Tech Tip #112: Spin-on Fuel Filters for Perkins Diesels

Great tips regarding spin-on fuel filters for Perkins Diesel engines

Over the years customers have complained about the difficulty in changing the secondary fuel filter cartridge on their Perkins diesel engine. The cartridges are messy and hard to handle. The cartridge containing diesel fuel usually gets spilled on the ground or in the bilge. Finally, because you can’t fill the replacement element with fuel, the injection system is difficult to bleed. We have a solution: an easy to use spin-on fuel filter set up.

This new Foley Spin-on set up features an adaptor that threads into the head on your existing Perkins diesel’s secondary fuel filter bracket. Then a spin on cartridge installs on the adaptor. Because it is a spin-on filter, changing it is easy and less harmful to the environment. You twist off the old cartridge and now can properly dispose of the fuel. You then spin on a new fuel filter. We offer two styles of spin on fillers. One is a solid metal canister-style filter. The other is also a metal canister but on the bottom there is a removable, screw-on reusable glass bowl with a drain petcock.

These two spin-on filters differ also in length. The standard genuine Perkins secondary fuel filter assembly has an overall length from the bottom of the support holder down to and including cartridge and thumb screw at bottom of the glass bowl of 5.5” The new solid metal spin-on with no drain is shorter at 4.5″ in length and the solid metal spin on with the reusable glass bowl with a drain on the bottom is longer at 6.75″. All in all, not much difference among the three styles.

As a final note, unlike the stock filter element, with our spin-on fuel filter you can fill the canister with diesel fuel before installing it. This makes bleeding air out of the Perkins high-pressure fuel system easier and quicker. For easy to read help concerning bleeding diesel systems, we publish various Tech Tips on how to bleed Perkins and other diesels. See for example

• Tech Tip #58: Bleeding Lucas, Stanadyne and Diesel Kiki Fuel Injection Systems
• Tech Tip # 82: Bleeding Perkins, Deutz and Deere Fuel Systems, Part Two

Written by Dr. Diesel

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