Oil inspection report

[jrsavoie]

Right on Will, I appreciate that info.

I'm definitely going to do an oil bypass system in the future. Any experience with that?

I run bypass filters on all of my vehicles. Amsoil 5w30 heavy duty diesel engine oil, 20,000 mile oil changes. I have about 300,000 miles + on each of the vehicles now

 

[Burning oil]

A centrifuge will take out the soot.

 

[WarWagon]

As mentioned above you are pressure testing the cooling system just to be sure. This is worst case and covering bases with that in mind as we are not there to look over your ride in person. UOA #1 benefit is to warn you about things like this so shorten the sample interval up to 1000 miles. Drop the drain plug, pull a sample, and put the drain plug back in. Oil change not required. However it may help to flush the engine out with 1000 mile oil changes.

Hopefully the studs are sealed with the GM sealer. This doesn't mean the timing cover isn't leaking or you messed up a HG. Again just a double check per the results to be sure it is just a new engine as suggested. Normally one just monitors UOA for trends, but, a loud and clear warning like this is what you take action on.

Water will evaporate out of the oil so it may or may not be present depending on how hot the oil gets and how big/small a coolant leak is.

Yes, the Alt fuel is an unknown as I only ran B99. From the other Bugs in fuel disaster it wasn't very good B99 at that. Regardless it did not show up or affect the UOA. The only time it did was as oil thinning out when the DPF system flooded the crankcase with quarts of B99 due to ineffective evaporation during regen. What WVO does to oil I don't know as I don't have results for it.

Note the alt fuels condense some on the cyl walls and wind up in the oil. #2 evaporates back out but the alt fuels won't. So alt fuel requires shorter oil changes. This is why IMO the expense of extra oil filtration is wasted with alt fuel use. #2 diesel alone is a different factor that does allow the extra filtration to be worth it.

The Gapless rings allow my oil to be clear enough to read the dipstick through it at 2000 on the oil and ~30K since I put them in. I have to pull the CDR out of the turbo to see any blowby at all - even with 30K on the rings.

 

[Hink]

For what it is worth, by the P-400's first 2,000 miles I was on something like my 4'th oil change as I did not want to keep break-in crud circulating any longer than necessary. Over time, I increased the interval from 1K miles out to 3.5K with an analysis at each change. Currently am around 15K miles on the motor and am not going longer than 3,500 miles on any batch of oil as the metal wear is still showing that it is not time to extend the interval yet.

Good to know. Oil changes are such a basic thing that I don't really think about them but it's good to know what you guys with way more experience do as far as intervals. And it's also good to point out that a universal number (change your oil at 5000 miles or 3000 or 1000) is just wrong. Every engine can be different based on the UOA.

PLEASE TELL ME YOU DO NOT USE PEANUT OIL!

I don't remember seeing peanut oil but I'll check again. Most of my suppliers over the years have been veg, soy, and rice oil.
But let's take a worst case scenario... let's say I used all peanut oil, what signs do you think I'd see in the UOA?

 

[Will L.]

Shiny metal flakes from the 3 metal bearings peeling apart. So copper, lead, tin.

Old babbit bearings in Rudolph Diesel's days are long gone...

 

[WarWagon]

Never hurts to also cut your oil filter open and see what's in it. Coolant sludge will be on the bottom or bottom side, as in bottom in use, of the can.

 

[Hink]

That's a good idea. I'll do that next round.