Posted by katorpus (jrb@…>)
George & Bob
A thought or two on your “cheapie” vacuum gauges.
Make sure you keep the right size wrench “handy” (tethered to the
bulkhead beside the filter, for instance). You will otherwise be
unable to adequately tighten (or remove) the filter top without
torquing the gauge off of the fitting.
Vacuum gauges are designed for vacuum, although some (likely not the
cheapies) are also able to withstand pressure. If you have installed
an electric fuel pump upstream of the filter (for the purpose
of “loading the filter” and bleeding the injectors without tickling
the manual fuel pump, for instance), then you will be putting
pressure into the bourdon tube of the vacuum gauge and will likely
rupture it (on the cheapies, anyway).
The Racor gauges are fluid damped (silicone, I believe). You can
obtain other gauges that are damped, but not at this price. The
damping does a couple of things…It keeps the needle of the gauge
from vibrating over a range due to the vibrations transmitted to the
gauge via the bulkhead/fuel lines/whatever. It also damps the
resonance of the bourdon tube (which is hanging in air in your
cheapie gauge). This vibration of the tube, over time, will lead to
the failure of the very thin brass in the tube, at which point you
will be sucking air into the engine through the resulting crack.
Since you’ve already ordered these, I suggest that you (non-
destructively) open one of them up before you install it and ask
yourself if you really want the continued operation of your engine
(at a potentially critical time) to hinge on the construction of this
flimsy piece of equipment. If the answer is “yes”, make sure that you
hang on to your T-Handle so that you can locate it and re-install it
when failure does occur (hopefully not too close to rocks or jetties,
since you’ll still have to bleed the system afterward in order to
restart your engine).
Apropos of another ongoing discussion, this would also clearly be the
weak point in the fuel system in the event of any type of engine
compartment fire as well.
Some things are WORTH the cost.
— In FreedomOwnersGroup@yahoogroups.com, Bob <rweeks6508@…> wrote:
These have the right screw threads as the RACOR T-Handle?? Save a
lot
of money I like it!Bob
On Mon, Dec 1, 2008 at 8:38 AM, george huffman wrote:
Vacuum Gauge
http://www.drillspot.com/products/67238/Generic_5WZ18_Vacuum_GaugeThe above link to an affordable vacuum gauge. I just ordered 4 of
them.
It doesn’t have the fancy little dial index like the Racor but I
can buy
a lot of grease pencils for a hundred dollars!George
— On Sun, 11/30/08, Roger L. <rogerlov@ix. netcom.com> wrote:
From: Roger L. <rogerlov@ix. netcom.com>
Subject: Re: [FreedomOwnersGroup ] Fuel cleaning
To: FreedomOwnersGroup@ yahoogroups. com
Date: Sunday, November 30, 2008, 10:08 PM
http://www.drillspot.com/products/67238/Generic_5WZ18_Vacuum_Gauge
http://www.drillspot.com/products/67238/Generic_5WZ18_Vacuum_Gauge
I’ve always filtered my fuel when it goes into the tank; I thought
that
everyone did. Mine are homemade, but the West product looks better.
Roger----- Original Message -----
From: Rees Midgley mailto:rmidgley@...
mailto:rmidgley@...
To: FreedomOwnersGroup@ yahoogroups. com
<mailto:FreedomOwnersGroup@yahoogroups.com>
<mailto:FreedomOwnersGroup@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, November 30, 2008 3:38 PM
<mailto:FreedomOwnersGroup@yahoogroups.com>
Subject: RE: [FreedomOwnersGroup ] Fuel cleaning
<mailto:FreedomOwnersGroup@yahoogroups.com><mailto:FreedomOwnersGroup@yahoogroups.com>
Has anyone used a fuel filter funnel between the fuel hose and
the
fuel port on the deck? West Marine sells one that will separate
water from fuel and pass 5 gal per minute of fuel through a 100
micron filter. I just bought one and will try it this winter in
the BVI
(10" H x 8-1/2" diam, $34.99, model 1933233).- Rees