Truck Filters Fuel Savings Maintenance And Importanance
Keeping your truck in shape and maintaining your trucks, all to secure the hopes of reliability and durability. Of course you want your truck to give you as little trouble and as much uptime for a long time.
Establishing good maintenance is smart and has many benefits including the fuel savings.
So many simple things like wheel alignment grease, the tire pressure and fuel filters all will add up their impact on your fuel bill. You' are looking at a worth while payback. There's hardly anything on a truck that's simpler than its air-intake system.
All diesel engines need to breath and have the flow of very clean air in order to function properly. There's as much as a two percent difference in fuel-efficiency at stake. For most over-the-road folks that's going to be more than $1,000 a year. And the filters only cost 10% of that.
Air intake is one of those things that you don't normally have to worry about when you buy a new truck.
The makers and engineers have it figured out for most applications. But if and when you switch from a nice clean highway haul to pulling gravel out of a quarry and then down a few dirt roads to the highway. Those filter will clog up quickly, and this can also affect your health..
For the most part trucks come with air-restriction gauges, but make sure of it. You do absolutely need it, because you can't just look at a filter element and see that it's dirty. It may look like it's had it and no good when in fact it has lots of life left. Only the gauge would tell you. The filter could also look clean enough to keep, but in reality be overloaded with fine dust. Again, only a restriction gauge could give you the true picture.
The gauge is usually mounted in the dash (preferred) or under the hood, in the piping between the filter canister and the engine. Usually it'll be a bar-type readout that shows restriction in inches (of water). It means 'restriction' literally -- the difficulty that air has in getting through the filter, past the trapped dirt, and into your engine.
For the most part the contaminants involved are ordinary dust, carbon soot from the exhaust, and water by way of rain or snow or even fog. If dirt particles are ingested into the engine, they'll do nasty things like damage the cylinder liners. A normal restriction reading is 10 to 15 in., and as it moves to 20 in. or so it means there's dirt plugging things up. The gauge will probably go up to 30 in., but the element needs changing at about 25 in. Leave it longer and the engine won't be breathing very well, and fuel economy will suffer. You'll use two percent more fuel at 30 in., compared to 10.
There's not just dirt to be concerned with in limiting restriction. The ducting has an important role to play here too. Add too many elbows and bends, and you'll also add restriction, perhaps in significant amounts. An easy 45-degree bend will add a half inch of restriction, while a smooth-radius 90-degree elbow adds one inch. But create a sharp 90-degree bend and your restriction gauge will show an increase of two and a half inches.
So that's clearly a speculating decision too, though it's only likely to arise if you've asked for some special equipment or made an oddball modification of some sort. Luckily, the ducting normally doesn't travel very far, so there are only so many elbows you could come up with anyway.
The trucks air-cleaner canister can be outside the hood on either side, or on both sides of a traditional long-nose/narrow-cab conventional. These days, with aerodynamic conventional predominant, it's more likely to be under the hood.
The dry system's filter element, round or rectangular, sits inside a canister, and the system will draw air through the element and then into the engine. Sometimes it can be mounted either directly on the engine or remotely.
Truely the science of air cleaning has had much improvement over the years, and these days most elements are very sophisticated things made of specially formed and treated paper or cellulose (sometimes a synthetic material as well), called the 'media'. They are sometimes re-useable, but with newer types this is less common. Please make sure you know what you've got, because washing and re-using an element designed for one-time use will cause you grief.
Also if you do have a re-useable element, limit it to one year's life and no more than six cleanings. Cleaning can be done by either compressed air or washing in a special solution. But take care if you're using compressed air. That should be done very carefully by limiting the outlet pressure of the blow gun to 35 psi to prevent damage to the filtration media.
Most air-cleaning systems are single-stage mechanisms, but there are several two-stage types that have a pre-cleaner and also a dust cup that collects contaminants before they reach the filter element itself.
Be sure before you install a new filter element, and make that you've got the right one. It's very possible to have the right diameter and the wrong height. It would fit, but there would be a gap between housing and filter, so the gasket would never be able to make a seal.
Finally every air-cleaning system must have a water-separating mechanism of some sort near the air intake. With an outside air cleaner, the intake should be installed or mounted away from the flow of water-laden air as it streams over the hood or fender. That's not always possible, in which case a shield of some sort must be used or installed.
But also remember the air filter alone is not the only way to save on your fuel costs. Simple things like grease, air tire pressure are all part of maintenance and if kept up will give you a truck that will not so many little problems and will increase your bottom line.
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