backwashing fuel filters {reuseing}

[dagwill Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dagwill]

i am on my second fuel filter in 90,000 ks useing SVO and bio.Probably no need to have changed it but after backwashing half a dozen times i figured id got good value out of the first one.
I take the standard spin on type filter off my hj60 landcruiser and sit it in a 4ltr icecream container and give a blast of compressed air through the centre threaded hole. I use a 1" od 1/2" id rubber gromitt to give a bit of a seal between my air nozzel and the filter with my left hand as a shield to stop the fuel ending up all over my face witch happened the first time i did it then i replace the filter open the bleed screw and useing the hand priming pumprun 1/2 ltr or so into a container and throw that back into the tank, just to make sure theres nothing i dont want that has found its way onto the wrong side of the filter gauze.
Now i totally agree,its not worth the risk of getting crapp through the system for the sake of the cost of a fuel filter,i see this practice of best use if you had two filters in line. You could backwash the first one and change the second at you discression.
I pour the backwash from the icecream container into a jar just so i can watch all the crud settle out [small things]