The haynes manual says to clean and/or replace the in-petcock fuel filter at 4000, but I don't see any mention of this process in the wiki (in fact, it says the GS has no fuel filter in place).  The haynes is a little nebulous on the exact procedure, and even whether it's all that important to check it until the bike gets up there in miles.

Have any of you guys cleaned/replaced the in-petcock filter?  If so, how did you go about it?  For a bike at about 8,000 miles, is it worth undertaking this procedure?

there is no stock fuel filter you NEED to add one, like 8k ago...

According to parts diagrams and the haynes manual, there is a fuel filter built into the petcock.  It shows up on parts diagrams if you look at the exploded fuel chicken.  $80 to replace, but the manual says to check and clean...just not sure how to go about that.

oh yeah the one in the tank, no comment on that one.

you still should add one in line though

If it's what I'm thinking of, it's just a mesh cover over the tubes in the fuel tank. Drain the tank, unbolt the petcock, and clean / replace that filter.

If you are running an inline filter, then the screen inside the tank is just stopping dirt from entering the petcock. You COULD just rip it out and run an inline filter. But if you start having fuel flow issues, you have to pull the petcock out and clean it.

just take the in tank petcock out and check on the filter (mesh screen).

my bike had a 16 yr and 8k mile old petcock and the mesh filter was fine. the o-ring inside of the valve how ever was fubar. that part costs only ~20$ on ebay. don't buy from stealer.

oh and i don't run a in-line filter. only that mesh one. no problems. i tried the inline when i first got it but it cause fuel starvation probs.

drain the tank into a bucket while you are there are see how bad the rust is. keep rinsing if there's alot.