diesel fuel filter

[tho52mas]

What material are the filters made from in store bought units? Can I use a water filter from Home Depot and a two to ten micron filter? The "plastic" appears to be the same in the Home Depot model and the filters are twice the size and 1/4 the cost. Would they work? Email me at tho52mas@nccw.net

[fer@fer]

Indeed you can use a water filter from Home Depot and a two to ten micron filter to filter your diesel.

Moreover you can do watever you want. What you can´t is to avoid the consequences.

95% of the troubles in marine diesel, according to specialists, are due to problem in the fuel systems. This is filtering and filtering.

Even if the diesel filter cost is 4 times the water comparable, the magnitude of dollars compared to the cost of the engine, injector or the boat itself, is peanuts. Moreover, is even worse compared with preventing to start your engine when you need it.

I would tie to diesel filters.

Regards. Fernando

[RichH]

Typical water filters in ''store-bought'' units can vary all over the map.... from wound cotton string to unbound cellulose to melt blown polypropylene fiber. The problem with ''store-bought'' is that the 2µM (or whatever the rating) is not necessarily the actual rating..... huh? The store-bought filters are ''nominally'' rated, meaning they MAY BE 50 to 90% efficient at their ''rating''..... plus there is NO guarantee that the filter media will not shed fibers nor will retain the particles under increasing pressure (extrusion). In simple language the ''store-bought'' filter can pass a basketball and still be ''rated'' at 2µM, etc. ...... filter jargon only translatable and understood by a filter geek.... a slight of hand / trap for the unwary.
Typical oil / fuel filters are mostly resin impregnated cellulose or similar ''fixed'' media - meaning they wont fall apart when wetted, are chemically compatible with oil/fuel and will remain fairly close and consistent to their ''rating'' (90-95% efficiency) under varying pressure across the filter.
As the other poster mentioned.... the small price you save in buying a crappy filter doesnt compare to the at-risk cost of rebuilding / unclogging vital engine components.
Moral: Never Ever EVER EVER Believe the "Rating" on a filter to be the particle size that the filter will retain.... unless there is documentation accompanying or the rating is stated/labled "absolute".