuel system it would not be the purifier. I have seen a Pury mainshaft bent by someone who was too lazy to read the manual and was not familiar with the job trying to remove a taper pin by driving it from the fat end.

I hope to get an answer from this guy in due course as I have asked how this all happened.

There is advanced training now available for this procedure.

I think we have an "engineer" trying to find someone to blame for his own ignorance.

Unfortunately, it is fairly common in the industry.
Duke