Kawasaki FR691V compatibility

[slomo]

Having been a mech at a few dealerships in my time, I was involved in a lawsuit against my employer by a customer where aftermarket filters were installed on two large diesel engines in his boat. This got nasty before it was resolved, and my employer was ordered by the court to replace both engines in the customers boat. The company did the repower at a cost of almost $100,000!!! My next paycheck bounced, the business closed up shortly after and all employees were laid off.

Are you kidding? On a boat with $100,000 engines? Why on Earth would someone install aftermarket filters? Customer can't afford OEM filters now after shelling out mega cash?

slomo

 

[slomo]

They found a lot of dirt in the intake and are trying to say I haven't taken care of the air filter.

Sure sounds like it to me. All that grit inside the engine will polish her right up.

slomo

 

[slomo]

88 hours is nothing! That is about the same as 8,000 miles on an auto engine. If you have put 4 air filters on it in that amount of time it is hard to believe you are not doing proper maintenance.

Aftermarket filter might not of been sealing. Dealer found grit inside the intake. To me case closed.

slomo

 

[RodneyShuffler]

slomo, I've changed NOTHING.......still doing what I was doing before the rebuild and I've had zero problems since. The problem isn't me. I have tractors, tillers, other mowers, 4-wheelers.....hell, I drive a 7 axle heavy-haul truck with a 50ton winch pulling 35 ton RGN and FGN trailers for a living; I know how to maintain equipment, it's all I ever seem to be doing. This came from the factory with something not right, it's been fixed properly (on my dime) and been fine since. I suspect the hose between the filter and carb was bad, maybe cracked. and that's what was letting dirt in. Why else would they need to change it?

 

[slomo]

I went back and re-read my post, that was kind of confusing; I should have done a better job proofreading.
I blow the whole mower off with my air compressor when I get finished mowing, I used to wash it but was told that it was really best to just blow it off with air. I do blow out that little foam pre filter with the air hose, but the paper filter I just tap around on until dirt stops falling out of it. I don't know of any way to do a visual inspection to tell when one needs to be replaced or not, whenever they reached a point that they looked like they weren't coming clean when I would shake them out I just replaced them. I have been told to oil that foam pre-filter by some people and not to by other people.... that didn't even come on it from the factory anyway, but it seemed like I shouldn't put oil on it to me because it was going against a paper filter. I just used it dry.
When I check the oil, I do it per instructions on the dipstick (NOT threaded in). I bought oil according to the chart in the book for the temperature range I expected to be operating the mower in.
I drive an 18 wheeler for a living, and have since 1993.... I'm pretty familiar with pre-trip inspection since it's a legal requirement of my job. I am absolutely not a mechanic, I'm a driver.... but fluid checks and pm/service etc... seem like something I don't even think about, it's just part of everyday life for me.

Running the pre air filter dry does no help. Allows grit to pass through towards the paper filter. No wonder you have to shake the paper filter out. Should never have to shake n bake the paper filter. Pre filter should do most of the work.

Briggs says to apply SAE30 oil thoroughly. Put the foam filter inside a rag. Take a red shop rag and squeeze out the excess oil. Foam should be oily. Much easier to clean the foam than buying filters. Don't worry about over oiling the foam either. Catch all the grit you can.

Also I use grease on the paper filter sealing areas. Most filters even OEM can have poor sealing lips. You'd be surprised to see how much grit you stop going into the engine.

slomo

 

[RodneyShuffler]

I asked the tech at Southern Tractor (where I bought it) about oiling the foam filter and was advised against doing that. That was when I picked the unit up after the rebuild. Grease around the hose that clamps onto the filter sounds like a great idea and I'm on that from here on out......thanks for the tip. My next mower will have a canister style filter. I started running the pre-filter as an added help, it didn't even come with that on it new.

 

[Scrubcadet10]

Hmmm... i have to disagree with that "tech"... especially, when the manual for one of my Kawasaki engine's says to wash the prefilter in warm soapy water, dry, and then to oil it.

Kawasaki Performance Air Filter Oil

Kawasaki Performance Air Filter Oil is a race proven formula that allows for increased air flow while providing ultimate protection from harmful airborne contaminants for critical engine components<br><ul><li>Super tacky</li><li>Resists wash out from water and fogging</li><li>Factory green...

www.kawasaki.com

this or cheap SAE30 is what i use for air filter oil.

 

[bertsmobile1]

I asked the tech at Southern Tractor (where I bought it) about oiling the foam filter and was advised against doing that. That was when I picked the unit up after the rebuild. Grease around the hose that clamps onto the filter sounds like a great idea and I'm on that from here on out......thanks for the tip. My next mower will have a canister style filter. I started running the pre-filter as an added help, it didn't even come with that on it new.

The pre filte is just that.
A prefilter
It is not meant to stop sub micron particulates ,
It is there to stops sticks stones & grass clippings that if damp can cause the paper to rot through
The paper is doing the filtering , the foam is screening
General rule is you only oil the foam on foam only filters
And when I fit them, I dip my fingers in the oil then spread some on the carb side of the filter only so the inital air enters vial the dry foam hat prevents very large bits and the closer to the carb the air gets the finer the filtering .

Back in the 60's manometers came into popular useage because they got a lot cheaper .
This then allowed tuners to measure the actual amount of air being sucked into an engine.
Shortly latter racers started to fit foam filters to the carbs which previously had no filteration at all.
Because of the totally irrational "if racers use it it must be better for my engine " foam filters ended up being used everywhere and in a lot of cases places where they were totally inappropriate.
If you are old enough you would remember the advertising, More power, , less fuel consumption, same old same old for every do dad marketed to car owners .
On most carburettored engines no great problem other than a bit more cylinder wear due to more fine dust entering the engine.
Remember that paper filters only came into popular useage in the late 60's replacing the oil bath filters used previously .
The big problem was when they got fitted to the early fuel injected engines and in particular to engines with variable stroke pumps because better air flow meant these engines started to run lean.
Lean enough to destroy many from over heating & lean burn detonation .
Not so much a problem on single barrel carbs but was a bugger with multi barrel carbs where the high speed barrels had different jetting .
By & large the invention & application of electronic fuel injection and in particular mass air flow meters ended this lean burn problem.

However this whole arguement is some what out of place when we are talking about mower engines.
Most mowers are over filtered and with a single barrel cab a higher air flow rate makes no difference because the carb is a fixed rate device so the volume of air passing through makes absolutely no difference .
The caveat to this is ZTR's fitted with baggers because the bags dump a massive amount of very fine dust right on top of the engine which sucks it right in.
Any ZTR fitted with a bagger either needs a proper double stage filter or a snorkel to draw in clean air.
Down here all of the local mowers were fitted with snorkels till B & S took over Victa.
Honda used to charge a fortune for their snorkel kit which included a smaller jet to compensate for the reduced air flow,,,,,, total tosh unless you were at 1000' or better elevation .
Down side is mowers with snorkels never ever need new filters and as Slowmo has mentioned, continual removal of the filter for cleaning, damaged the seals thus rendering the filter useless, but as the mower is sucking clean air it made no difference as the air bypssing the filter was fairly clean

 

[slomo]

I asked the tech at Southern Tractor (where I bought it) about oiling the foam filter and was advised against doing that. That was when I picked the unit up after the rebuild. Grease around the hose that clamps onto the filter sounds like a great idea and I'm on that from here on out......thanks for the tip. My next mower will have a canister style filter. I started running the pre-filter as an added help, it didn't even come with that on it new.

I agree with ScrubCadet10. Foam needs oil.

Briggs and Stratton says it needs oil.

I know this is not your exact filter but should be followed in general.

 

[bertsmobile1]

But it is not a foam only filter he is talking about
It is a paper filter with a foam wrap
They get fitted dry