Bad Diesel Filters, Bad Fuel

[Lynne Glazer <lynne@glazer.org>]

While at my Dodge dealer's today for an extended length of time 
(story to follow), they told me of a manufacturer warning about 
certain Frahm oil filters.  The part number to avoid is PF3976.  From 
their service bulletin: "This filter uses neoprene in its internal 
construction.  The neoprene can come loose from the filter and travel 
linto the engine's oiling system, ultimately plugging one or more of 
the piston cooling nozzles.  If this happens, piston scuffing can 
occur which causes severe engine damage.  My dealer is repairing an 
engine that had this kind of damage right now.

My truck did indeed have one of these filters.  The one to use is 
Frahm PF3976A.  No "A", no bueno.  Or stick to Mopar, of course.  But 
I'm a Jiffy Lube kind of gal, unless the truck's in for more serious 
diseases or injuries.

Like today's.  I filled up at a known-good Mobil station in Los 
Angeles last night, about 25 gallons for $50, the credit card limit. 
It had 5 gallons in it.  Sounded terrible when I started it up, was 
not in a good part of LA, so I decided it was probably cruddy diesel 
and headed home.  40ish miles.  It got pretty unhappy on the route by 
the last 10 miles, and when I got it out this morning to take it to 
the dealer, it was incapable of going more than 5 mph and smoked like 
a chimney.  I nursed it to another favorite gas station to wait for a 
tow truck.

5 hours later I emerged, with a $645 bill--the fuel in the DIESEL 
tank had been GASOLINE!  Amazing that it ran at all, at 5 gal diesel 
to 25 gal of gas.  (This necessitated dropping the tank, flush/fill 
kit and labor, fuel filter, oil change.)  They had another customer 
in the day before with the same thing.  One of the mechanics heard 
from another customer yesterday that there had been some deliveries 
to gas stations with gas instead of diesel, that it had been on the 
radio and the news.

The way I figure it, they owe me the $645, the $50 in fuel I had to 
pay to have dumped (hazardous waste), and a whole day's work that I 
couldn't go to, which was supposed to happen AFTER the conditioning 
ride planned. <grrr>  This is a really busy station, with 4 islands 
with 3 pumps on each--the end one on each island has diesel.   This 
fuel switch has to have happened to a whole bunch of people.

There are some really handy tools on the internet to track down a gas 
station's location/contact info.  http://www.gaspricewatch.com was a 
good one, but had incomplete contact information.  I found a Mobil 
station locator site that gave me a phone number that turns out to be 
for this station's parent company.  Just asking 411 for the "Mobil 
station on Pico and La Brea" just doesn't cut it, when the street is 
20 miles or more long...

Now if my credit card company would just get the draft from the fuel 
sale, so I can prove that I bought it there.  Like many people, I 
suspect, I use my ATM card in credit card-mode, and choose "no 
receipt", so it shows up on my statement--why waste the paper?  You 
can bet I got a receipt when I put $58 of NEW diesel in it this 
afternoon...

Lynne