Car Fuel Filter suppressor
Image via Facebook

We all know how Facebook aggressively and promptly kills off posts that promote gun sales on their platform. That’s even extended to gun reviews and posts about Medal of Honor recipients that they have sometimes interpreted as promotions. So it seems a little suspicious that they not only allow dubious posts selling “fuel filters,” but they place them into gun owners’ news feeds.

Today, one of those landed in mine. A Facebook user named “1choose” put up the post for “Hot Sale Fuel Filter” on May 19 at 4:49 AM. Someone (probably in the Middle Kingdom) created 1choose’s Facebook page on December 10, 2019.

Now some folks will ask what’s wrong with buying a fuel filter? Nothing at all, if that’s what it is.

Car Fuel Filter suppressor
Screen cap via Facebook

Except this one looks a lot more like a suppressor (complete with baffles) than a fuel filter. And even if you think it’s really a fuel filter, our friends at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (and really big fires) may have a different take.

Folks still thinking this looks like a great place to drop a few bucks should familiarize themselves with the legal term of “constructive possession.”

From the Cornell Law School:

The legal possession of an object, even if it was not in a person’s direct physical control. Often used in criminal law prosecutions for possession crimes, such as possession of illegal drugs. Generally, for a court to find that a person had constructive possession of an object, the person must have had knowledge of the object, and as well as the ability to control it. For example, someone with keys to a safe deposit box may have constructive possession to the contents of that box, and the owner of a car may have constructive possession of the contents of its trunk.

If you’re not familiar with constructive possession and NFA-regulated items, read our post about the topic by a Florida attorney.

Also, see our posts on the perils of buying Chinese knock-off gun accessories here and here.

It doesn’t seem like a stretch that Facebook would cooperate with the ATF to target gun owners who don’t know any better. Or those trying to acquire things they aren’t licensed to have. After all, Facebook’s business model involves selling targeted advertising thanks to all the personal information they collect on each of their users.

Then again, maybe labeling these as “car fuel filters” is enough to get around Facebook’s anti-gun algorithms. And the typical pasty-faced Facebook drone who might have actually reviewed this manually probably wouldn’t recognize these for what they really are.

The good news: there’s plenty of comedy gold in the comments section under the 1choose post.

Bill T.
This is an awesome “fuel filter”! It makes my “fuel” flow through the lines so much more quietly than it used to! My “fuel” used to flow very noisily, but this “filter” reduced the sound level of my “fuel” to a much better level.

Brandon H.
Can I get a diagram of exactly how this filter the fuel let alone let any kind of liquid flow through it? Seems drilling small holes through it would help. I’ll throw out some random numbers, maybe 5.56 or 7.62?

Larry B., Jr.
I have for my car in 300 black out, works great driving at subsonic speeds

Marty Z.
Works great on my 9mm fuel lines.

Mike M.
Wondering about the performance of this filter on a 6.5 Cummings.

Jimmy S.
It usually takes a class three federal firearms license to own a fuel filter like this.

Tommy-Kim B.
I have a new hotrod. How well will this hold up to the magnum pressures going through a .338″ fuel line? I cant have a failure when at full send to the 3000 foot mark.

William P.
I was needing a new filter for my P320 compact motor. She’s been running a little louder than i prefer. It has a 9mm exhaust port. Will this fit that?

Chuck H.
Will it work on a 45 gallon tank or is it only good for a 22 gallon tank?

Tim S.
Is the micron rating .356 or .451?

James J.
Are these “High” pressure filters for high performance engines or just “Standard” pressure for the smaller performance units

Stephen S.
I absolutely love this. How funny. Who would have ever guessed a filter could look so good. How about performance? Does it keep most of the contamination out of the flow???

John C.
Does the ATF deliver it?

Trent R.
Filters out everything but the lead.

Ray B.
I wonder how “gallons” it can filter before needing changed

Shawn O.
Does this fit a 9mm or .45 fuel filter line and meant for subsonic fuel, correct? Asking for a friend

Kevin H.
Is this approved by the Bureau of Automatic Transmission Fluid and Exhaust?

Tomas B.
7 Baffles. THAT will filter the sound, I mean particles.

Alexander B.
I guess this is California Legal filter right? Its looks like a featureless filter…

At best this is what will likely happen if you press the BUY button:

ATF letter suppressor

At worst, your purchase might come with a free set of bracelets and a decade or more of full room and board courtesy of Uncle Sugar. Along with the loss of your gun rights for life.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

69 COMMENTS

    • Exactly. Have a form 1 filled out, and submitted to the ATF, and it would be very hard for them to charge you, when it’s the ATF that takes so long to process the form. As long as you don’t have any holes drilled in the solvent traps or fuel filters, it’s fine.

    • I don’t know what you guys are talking about. These make great fuel filters – further, for some reason, people who look at guns a lot also have been looking at these quality fuel filters. Facebook’s nosy engine analyzing your cookies has made this connection and presented this AD to gun owners. Because a portion of gun owners keep looking at these quality filters, they thought you might also like to look at it. Thus, your ad.

      Go ahead and buy one and start filtering fuel right away with a quality enclosure.

      • So after you run fuel through your filter will you go and shoot through it afterwards? Please send a video (or have a friend do it for you).

        • Before the current issues not much besides a lot of intrusive data mining and the ability to figure out who you know has underlying mental instability. Now they aren’t allowing the riot video up my way to be searchable or readily viewable. Fulton county news has some amazing footage of the Albany arsons and those responsible for much of the looting.

    • To tell you the truth if there was somebody smart in China they’d design (or rip off) a few titanium monocore solutions in 22LR, 556, 308, and 9mm and get some well-known YouTube gun sites in the USA to test/review them (after getting the appropriate form 1’s )and it seems like they’d be in fat city.

      Who would bet that they couldn’t drive down the kit price to $100-$150 (or less)?

      No OSHA, no insurance, no lawyers, no EPA.

    • I love when “experts” get online to spread their vast knowledge.

      I bought one, had it shipped to my house, did the eForm 1, got approval back in 2 weeks, and started drilling.

      Now I have a legal .22 suppressor for a whole $270 and am not waiting to enjoy it.

      Ignorant gun owners are worse than liberal dems.

  2. Rope-a-dope some antifa retards into that ‘deal’, then anonymously ‘tip’ the BATF.

  3. I saw this in my feed today. I hid it. I guess the next thing is a survey on whether you intend to go boating in the next few months? Nice try, ATF!

  4. Hmmmm, I’m more of do it yourself person when it comes to fuel flow on my hot rods… Just another example to support my premise that ALL that shit (facebook, twitter and the rest) should be banned…

    • There’s an army of Karens policing facebook and twitter, ready to tattle on someone. They live for that.

  5. Bahahaaaaaa!!!!! I read this article, went to Facebook, and an ad for a “fuel filter” was the sixth post down from the top!

    Not today, Satan. Not today…

  6. Since facebook firearm polices are aligned with discriminating Jim Crow Gun Control I do not have anything whatsoever to do with facebook et al. If they depended on me for revenue they would be dust in the wind.

    • I ditched Facebook in 2007 when it became clear which direction they were headed, and I haven’t looked back. Also, I have social media blocking enabled in Brave browser, which blocks tracking cookies by default, so they can’t follow me around. Big Social gets nothing from me. (That’s my social media virtue signaling for the day.)

      • Let’s see…

        Facebook was launched in 2004 for use within universities. After growing to expand to campuses everywhere, Facebook was finally opened to anyone with a valid email address in late 2006. At this time, it was still relatively small (compared to the global leviathan it would become) and considered a novelty. It didn’t even reach its first milestone of 100 million users until late 2008. In 2007, its user base was only a fraction of that.

        You’re telling us that you “saw the signs” of its evil intent way back in its infancy, when it was still limited in size, scope, and function?

  7. But you can buy the parts as long as you don’t drill out the centers. Lots of form 1 kits are out there and are legal.

    Just stay away from those Airsoft Glock trigger kits. And coat hangers.

  9. And I’m sure they’d never think of forwarding your personal info to the ATF, right!?

  13. A serious question –

    I apply for and pay $200 and receive a ‘Form 1’ tax stamp for a home built suppressor.

    With the paperwork cleared and that NFA stamp in my hot little hands, is it illegal to buy one of those ‘fuel filters’ or ‘solvent traps’ and use it to construct my can?

    • I am not an NFA expert nor an attorney so the following is my opinion and not legal advice:

      I believe you would be fine as long as you do not have anything else in your possession that fedzilla could credibly claim were the necessary parts to make a suppressor.

  14. Yep. That thing pops up all the time. You can bet your a$$ the greasy turds at farcebook have a devious intent when letting it be posted.

  15. I guess i should dispose of the pipes and endcaps I got at Home Depot the other day. Don’t want to be seen as a troublemaker.

  16. Here is another possible angle: a foreign entity placing those adds and fulfilling orders — and then using that information to blackmail the unwitting recipients (e.g. using coercion to develop “assets” for spying purposes).

  17. Something similar has been in Google’s ad network for months now. TTAG is welcome to email if you want screenshots.

  18. So I’ve actually gotten on Wish and looked at these. Most are one piece K-baffle types, in a tube, tubes are solid, no holes or anything. They’re all made of aluminum, tubes and baffles.

    You’d be lucky to run 22LR without blowing it up. I wouldn’t recommend it for legal or illegal use.

    • Ya know what works really well for .22 Short? A large rubber bicycle handlebar grip (found in any Walmart) filled with 00 steel wool and slipped over the end of a barrel. Allows for one to make short work (get it?) of any rattlesnake or rat in the yard without bothering the neighbors or making the hair on Karen’s neck stand up.

      At least, that’s what a six foot rabbit named Harvey told me. He’s full of good info.

      • For sure. My point I guess is that do you really want to trust the forgings/materials from a $25 baffle stack made in China?

        I’ve never made one, so take it for what it’s worth. Absolutely nothing.

  19. Is TTAG really pretending it didn’t do a review for a solvent trap kit a month ago?

    Cmon guys. The product you reviewed and by de facto advertised could even be sold with caliber specific jigs for drilling. And was being sold on a suppressor dealers page.

    If you ask me, that’s much more likely to run afoul of the atf than this.

    If you’re comfortable with the legal wiggle room that comes with form 1 solvent trap builds, this isn’t any worse than buying anything else openly sold on the internet.

    Nice try

  20. Facebook is not a trustworthy player. Best to stay far, far away. Especially when they will not remove an obvious hoax or illegal offer.

  21. I see ads from “Lafoauto” all the time. And I didn’t seek them out, either.

    Not today Mr. ATF agent.

  22. Yeppers, Farcebook working with ATF and others to weed out low IQ gun owners. FB knows full-well what these are. Caveat emptor!

  26. I make a new recoil buffer for the Ar15’s, I was banned from all advertising on Facebook several months ago because some snowflake found my buffers offensive. Messed up they allow these.

  27. As part of the research for an article, I’m writing about manufacturing your own suppressor legally. I ordered one of these from Wish. I chose it because it said shipped from the US. Nope, coming from China. Been over a month now and still waiting.

  28. “It doesn’t seem like a stretch that Facebook would cooperate with the ATF to target gun owners who don’t know any better…”

    No tinfoil needed here. Facebook is lazy and works on algorithms using filters (ha!). Same thing with Amazon. That’s why you CAN buy gun stuff on them if you know the words people use (not talking about illegal items). Facebook would certainly hand over what the feds ask for but facebook probably wouldn’t have the actual transaction info anyway.

    But if you’re gonna mess around with this stuff just go to the hardware store and pay cash for something.

  29. Let me know when you see Facebook ads for 12 gauge 00 fuel tablets. I might need refills for my multiple-stroke engine.

  30. Favorite comment from the ad.
    “ Trent R.
    Filters out everything but the lead.”

  31. Constructive possession has nothing to do with the question of whether possession of one of these is legal or not. If you buy it and take delivery and the feds conclude it is an NFA item, you are in actual possession of an unregistered NFA item. Constructive possession is as relevant to the subject as res judicata; an utter non sequitur. It’s like saying transmission fluid is important to carburetor jetting.

  32. Well, I think one of the issues here is that, whereas you might get away with ordering such a device within the US (assuming you have your Form 1 in hand), there is the added complication of importation of a “potential” NFA device. Customs rarely gets things right. When I ordered some special beer from Europe, one box made it and the other didn’t. I got a very similar letter to above quoting all these non-relevant regulations (counterfeit goods, explosives, non-taxed cigarettes). When pointed out in my response, they acted like they never said it and still gave me shit (I got my beer eventually). Point is, govt minions are morons and nobody really knows the laws. So don’t take the extra risk of ordering it from overseas (China) if you don’t have to, and doubly true from Wish.com (ATF glock switches anyone??).

  33. The ATF is pretty consistent about being inconsistent on these. Officially, these “fuel filters” or “solvent traps” are perfectly legal as long as there is not a hole all the way through them.

    But just like the idiot who intercepted a shipment of airsoft guns claiming that they could be “easily converted” to fire live ammo, some ATF offices have gone after some of these sellers.

    I would expect that any seller operating openly understands the law and ships filters with at least a solid end cap (dimpled in the center to help you line up your drill). Similarly, the “fuel filters” that use individual baffles normally none of the baffles are drilled when you get them (again they are dimpled to make drilling easier).

    As long as you don’t start drilling until after your Form 1 has been approved, you should be legal — of course being legal doesn’t guarantee that you won’t have a very unpleasant visit from ATF agents checking everything in your home looking for anything with a hole through it.

    On the other hand, these “fuel filters” and “solvent traps” are essentially garbage because they are all made of aluminum meaning that they won’t last long with anything above .22LR Some of the ads are especially funny in that they talk about the filter being “titanium” but you have to hunt to discover that all the “titanium” involved is a thin black coating on the outside of the housing tube.

  35. Remember intent, have a drill? Have a threaded host? That’s enough. Get your form one first guys and have at it. My buddy did at he says runs 22lr (only( and is great especially wet.

  36. That letter makes it sound like… well, the worst that might happen is you get a love letter from the ATF, kind of like a love letter from customs. Claim the item / protest it within 30 days or its forfeit.

  37. Facebook is rampant with dubious products from China that basically don’t work, much like Pinterest it’s buyer beware. The one that comes to my mind first is the “guarantee” item that’s magically reduces your electric usage. Recently China was asked to help America and clamp down on the illegal smuggling of Fentanyl into the US, (just recently ships from the Chinese mainland were intercepted with Fentanyl by the barrel load) and rather than admit that they couldn’t “help” we were told that if there wasn’t a market for it…..

  38. Nobody @ Failbok knows anything about guns except the wrong stuff they learn from NETFLICKED or Gaming……..u can’t find 1 complete brain cell in that entire building in Commiland!

  39. For ANY OTHER law enforcement branch, that is called entrapment. For some reason, the ATF manages to get away with it.

    They tried to trap some people at a local gun show by selling DDs and AP ammo at a booth, one of the guys saying, “It’s not illegal unless you get caught.” I said thanks but no thanks and walked away.

  41. I file with the Federalies and pay $200 and receive my form back. Would this be a good cheap .22lr suppressor, or are better options to be had without breaking the bank? Maybe for other calibers if built from something other than aluminum.

  42. Y’all are living in a paranoid state of mind. There are several countries which have reasonable firearms laws,restrictions,etc. and they are not police states or bad places to live. And the have Way less accidental gun deaths and suicides. America is armed to the teeth, but why ?

  44. Great, this is what I was looking for for a long time. I was thinking to comment on your article. But I was aware of SEO company primelis. But I will share this article with my friends.

Comments are closed.