Where is the boron going???
In the next installment of will 10k mile drain intervals / 5W-20 weight oil destroy my Mustang’s engine we’ve got Valvoline Advanced Full Synthetic. Unlike the last test with Mobil 1 we’re now in the API SP era and this data was collected over a 1 year 3 month period and saw a solid winters worth of cold weather driving in the north east. Driving was ~60/40 city/highway split.
This time around I took a sample at 200 miles to act as a baseline, figured that would give the new oil enough time to work through the engine and blend in with the leftover old oil. Wear metals certainly get cleaned out but you can see there’s still 10 ppm of Al/Fe/Cu carried over. 6/25/6 ppm -> 3/5/2 after the change.
4oz of fresh oil were also added each time a sample was taken to get a better handle on changes to the viscosity and TBN.
Ignore the particle count data that was for something else I was trying to test. Starting (200 mile) TBN value got covered up by that data, it was 4.9, and at the end it was 2.4 I don’t know why it’s not showing up on the sheet.
Viscosity started at 7.56 cSt, started thin out a bit during the last 2000 miles but it didn’t go out of grade.
Wear over the interval was very low. Starting with 3/5/2 ppm of aluminum iron and copper it ended with 4/20/3. That’s like 1.7 ppm per thousand miles, and steady over the run. It’s not like things are spiking at the end because the oil has worn out.
One thing I really notice was how much the boron levels dropped over the 10k mile run. 127 ppm -> 37 ppm. The only thing I can figure is this has to be boron used as a dispersant that’s getting caught up in the filter over time. If it was used for antiwear like zinc and phosphorus you shouldn’t she the levels significantly drop over time.
If that’s the case then it seems like boron would be one of those markers to keep an eye on when determining if the oil additive package is used up. Maybe folks keep an eye on that but I haven’t seen folks really talk about boron levels like viscosity TBN or oxidation
Anyway Valvoline went the distance and held up. I’d use it again in a heartbeat and that’s not because I grew up in the city where the company was founded and briefly based.
Poo poo group 3 oils all you want but my coyote thinks they’re just dandy
In the next installment of will 10k mile drain intervals / 5W-20 weight oil destroy my Mustang’s engine we’ve got Valvoline Advanced Full Synthetic. Unlike the last test with Mobil 1 we’re now in the API SP era and this data was collected over a 1 year 3 month period and saw a solid winters worth of cold weather driving in the north east. Driving was ~60/40 city/highway split.
This time around I took a sample at 200 miles to act as a baseline, figured that would give the new oil enough time to work through the engine and blend in with the leftover old oil. Wear metals certainly get cleaned out but you can see there’s still 10 ppm of Al/Fe/Cu carried over. 6/25/6 ppm -> 3/5/2 after the change.
4oz of fresh oil were also added each time a sample was taken to get a better handle on changes to the viscosity and TBN.
Ignore the particle count data that was for something else I was trying to test. Starting (200 mile) TBN value got covered up by that data, it was 4.9, and at the end it was 2.4 I don’t know why it’s not showing up on the sheet.
Viscosity started at 7.56 cSt, started thin out a bit during the last 2000 miles but it didn’t go out of grade.
Wear over the interval was very low. Starting with 3/5/2 ppm of aluminum iron and copper it ended with 4/20/3. That’s like 1.7 ppm per thousand miles, and steady over the run. It’s not like things are spiking at the end because the oil has worn out.
One thing I really notice was how much the boron levels dropped over the 10k mile run. 127 ppm -> 37 ppm. The only thing I can figure is this has to be boron used as a dispersant that’s getting caught up in the filter over time. If it was used for antiwear like zinc and phosphorus you shouldn’t she the levels significantly drop over time.
If that’s the case then it seems like boron would be one of those markers to keep an eye on when determining if the oil additive package is used up. Maybe folks keep an eye on that but I haven’t seen folks really talk about boron levels like viscosity TBN or oxidation
Anyway Valvoline went the distance and held up. I’d use it again in a heartbeat and that’s not because I grew up in the city where the company was founded and briefly based.
Poo poo group 3 oils all you want but my coyote thinks they’re just dandy
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