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This past weekend I overhauled my cooling system as preventative maintenance. To keep the system fresh over the coming years I decided to install a bypass filter in the system.
I mimicked dieselenthusiast's filter head placement but I plumbed it differently.
The filter head uses 3/8 NPT fittings which I feel are to small to have 100% of the system's coolant flowing through it at once. Because of this, I decided to plumb my filter by using tee fittings off of the heater hose.
I contacted Donaldson filters and asked why every filter head on the market uses such small ports. They informed me their filters are not designed to handle the full flow of the coolant. They are intended to only filter about 10% of the flow at a given moment. They sent me a pdf regarding their coolant filtration systems for fleet trucks which contained this image:
These are the instructions that came with the filter head. I took used them as guidelines, more or less. It says to mount the inlet at high pressure and outlet at low pressure. I didn't feel comfortable bypassing any part of the system so I decided to come off of the heater hose and go back into it.
Following the ideas of the other two, I mocked up the filter head in its location behind the front cross-member and decided how I wanted to plumb off of it.
The plumbing did not go exactly as I had planned. NPT (national pipe thread) uses tapered threads that are designed to have an interference fit. This means that the fittings do not bottom out in the threads and you can tighten them as much as you need to orient the fittings in the proper direction. I did not know this at first. I tightened everything up worked with whatever direction the fittings came off at.
I ended up using:
6' - 1/2 ID Heater Hose
1 - 3/8NPT Male - Female 90 Elbow
1 - 3/8NPT Male - 1/2 Barb 90 Elbow
1 - 3/8NPT Male - 1/2 Barb Straight
2 - 3/4 - 3/4 - 1/2 Barb Tee
Teflon Thread Sealing Tape
and a zillion misc hose clamps. Good luck with the sizes of those, I seemed to have the hardest time. Some are new constant tension style, some are worm style, some are random ones I had kicking around. The guy at the hardware store actually laughed at me when I walked in there for the third time that day.
When it was all together I was pleased to see nothing was leaking, miraculously. After the system was up to temp the inlet hose was hot but the outlet was only lukewarm. I realize the placement and plumbing of the filter is not the most efficient and is probably not getting much flow through it. I plan to run this filter and coolant for about a year then cut the filter open and see if it what it captured. If anything, this setup gives an extremely easy way to drain and the coolant.
I'd love to hear any and all feedback on this, as well as any constructive criticism. When I first stumbled upon this idea I was surprised at the small amount of people that have done this. With some more people getting on board I think we could come up with an even better design that would get better flow and not obstruct a hidden winch.
Last edited by XJlimitedx99; 06-01-2017 at 08:52 PM.
I've seen these before. How fine are those meshes? Do they grab the real small particles or just larger things? A filter that style in addition to the media style filter I installed would be a great setup.
Originally Posted by peligro113
Looks really good, I plan on doing the same when I have the time, but shouldn't the filter be vertically instead of horizontally mounted?
Yes, it probably should be (per the instructions) but I don't see a reason why having the lines sideways would cause too much of a problem. I also only have 1/2" hose running to it when it says 5/8" minimum. Again, I think its okay. If it was full flow I'd feel differently.
I've seen these before. How fine are those meshes? Do they grab the real small particles or just larger things? A filter that style in addition to the media style filter I installed would be a great setup.
Yes, it probably should be (per the instructions) but I don't see a reason why having the lines sideways would cause too much of a problem. I also only have 1/2" hose running to it when it says 5/8" minimum. Again, I think its okay. If it was full flow I'd feel differently.
They grab small and big particles. Its gesign keeps from plugging up with regular maintenance . Arrow is direction of flow.
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Hey all, been awhile, huh? I'm here to give an update on my thoughts about this project. Long story short, I don't like the design.
I recently purchased a winch and will be doing a hidden winch setup, which meant the filter needed to be evicted from its home. When I removed it I cut it open to see how much crap it had collected over the past 2.5 years. From what I could tell it wasn't much. The filter media was not very dirty to the touch and I couldn't visually see a difference between one side or the other. One thing I found interesting was the layer of sludge that was built up inside the filter on the side that was facing down. This should've been the clean side of the filter. My best guess is my choice of inlet/outlet did not provide enough pressure difference to ensure the coolant flowed properly through the filter. Any flow that was going to the filter was probably stopped by the pressure drop across the filter, most likely having coolant sit stagnant in the filter for quite some time.
In hindsight, this was a pretty obvious outcome. Was it a waste? I'd like to think not. I learned a good bit from it, and hopefully someone else can from my experience. I ended up removing the filter from my system, but I have not totally given up on the idea. I think this would be much more effective if installed in such a way where there is a greater pressure difference between the inlet and the outlet. My placement of the outlet is probably the ideal spot because its just before the pump. I'd think the best location for the inlet would be on the heater core inlet or upper radiator hose. The question then becomes how does adding an additional branch to the circuit affect the system.
Maybe a solution would be to install the filter between the upper and lower radiator hoses? Yes, this would give the coolant a passage to bypass the radiator but it would not affect heat output from the heater core. If engine overheating problems were had because too much flow was getting past the radiator the flow through the filter could be regulated with one of the ball valves.
I would very much like to reconfigure my filter setup and get it back on there. My coolant has stayed alien blood green over the past few years. Is that a result of the filter? I'm not sure.
That filter media was egg shell white when it was new and it isn't now. I'd say it has been working and a big contributor to the alien green you've observed.
These filters are installed in supplemental or by pass configuration. A direct inline installation would require a filter probably half the size of the engine due to the water pumps volume and velocity.
Coolant filters with SCA ( Supplemental Coolant Additive ) balance the coolants PH to prevent corrosion and replenish other chemicals that are part of the coolant.
TL;DR Tractor trailers with this type of filter often go 1 million+ miles on the original radiator and heater core if the cooling system is serviced as scheduled from new.
06-01-2017, 08:46 PM
Coolant Filter Install Write-Up
