***Racor Filter Warning***

[Capt13]

With a new season upon us, I just wanted to post this again in hopes it will prevent a really bad situation for somebody. I was reminded of it again today as I was removing the barbed brass fuel fittings from a racor filter that was on a boat I'm redoing. The plastic bowl literally fell off the filter. Same issue, the threads had shrunk and become tapered. Guys, when you change your fuel filters this spring, take a good look at your plastic bowl and make sure the threads haven't become tapered.

I posted this once before about two years ago:

Racor Filter Warning !
Ethanol is the devil. Just wanted to give a heads up in regard to potentially very dangerous issue. I was getting the boat ready last week and after draining tanks and lines and starting fresh with new gas, I was pumping the ball on the fuel line and heard a clunk that came from the compartment housing the Racorfuel filter. The plastic bowl had fallen off and spilled the gas from the filter onto the deck. It took about 45 minutes before I realized that the plastic threads on the the bowl looked tapered. I did a search and found this thread on the hull truth.

http://www.thehulltruth.com/boating-...er-bowl.html#b

My old bowl side by side with new one.

 

[Chinacat]

So I'm guessing this is specifically a plastic bowl issue? My bowl is metal. I'm guessing aluminum? Its pushing 15 years.... I'm also guessing on the plastic bowl the threads themselves are plastic? I'm guessing the reasoning behind plastic is so its clear and you can peek at it to check for water? My metal bowl has a drain plug at the bottom that's easy even to drop and let the fuel fill up a container and then you can check out whats in the container easy enough.

Compared to the issue you mention, I'm thinking the ability to look into the clear bowl is not worth having to deal with it falling off

 

[Koz]

So I'm guessing this is specifically a plastic bowl issue?

Yes, ethanol caused the plastic to expand / deform. I heard that Yamaha corrected that a few years ago by using a type of plastic that ethanol does not affect. Forgot what year that started though

 

[Dx life Rx fishing]

Thanks will check tomorrow

 

[poorrichard]

Had the same problem with a Racor filter. Started to pump up the ball and pop!! The bottom (plastic bowl) of the fuel filter hits my deck. Fuel splashing all over the place. Could have been very serious. Thankfully, it did not start a fire.

The bowl would not screw back on because as stated above, ethanol destroyed the plastic threads.

Consider switching back-as I did, to the solid canister filters.

 

[Fishing Nerd]

Didn't realize this was an issue. I was running a Racor with a clear plastic bowl for the first year I had the boat, until I had an issue with some water in the gas. I drained the bowl from the bottom, then tried to remove the filter from the bowl.

And tried, and tried - and never managed to get the damn bowl off the filter. Put it back on, got back to the dock, went back to a Yamaha filter.

Would rather have the 2 micron protection, but not going through that again. I'm surprised to hear of bowls falling off (though I don't doubt it it), given I couldn't get mine off with a sledgehammer.

 

[Chinacat]

Didn't realize this was an issue. I was running a Racor with a clear plastic bowl for the first year I had the boat, until I had an issue with some water in the gas. I drained the bowl from the bottom, then tried to remove the filter from the bowl.

And tried, and tried - and never managed to get the damn bowl off the filter. Put it back on, got back to the dock, went back to a Yamaha filter.

Would rather have the 2 micron protection, but not going through that again. I'm surprised to hear of bowls falling off (though I don't doubt it it), given I couldn't get mine off with a sledgehammer.

My filter system is Racor with a metal bowl at the bottom