A while back I took a short cut with my filtering and ended up with problems.
I needed a significant amount of fuel for a trip, quickly. So I passed my usual course filtering stage ie Bunnings Bag, and pumped the 12month old visually clear settled oil straight through my 5 um bag filter. After a 8 hour??? drive I arrived at Jindabyne. A week there of short drives and the car was progressively struggling to start hot or cold and getting worse. Significant loss of power over several days. The pre filter was removed and found clogged up with gum/fat. It would not melt even under hot tap water. I replaced the pre and main filter. Car started much better but I was concerned now.
I remembered Jeffrey Brooks suggesting Lacquer Thinner as a solvent for the fats. I was apprehensive but had no better idea to prevent problem on the rest of the trip. I didn't know at what concentration to use it. So here goes.
There was 15lts of oil with 20% unleaded in it. The weather was warm. I bought a litre of lacquer thinners and put it all in the tank. I thought, low fuel quarter of a tank, winding roads, swishing, solvent, would help dissolve fat/gum. After maybe 20mins the power was much better and the engine sounded much better and continued to improve as I drove. I have not had problems since I returned and gone back to 'no short cuts in filtering'.
Forgive me if the details are not exact and my grammar is not up to scratch but this is as best as I can describe and it worked for me. I don't know if there was any long term damage to the engine, IP or whatever, I can only note the car is running as good as it was on diesel when purchased. I am not suggesting you do it, or that it will work for your car but I will probably use the Lacquer Thinner again if the pre filter clogs up again. Hope this is useful info to someone. By the way I have a 1980 300D Merc.
Regards
Peter<><
I needed a significant amount of fuel for a trip, quickly. So I passed my usual course filtering stage ie Bunnings Bag, and pumped the 12month old visually clear settled oil straight through my 5 um bag filter. After a 8 hour??? drive I arrived at Jindabyne. A week there of short drives and the car was progressively struggling to start hot or cold and getting worse. Significant loss of power over several days. The pre filter was removed and found clogged up with gum/fat. It would not melt even under hot tap water. I replaced the pre and main filter. Car started much better but I was concerned now.
I remembered Jeffrey Brooks suggesting Lacquer Thinner as a solvent for the fats. I was apprehensive but had no better idea to prevent problem on the rest of the trip. I didn't know at what concentration to use it. So here goes.
There was 15lts of oil with 20% unleaded in it. The weather was warm. I bought a litre of lacquer thinners and put it all in the tank. I thought, low fuel quarter of a tank, winding roads, swishing, solvent, would help dissolve fat/gum. After maybe 20mins the power was much better and the engine sounded much better and continued to improve as I drove. I have not had problems since I returned and gone back to 'no short cuts in filtering'.
Forgive me if the details are not exact and my grammar is not up to scratch but this is as best as I can describe and it worked for me. I don't know if there was any long term damage to the engine, IP or whatever, I can only note the car is running as good as it was on diesel when purchased. I am not suggesting you do it, or that it will work for your car but I will probably use the Lacquer Thinner again if the pre filter clogs up again. Hope this is useful info to someone. By the way I have a 1980 300D Merc.
Regards
Peter<><
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