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When to swap filters..... now or next spring?

metal-chicken

Regular Contributor
Our boat [and BF225] will be coming out of the water and back home to our barn next week - it will be in there until next April. Over the winter I'll be doing various standard servicing jobs and was wondering if I should leave the high and low pressure fuel filters until nearer the spring so the new ones don't sit in fuel for 6 months, or should I get stuck in over the next month and get it tucked away?

To complicate things slightly I've had a minor problem this summer with the engine gradually dropping about 400rpm over 10 seconds then jumping back up to where it should be when running at <1500rpm.... above that and it's absolutely fine.
My main culprits are either the HP filter (which I didn't change over last winter] causing fuel pressure issues or the HO2 sensor [which was replaced 15 months ago], as I'm getting an intermittent check engine code which could either be the fuel pressure or the HO2 sensor.

I'm keen to find the issue sooner rather than later so would like to swap the filter and tank test the engine but not if it's just going to degrade while sitting over the winter.

What would you do?
 
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Agree with Chris. However, if you have some time on your hands over the winter, you might want to pull the HP filter to see what it looks like, and try testing the HO2 sensor yourself. There is a good number of write ups and videos on the Internet showing to do it.
 
Good point.... I'll have plenty of time so I'll check out the filter fairly early on to see what I can see. I'll look into testing the HO2 sensor also - I'm not convinced it's dead as it was very inconsistent about throwing an error.
 
It's been my experience (with auto's) that once an HO2 sensor fails, it fails completely. Having said that, some folks around here routinely remove and carefully clean them, letting them soak in gasoline overnight, then taking a tooth brush to them.
 
I've still got the sensor that I replaced last year. A quick look shows it to have a fair amount of 'stuff' on it and a couple of blocked holes.... just for kicks I'll give it a clean and test it to compare with the one that is currently fitted.
 
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