Last week when I had my car inspected (woo hoo it passed!), my Dynomax installed (love it, love it!), and my rear brakes changed, I also asked the mechanic to change the fuel filter. Well, you can guess what he told me. Yup. The fuel lines were frozen to the filter.

Solutions?

 

Oh *** I hate when this happens. (sigh) It's happened to me twice. Now, I coat the threads of the fittings on the lines with a bit of anti-sieze.

You can try a few things... first, and probably best, start soaking that filter's fittings with Liquid Wrench or PB Blaster or some other powerful pentrant. Spray it up for a week or so. (Come outside, spray the filter's fittings, go for a drive. You get where you're going, turn the car off, get out, and spray the fittings again. Get back in the car, but spray the fittings first. Etc, etc). Hopefully that'll help things out.

Next, I'd say forget about using the cute flare-nut wrenches. I hate 'em. They always seem to strip the line nuts anyway, especially those f'ing 11mm brake line nuts. I use a large (by large I mean 12") open-ended adjustable wrench.. mine has jaws that are 1/2 thick. Tighten that down on the fitting. If you look closely at the wrench, you want the solid jaw to be taking the "brunt" of your force. So say you're looking at the "back" of the line fitting, as it goes into the filter. You know you have to turn the nut counter-clockwise. So put the wrench on the nut with the handle facing downward, and the "solid jaw" on the left of the nut. This way, when you swing the bottom of the handle towards the back of the car, the solid jaw is the one that exerts the most force on the nut. The little adjustable sliding jaw is just keeping the wrench on the nut. Know what I mean?

Try some quick, hard "hits" on the wrench. This simulates the action of a shop's air impact wrench. A constant pullllling will induce a side-load, which will help round off the nut. Try tapping the bottom of the wrench with a hammer. BE CAREFUL- this WILL cause SPARKS! So if you see fuel start to drip, or the fitting starts to turn, stop using the hammer.

I think a constant weeks' worth of soaking with penetrant will help you out the most.

Good luck... and buy a $3 tube of anti-sieze compound to put on the threads of the fitting when you get it off. ALSO: Try to put some anti-sieze compound on the metal tube itself, where the fitting slides over. Sometimes the fitting rusts to the tube. You loosen the fitting, and the tube twists with the fitting, and SNAP! (Damn brake lines.)

 

Thanks for the help. I'll be spraying that crapper all week, hopefully getting it done Saturday.

 

Flare nut wrenches are around because they work. They grab the fitting on all 6 sides instead of two or four... Its a 16mm, craftsman sells one for about $10 that works great. The nut on the filter is a 20mm. Just go slow and cautious... if you're worried the fittings will strip, go check your dealership and see if replacements are available before you screw up the pieces on the car.

 

gas line anit-freeze works for me.....

 

And when the nut is so rusted to the line that it won't move, the flare nut wrench acts like any other wrench, and starts rounding off the nut. I know how to use a flare nut wrench properly, and it does happen. But thanks for your opinion... he should use a flare nut wrench FIRST. If it won't budge it, move up to a large open-ended adjustable wrench.

 

I've never had any kind of luck with adjustable wrenches, large or small. All my tools are craftsman (better than average quality) and if they can't build an adjustable wrench thats not a piece of junk I don't believe they exist. There is really no way a flare nut wrench could strip the fitting unless you use the wrong size or the wrench is a pos and the jaws flex.

I've seen more than one fuel fitting get boogered up because the person doing the work didn't use the right tools. I have yet to scar a fitting since I dropped $30 on a set of craftsman flare nut wrenches.

Again its a difference of opinion, you've got your experiances and I have mine. I'm not saying you're an idiot, I'm just saying that I disagree with your preferences. But then again I'd rather spend money I don't have on a tool thats correct for the purpose then to fudge my way thru it and have to do it again later.

 

That must be it; my adjustable wrench is a Snap-on, yet my flare nut wrenches are Craftsman.

And I assume his mechanic tried the correct flare nut wrenches, yet, the fuel filter's still frozen. So he might as well give my idea a shot while he's at it.

 

Or his mechanic is a slack jawed ****** with no idea what he's doing and would rather do brake jobs, exhaust work, and mount tires then to change a fuel filter.

 

Once again. Cratfsman makes excellent tools. But when it comes next to snap-on move back craftsman. Snap-on wrenches for some reason always fit on a nut tighter. Making it the hardest to strip.

If Filter will not come off. You could aways go with the make shift alternative. You can buy fuel filters with two short pieces of rubber flex line on each end and can then station it where the old filter goes buy cutting the old one off with a small pipe cutter.

But the penetrating oil should do it. The idea above is if worse comes to worse.

 

Everybody knows that no bolt or nut has EVER been 16mm. The fuel filter connections are 5/8ths and 20mm. All other fuel connections are 3/4ths and 5/8ths.

 

Ok this is gonna be a dumb question but here goes. Yesterday my dad went out to spray the fuel filter and when I got home from work he asked me,

WHERE THE HELL IS THE DAMN THING?

I crawled under there once about 3 yrs ago, and I didn't see it either.

 

Right... and thats why 5/8ths is a nice sloppy fit, and 16mm is a nice snug fit... just because a wrench slips over the nut and will grab part of it when you turn it doesn't mean its the right size. GM went to metric bolt sizes on all exterior bolts in the mid 80's, including the fuel lines.


The fuel filter is under the car on the drivers side under where the back seat would be. Its a silver can maybe 5" long and 2" round. Also be sure you relieve the fuel pressure before you remove it and that you replace the fuel filter in the right direction. There will be an arrow or markings showing the inlet and outlet, if you get it backwards the car won't start.

 

Thanks. I know what it looks like and how to change one, I've done it on 2 other cars. Guess I was looking too far back. I was looking back by the gas tank.

Guess I'll break out the ol floor jack this weekend.

 

I know this is old, and it's pretty trivial, but I don't like people telling me I'm wrong when, in fact YOU are wrong.

OK, you're saying that a 5/8th is SLOPPY compared to a 16mm?!?!?!
Let's see: A 5/8ths wrench, when converted to MM is exactly 15.87500mm. Now, i know the public schooling in Southern California is poor, but I think they taught me well enough to know that 15.87500 is SMALLER than 16mm. Still sloppy???

 

I just cut the dam lines on mine, well after i twisted on in half. Then I used steal braided line and doubble clams on each end. NO leaks.

no way I am gonna change that whole line, I do not even want to know what it cost for that long a$$ fuel line.

but messing around down there I moved my brake line and guess what, leak....

cut/snip pressure fittings, ahhh all better.

 

Ok, so its .13mm smaller... can you measure the difference? see the difference? I can't. My point is simply that for every job there's a right and a wrong tool, if you're using sae tools on a 90 Camaro, you're using the wrong tools (in most cases).

Believe whatever you want, but the fuel fittings are 16mm. If you disagree, thats fine you can do whatever you want on your car.

 

Damn you are stubborn.

 

ANY MECHAINIC that claims he is one,
has-
Metric Flare wrenches
SAE sized Flare wrenches.
Sears, wha $20-30/set/each?
Any smart mechanic uses the right tools then the bigger hammer.