I could be wrong, but I believe the Perry filter was used years ago on the Cummins diesel engines. I don't know if the one you have would be the same as these, but actually the more important part on the Cummins was that it was not just a filter, it was a filter/conditioner. I don't recall exactly what was in the filters but it released something into the coolant that prevented or greatly reduced cavitation erosion. Cavitation erosion is fairly common on wet sleeved diesel engines although it has occurred in non sleeved gasoline engines but it is rare. I have never seen it on any engine of this type.
A filter certainly would not hurt anything in a gas burner, but probably isn't really necessary either.
The filter/conditioners used today on diesels are spin on type and usually are replaced every 400 hours.
