Warning: Cheap fuel filters almost cost me a head gasket on I-80

Last month I was hauling a load through Nebraska when my '97 Cummins started losing power and smoking bad. Pulled over near Grand Island and swapped the fuel filter like I always do, but it kept acting up. Turns out the filter I grabbed from a discount truck stop was a knockoff with way less filtration media inside. I had water and crap getting past it and into the injection pump. Took me two days and $400 in parts to flush the whole system and replace the pump seals. Has anyone else run into these fake filters sold at smaller stops along the interstate?

3 comments

3 Comments

hollyscott6d ago

Same thing happened to me in Iowa, those cheap filters are absolute junk.

charlieh746d ago

Hollyscott is right, they are total junk. I got burned by one of those at a no name stop in Wyoming last year. My truck started chugging like it had a cold, and I found a bunch of fine metal shavings in the bowl after. Had to drop the tank to clean it out. Never again.

alex8206d ago

Man, metal shavings in the bowl? That's scary. It makes you wonder what else is floating around in those off-brand filters that we don't see. @hollyscott's story about Iowa really drives home that this isn't just a one-off bad batch, it's how they're all made. You're basically paying for a metal tube full of junk that lets everything through.