Results from 96,000 mile oil analysis
- Thread starter WiggyHD
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- blackstone lab #1
I would suggest looking back at 3 or 4 samples and doing a trend. You have to remember that the guys doing these test are normally only looking at one sample. Your sample looks ok, but what if the last sample had iron at 6 now its at 11... You can catch something going on by having a trend to follow.
Yeah, it's the first I've done. I will be getting one each oil change now. Schaeffer's does them free. The way I understand it is that different internal parts are made of different materials. How much wear there is over time is measured in parts per million. Since this is my first, I will be able to show a trend over time so I will know when a problem might be rearing it's ugly head. Like I said though, that is the way I understand it. What I did not know is if there is something noteworthy after my first one at almost 100,000 miles.
Mark
Mark
The army has been doing oil analysis (AOAP) since the late 70's. (I remember when they started, I had to suck that thick stuff out.)
The army looks for changes in metal wear, contamination, And break down of the oil. Prior to AOAP we changed the oil on every truck and tank, basically every diesel vehicle every 3 months no questions asked. I'm talking 5-20 gallons per vehicle. They don't get too many miles on them so it was done more on time. Unless they put on over 300 miles before the 3 months.
When AOAP started I had a M88A1 that went 2 years before changing the oil. Every month it would get checked. If they found something wrong the could tell you to change the filters and run it for an hour then re-sample or change oil and filter and re-sample. It saved the Army a boat load of money in oil, filters and engines because they would catch most before they came apart. Like was said earlier do a couple of samples and compare. :thumb:
The army looks for changes in metal wear, contamination, And break down of the oil. Prior to AOAP we changed the oil on every truck and tank, basically every diesel vehicle every 3 months no questions asked. I'm talking 5-20 gallons per vehicle. They don't get too many miles on them so it was done more on time. Unless they put on over 300 miles before the 3 months. When AOAP started I had a M88A1 that went 2 years before changing the oil. Every month it would get checked. If they found something wrong the could tell you to change the filters and run it for an hour then re-sample or change oil and filter and re-sample. It saved the Army a boat load of money in oil, filters and engines because they would catch most before they came apart.
Like was said earlier do a couple of samples and compare. :thumb:
You can use it to catch a failure before it does major damage. The problem most people have is not having enough samples to keep a good trend going. I think a lot of people are just using them to push there oil changes out farther which is fine, I just look at oil as being cheap & my turbos & long block are not so cheap...
Anywhoo if you know what wear metals are present in the oil you can pinpoint areas to look at upon tear down. Such as high iron can indicate a crank problem this is usually accompanied by elevated lead & tin levels (bearings). High silica means dirt, open breather, dirty air filters etc. Coolant & fuel in the oil, head gaskets, bad injectors. It is great tool but you need know what your looking at. I work for a Caterpillar dealer & use oil analysis a lot to help me troubleshoot.
Anywhoo if you know what wear metals are present in the oil you can pinpoint areas to look at upon tear down. Such as high iron can indicate a crank problem this is usually accompanied by elevated lead & tin levels (bearings). High silica means dirt, open breather, dirty air filters etc. Coolant & fuel in the oil, head gaskets, bad injectors. It is great tool but you need know what your looking at. I work for a Caterpillar dealer & use oil analysis a lot to help me troubleshoot.
I might add if you are doing extended oil change intervals & Shaffer will do the sample free, have one done every 3000 miles. That should get you a nice trend, & should allow you to catch anything before it causes major damage to spendy hard parts.
I understand the extended oil changes. Some of the Cat engines I work on hold 75 gallons of 15-40...
I understand the extended oil changes. Some of the Cat engines I work on hold 75 gallons of 15-40...
There is nothing better than trying not to make a mess while balancing a 30gal drum of oil hanging from a crane.
I would love to be able to work on the 3500 and 3600 series engines, but the biggest stuff I see is C32's and good ol' 3412's.
A friend of mine runs/owns this small 1 man excavation company. He of course gets oil by the barrels. I was a bit surprise till i thought of the costs, but he buys used coolant by the drum from local salvage yards for his stuff. He checks it with a refractometer and such. Amazing amount of money in basic things like coolant and oil when it holds so much of it.
There is nothing better than trying not to make a mess while balancing a 30gal drum of oil hanging from a crane.
Ha Ha there fun but sometimes I wouldn't mind a nice 3406 on a engine stand to work on!
New 793F is coming in march with a C175 high pressure common rail. Should be fun.
Yeah, at my parts store (Car Quest), where I get the oil, they give me a postage paid cup with all of the paperwork in it. I just collect the oil at the oil change, and send it in. It took about 3 weeks.
Mark
7000s a good oil and your #s look good I'm sure you can go to 10K and more. I went 16K on delo 400 with my bypass filter.
What would a high content of copper mean? My recent oil analysis showed a high content of copper but everything else looked OK. The only thing I can think of is oil cooler. Any other thoughts?
To the OP - something I learned when I started to get an oil analysis done is you need to also look at the TBN (Total Base Number). Once the TBN is about half of the original TBN number, no matter what the analysis says, you need to change the oil. The Amsoil I use has a TBN of 12. If the TBN gets between 6 and 8, I change it no matter what. Google TBN if you want more info.
Schaeffer's is the best oil out there IMO and 10k intervals seem to be fine on even higher mileage trucks from samples I have seen:thumb:
Cooler maybe... Lead & tin stay the same? Sometimes its easy to miss the lead, tin levels rising showing bearing wear. Do you have 3-4 of the last samples?
63500 mi on the engine? Your iron jumped some with the lead & copper which makes me think bearings maybe? Did you change your oil on the last sample? Have you done or had any work to the engine recently? I would pull another sample, PM with it if you like, sometimes I miss some of these threads.