2003 Saab 9-5 Aero, RLI 5W-40, 5,500 miles

[greenjp]

Howdy folks. Here's the latest UOA on my Saab. Previous threads can be found by searching my name and the word "aero".

Here's all the data to date from my car, most recent run on the right:

Mileage 14441 45050 70225 85500
OCI 3776 5100 5225 5500
Oil dealer M1 5W40 M1 5W40 RLI 5W40
filter Saab PureOne PureOne EAO
date May-04 Jan-06 Apr-07 Dec-07
lab Bstone Bstone Bstone Terry's

Aluminum 3 2 1 2
Chromium 1 1 1 1
Iron 20 11 11 13
Copper 8 8 4 88
Lead 5 2 1 6
Tin 0 2 2 0
Molybdenum 11 22 3 1
Nickel 0 0 1 1
Manganese 1 0 0
Silver 0 0 0 0
Titanium 0 0 0 0
Potassium 0 1 2 0
Boron 17 37 20 6
Silicon 6 8 8 10
Sodium 4 3 5 11
Calcium 2761 2454 1894 2494
Magnesium 177 336 366 153
Phosphorus 767 1002 845 1362
Zinc 871 1202 1027 1536
Barium 0 0 0 0
Antimony 103
Vanadium 0


Viscosity @ 210 55.6 68.6 67.1 90
Viscosity @ 40 n/a n/a n/a 13.2
Flashpoint 340 350 365 295
Fuel % 1.3 1.3 0.5 1.51
Antifreeze 0 0.0 0 0
Water % 0 0.0 0
Insolubles % 0.3 0.3 0.3
TBN n/a 4.3 3.3 3.9
TAN 3.17
Oxid 132
Nit 16
KF 925
Soot 0
viscosity index 167

Unfortunately I can't figure out how to enter this so the columns line up nicely. If somebody can help with that let me know

Thoughts?

jeff

 

[buster]

Looks like Delvac 1 did the best of the bunch, although I don't see the final viscosity?? Consistent wearing engine which would probably do well on many oils.

 

[JHZR2]

is that 88 copper on RLI???!!!!????

Lab error?

JMH

 

[JAG]

buster, viscosity at 210F was 13.2 cst but it's listed in the 40C row and the other oils' viscosity is in SUS units.
JHZR2, copper is an additive in this oil.
There's a lot of water in this oil: 925 PPM vs. Nitration is getting high but not dangerous yet.
Oxidation is lower than the 150 that was reported on this virgin oil in the past. Must be either error or formulation change (ester decrease).
TBN is semi-strong. TAN is getting near TBN though.
Tin dropped from 2 to 0 but lead jumped from 1 to 6 (maybe corrosive wear?).

This engine is truly diluting its oil with more fuel than most engines. Even the Blackstone flashpoint data shows that.

 

[double vanos]

Yeah, that spike in copper is new and boy is it high! I wonder what the he LL is going on.

 

[DmanWho]

For a RLI oil, you could argue that the copper is low.

 

[greenjp]

Yes the copper is an additive in the RLI oil. Does make checking for copper wear a bit tricky but I suppose Terry looks at the whole picture to determine if there's something to be concerned about in that regard.

The car does seem to be a fuel diluter. It's in a good state of repair and tune so I'm struggling to figure out how to address that. In the meantime, I'm limiting OCIs to 5-6k. Both the Mobil 1 and RLI seem to do a good job with wear control.

FWIW the car's computer usually chimes in every 9-9.5k telling me it's oil change time. The car was originally spec'd for 5W-30 semi synthetic. I wonder how a 9k run of Mobil 7500 5W-30 would turn out

jeff

 

[benjamming]

Are these still factory plugs? What kind? Gap?

What air filter & mileage?

 

[greenjp]

Originally Posted By: benjamming
Are these still factory plugs? What kind? Gap?

The factory plugs are platinum NGKs. I took those out at 30k and have been using the copper NGK equivalents every 15k since. The gap is 1.1 mm I believe. I've been using the R6ES type, am actually going to install the R7ES type for a run to see if that helps. I think that's a colder plug, is specified by Saab if you do high speed running or have mods I believe. Couldn't hurt to try

Originally Posted By: benjamming
What air filter & mileage?

OEM air filter, a snazzy cylindrical filter made by Mann. I change it every 15k or so. Last change at 75k.

jeff