Found there was a fuel leak from around the fuel filter area and it had left a diesel-soaked 3 foot circle in my gravel-floored hoop shed overnight since being parked there afternoon before. Was on my way to town so so stuck a clean bucket under the drip and got on it upon return, expecting to find that my bush logging work and resultant loose brush and sticks had bust the filter housing.
Drained what was left in the tank and it seemed like I'd lost most of half a tank of diesel to the gravel already overnight. Yukky mess in there, maybe be scooping some up with the loader and dump it at the burn pile, then replace with a good cover of clean gravel.
Anyway, I removed the filter housing and after a thorough cleaning and inspection without finding any damage I reassembled it carefully on the tractor and dumped a gallon of fresh diesel in the tanks and presto! NO LEAKS NOW so what the problem was is a bit of a mystery.
One thing that I noticed was I couldn't hand loosen the filter cup by hand for the life of me, needed a careful wrenching with a pipe wrench to break its threads free them I could spin it off.
I am guessing that the filter cup got jammed by a stiff branch resulting in it getting OVERtightened and threads got deformed just enough to allow fuel to drip past the o-ring.
It all ended well enough, though!
Except now I'm finding it's a $500 bill to buy a set of guard covers for the fuel filter and hydraulic and hst filters protection in the bush. Plus will the right-side HST filter cover plate protect the right side of the engine in front of the fuel filter, too? I've already had to replace a stick-broken rpm sender gauge once, and there's a lot more vulnerable components, wires and tubes there to be bush-whacked.
Looking at
https://specialtyrepairscustommods.com/ mods covers for my B2650.
It's going to be less money and problems to invest in good undercairraige protection now than being broken and stuck in the bush and waiting for very pricey parts.
I'm SE of Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Any suggestions on a way to get this done? Looking for possible local fab shops worth checking out.