I would take a guess at over 15,000 filters I've installed. 50day for 5 yrs at a truck stop i worked at and 20yrs. marine mechanic. I've had my battles! johnson bar lots of times on trucks ,never an airchisel!The mack spinner oil filter which looks like a small artillery shell were sometimes a muscle tester,but in a spot where you could get some footing! Cat 3406 oem oil filter is certainly the best manufactured filter I've ever seen!base is over 1" thick and the filter hold 1us gallon.
Did that, plus a few coils and plug wires this past year on my wife's 03 2500.. Wires are fun all 16 of them! 2 1/2 hrs with taking breaks cause my back was killing me standing on a step stool leaning into the engine compartment. Fired right up and got all of them right the first time..
Having fought the battle a few times over the years, I've come up with the next to last resort. Having a machine shop, I've taken a piece of scrap round stock of sufficient od. and drilled it to take dowels. Set the hole pattern and size to match the holes in the filter base and mill a 1/2 square pocket in the other side to put a extension in. Then hammer the bitch loose with a 1/2 in air impact. I've found punching the "can" to be about useless....they just tear apart. Last resort is cutting it off. Dave
Have used an air chisel on more than a few semi’s in my day. You just have to show the engine who the boss is!
He wasn't by chance the same guy with the cockroach infestation? New Zealand man had cockroach trapped in ear for 3 days
Was thinking the same thing; next headline: Guy takes three weeks to remove plugs. When I bought my '63 the car had been in storage for 6 years...had fun getting the filter off...only time with all the oil changes I did that the can started collapsing to get it off.
You kind of get that feeling when you go to change a filter and you notice paint missing where a filter wrench was used to install it.
Hand tighten only? Who's hand Is doing the tightening? And why we don't trust our own Kung Foo grip? Personally I use a band type wrench to tighten it a little bit beyond my oily hand grip can muster. Because it's usually oily!
I'll make it simple. 1/2 to 3/4 turn after the gasket contacts the flange, one full turn can be too tight in most cases. Put a thin film of clean oil on the gasket first and make sure the flange is clean. This is stated with most filter manufacturers on their filters. Some filters are a bear to get to so using a wrench or a filter socket is not out of the question if you watch how far you turn the filter after contact.
I've always gone about a 1/3rd of a turn after the gasket starts to catch. Never had one leak yet but I always check for leaks when I fire it back up.
Yeah, I had a major oil leak encounter in my folk’s garage eons ago with my Challenger. All nice and full, fire it up and see a puddle of oil spreading out from beneath the car. Looked like a major artery bleed out, lol. Come to find the retaining nut had backed out slightly, that’s all that took. Ever since my ritual became more anal, I put the last qt in after I start the car to save the qt if there’s a leak (just a thing to ease the extent of pissed-off-ness) and also double check the retainer before screwing on the filter.
I think the hand tighten and oil on the gasket rules of thumb were the first car things I learned from my dad in grade school. He also warned me against the fram/allied signal filters. Can't imagine what happened here, rusted and seized on the threads? I suppose any nightmare is possible with a fram filter. I got a free super fram xp3 whatever filter recently. Inspected and briefly considered, then threw it in the garbage and bought the WIX.
these were fun, good part was most of the trucks with them usually ran 6 months on an oil change because of the oil volume!
