We think the best tips are the ones that keep you from getting stranded in the middle of nowhere. This is one of those tips.
We all know that the early 950’s have on occasion, had some issues with the water pump seals and shafts. On these occasions it is not unusual for the bike to suffer a loss of oil pressure causing the oil light to come on, and the valve train to start clattering (is that a word?) Anyway the reason for the lack of oil pressure is that the water getting into the oil breaks down the paper oil filter collapsing it and causing it to swell. When this happens well, you get the picture.
On almost every bike that we’ve seen with a bad water pump seal, the only evidence was the damaged oil filter. If you were to put a new filter in and some fresh oil the bike would run just fine until the filter broke down again. Just in case you are wondering, it didn’t take us long to figure out that there was a reason the oil filter was breaking down….
Anyway, the point of all this is that a Stainless Steel oil filter like the Scotts Filter will not collapse like a paper filter. Although we don’t recommend running your bike with water contaminated oil (even if it is so slight that it’s evaporating form the heat of the engine before you can even tell), if you are 50 miles from the nearest road I’m going to think you may want to have the option. And certainly we’d rather have a filter that won’t under any condition, contribute to a loss of oil pressure in our bikes. For that reason the Scotts filter gets the KTMtwins seal of approval.
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