RichWaugh

I agree with you Bob, if they are used as an auxiliary partial-flow filter.  What I see as the problem is that they seem to be presented as an alternative to standard full-flow filtration, aimed only at saving short-term money at the expense of an engine.  Personally, I think $18-25 is pretty cheap insurance against a trashed engine and I'm sincerely glad that I don't have to pay what Cat or Cummins would charge for a filter.  And when you get to the filters for those gigantic monsters that drive ships and huge mining equipment and such, I'll bet the equipment owners are still happy enough to pay hundreds of bucks for filters to save hundreds of thousands in repair costs.

I remember as a kid seeing advertisements for “secret” methods whereby you could re-use old oil to save even more money.  Another false economy.  I guess a lot of it comes down to how much you care about equipment and want it to have a long service life.  I'm cheap and don't want to have to replace the big ticket items so I spend the money on the little stuff to preserve my investments.  That may be why I can get 300,000 miles service from my car engines and thousands of hours from even a little over-worked lawn tractor B&S engine.  I can afford a number of filters and gallons of oil much more easily than I can afford to replace an engine costing thousands, to say nothing of how much easier it is to change a filter than to change an engine. (smile)

I wonder if the same parsimony would come into play if we were talking about say, a kidney dialysis filter?  When it comes to our own precious bodily fluids I doubt we'd be cheap enough to want to use a discount house filter, but a lot of people seem to feel it reasonable when they're talking about their equipment's precious bodily fluids.  But then, a lot of people gobble down Hostess Twinkies and McDonald's burgers without a thought, so maybe they would opt to get their dialysis filters from WalMart.

Well, that didn't change anything, Hal.  I'll just have to wait for the new version of the forum software, I guess.

That depends on exactly which engine you have and what year it is.  Though you're likely to find that the better quality American made filters cost more than you expect, too.  Diesel filters are built differently than automotive filters. 

I just buy OEM filters from the dealers who advertise here.   Since they provide so much free advice here, I think they're entitled to my business even if they are a couple bucks more than AutoZone or whoever.

test – trying from my laptop, also running latest version of Firefox.  Still no camera icon on the picture insertion pane.  I give up.

It is brighter, almost too bright – but I can turn down the brightness on my monitor, so no problem.  Better that than too dim, for my old eyes!