By Charles Krome
Copyright jalopnik
Following some smart tips for diesel maintenance can go a long way in keeping a vehicle healthy, and that’s certainly true for diesel lift pumps. Perhaps the most important thing you can do is always change your fuel filters at the manufacturer’s recommended intervals, always using OEM-approved filters. Don’t forget to change water separators, either. They’re engineered to filter water from diesel fuel, so if they’re not maintained, it can get into the fuel system. The water not only causes corrosion but can also leads to some nasty microbes forming.
What happens is that the water and fuel can separate into distinct layers when sitting around in the fuel tank, and certain kinds of bacteria love living there. They rest in the water layer and essentially eat the hydrocarbons from the fuel layer. The stuff can grow large to be visible and, in fact, large enough to form clogs on your filters and damage the pumps.
Among the other ways to help keep your fuel pumps clean and working at their best is to use high-quality diesel fuel that you can trust to be free from major contaminants. The occasional fuel-tank cleaning will help your lift pumps keep lifting as well.
