Hey everyone, I just finally got my old fuel filter off, WOW!!!! what a pain in the ****. I had to go out and buy a set of crows feet attachments to get the bottom flare nut off the fuel filter and even with that it took about 15 minutes, it never popped loose, it actually started bending the bottom of the old filter as it was being pried out, all my muscle with each mm of turning that ratchet! Anyone else have this experience or this much trouble..

My two questions about when I put the new one here is following...

1) the new fuel filter looking down into it from the top has like a blocker their, their seems to a metal sheet with a rubber surrounding sitting in their, is this normal, Im assuming it is since its brand new??

2) the bracket that the filter sits in is all mangled and bent, i have bent it back best I can, I hope this doesnt hinder the process of putting it back together. the 10mm bolt that connects the bracket to the frame of the car was very hard to get out, im assuming the threads in their are a little messed up because I bought a new bolt and started screwing it in and it starts getting real hard to get in their very shortly, should I just force it in their?