The steel wool looking inside part of the air cleaner element has got a small amount of rust which turned about 2 inches of the steel wool element to dust. Can I blow out the steel wool dust and pieces, rearrange the remaining filament (which is clean) to cover the hole left by removal of rusty debris? Is there any way to open and replace the steel wool? How do I reassmble? Do I attached top part of air cleaner to support, then slide bottom part filled with oil up to the upperportion and attach with band? Do I need to pre soak the filter (that looks like a messy task becuase there seems to be no way to slide assembled filter through hood hole)? Maybe the whole assembled cleaner will fit through the hood? And most importantly what kind of oil do I use? Sorry for these simple questions. I have purchased an interent service manual in the hopes of getting this kind of information, but the manual covers none of these details. I don't know anyone around here with knowledge of these machines and my knwoledge is zero.
Hi antyK well I hope the rust from the _water_ hasn't gone too far into your intake after the air cleaner. Sorry I haven't any experience with that 'oil bath' air cleaner, but there is one here on a Ferguson tractor my Dad bought in 1952, we still use it regularly to cut our firewood. It's oil bath air cleaner has steel fibres in an section just above the oil from memory on the intake hose side. If yours is damaged I'd disconnect the air intake hose to the manifold (on the way into the engine) and seal that with a non lint making single large rag such as an old towel. Clean out the air cleaner body and maybe some of that dish cleaner steel wool (known in Australia as 'curly girl') might replace the damaged element. Just be super careful that whatever you put in there is captive behind a screen or your engine will breath it instead of air and that would be very bad, so caution there. Maybe the hood comes off to access the filter, just thinking - no idea really. Oil, well probably engine oil would do, but any lube company / distributor should be able to advise, I know on the Honda bikes here on the station that I service, the air cleaner oil is sticky, like the stuff used on chainsaw bars. Good luck.
I just got my 580CK manual and straight from the manual: 1. Loosen the oil cup retainer clamp screw so oil cup can be lowered and remove the air cleaner. 2. Drain the contaminated oil, remove the baffle from the oil cup. Wash baffle and oil cup in clean fuel. 3. Reinstall baffle in oil cup. Refill oil to the level mark with the same viscosity oil as used in the crankcase. Do NOT Overfill. 4. Remove the pre-cleaner and wash the pre-cleaner in clean fuel. At least once a season (more often in dusty conditions), remove the entire air cleaner. Remove oil cup an submerge the entire air cleaner body in clean diesel fuel.
Thank you. I think you have a better manual than I. I purchased a pdf manual from e-bay and its missing much.
That one is from the operators manual I picked up as a hard copy on ebay. I picked up pdf copy of the service manual as well, but it is more fix broken things than keep it running. Here's the reprint ops manual I got: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=360275276148