2020 Land Rover Discovery Td6 (3.0L Powerstroke Diesel) MOTUL X-clean Gen2 5w40

[AirBull]

The factory fill Castrol 5w-30 was changed at 2,000 miles. I went with Hot Shot's Secret Gray Diamond Euro 5w30 which is an ACEA C3 oil. I wanted to go to a 5w40 based on my experience with my previous Jeep Grand Cherokee EcoDiesel, so I went with Motul X-clean Gen2 5w40. Ford F150 owners manual also says to run a 5w40 in the PowerStroke 3.0L diesel if you run biodiesel. Most diesel in my area is B5 and I go out of my way to avoid anything higher.

The shearing is why I want a 5w40 as opposed to a 5w30, but the rise in Cu levels is the opposite of what I was hoping to see. Not sure what to think at this point. Motor runs strong and purrs like a kitten. I run a quality diesel additive at every fill. Usually 2oz of Hot Shot's Secret Everyday Diesel Treatment, but I do have some Optilube products that I am trying to use up on the side.

I am, however, glad to see no fuel dilution!

 

[edyvw]

Hmm, something is not right with that engine. Copper is usually sign of rod bearings on the way out. You have trend established so definitely something is happening.
There is a lot of shearing. Gen2 is latest and greatest from Motul. You should do TBN and RAN to see how that geld up and is there any oxidation.

 

[AirBull]

Hmm, something is not right with that engine. Copper is usually sign of rod bearings on the way out. You have trend established so definitely something is happening.
There is a lot of shearing. Gen2 is latest and greatest from Motul. You should do TBN and RAN to see how that geld up and is there any oxidation.

I only did 8.2k miles on this OCI so I'll look to do slightly less next time, maybe 7k and measure the TBN, and maybe the TAN as well like you say. I have enough of the same Motul oil to do another oil change, but obviously, I'm on the fence right now. Is the shearing of the oil indicative of the oil, the motor, or both? I wouldn't think that oil would be shearing at 8k miles regardless.

I'm wondering if switching over to a thicker viscosity (5w-40 vs 5w-30) had anything to do with it? Ideally, maybe that just helped finish out the initial wear-in of the Cu. (The only optimistic take I can come up with.) Ford F-150 manual calls for 5w-40 if you run biodiesel, and the long block is the same as in my Land Rover. Love the Discovery, might have to do an LS swap if I ever have to fix the motor on my dime.

 

[edyvw]

I only did 8.2k miles on this OCI so I'll look to do slightly less next time, maybe 7k and measure the TBN, and maybe the TAN as well like you say. I have enough of the same Motul oil to do another oil change, but obviously, I'm on the fence right now. Is the shearing of the oil indicative of the oil, the motor, or both? I wouldn't think that oil would be shearing at 8k miles regardless.

I'm wondering if switching over to a thicker viscosity (5w-40 vs 5w-30) had anything to do with it? Ideally, maybe that just helped finish out the initial wear-in of the Cu. (The only optimistic take I can come up with.) Ford F-150 manual calls for 5w-40 if you run biodiesel, and the long block is the same as in my Land Rover. Love the Discovery, might have to do an LS swap if I ever have to fix the motor on my dime.

So shearing usually happens bcs. fuel.
You could try to run Shell Rotella T6 or Mobil1 Delvac 5W40. It might help. Question is why there is so much copper ?

 

[AirBull]

So shearing usually happens bcs. fuel.
You could try to run Shell Rotella T6 or Mobil1 Delvac 5W40. It might help. Question is why there is so much copper ?

I didn't want to run a CK-4 oil in my Land Rover because of the potential sensitivity of the SCR/DPF system. I liked the ACEA C3 oils with their 0.8% max SA content. Originally, JLR tried to say you should run an ACEA C1 5w30 oil and that's why I dumped that at 2k miles. I don't think many dealers in the USA even knew or spent the coin to import the specific Castrol C1 oil. It was a very unspectacular oil with a low HTHS. Fortunately, ACEA did away with C1 earlier this year with their latest ACEA 2021 specs. From day one I have been running a quality diesel fuel additive to minimize soot buildup (EGR and DPF,) and protect the injectors and HPFP.

On the other hand, my folks MY16 Jeep Grand Cherokee EcoDiesel (with GDE tune) has been running Shell Rotella T6 from the beginning and knock on wood, nearly 70k miles later and no issues.

As much as I am perplexed with the Cu levels and the reverse of the declining trend peeves me, I'm equally hard-pressed to explain the shearing of the oil when there was no measured fuel dilution. Fuel dilution was an issue on some of these vehicles but they were primarily limited to the Sd4, four cylinder diesels in the smaller Discovery Sports. The issue stemmed from short trips in urban locales that prevented a passive regen from burning up the soot in the DPF, resulting in more frequent active regens that as a result of the short trips, were being interrupted forcing a little extra fuel intended to raise the temp in the DPF to be dumped into your crankcase oil. I work from home and my trips are rarely short, so while I was curious (one the multiple reasons why I run a UOA) I did not suspect a whole lot of fuel (if any) was being dumped into my oil.

 

[Popsy]

Could your fuel additive contain copper?

 

[AirBull]

Could your fuel additive contain copper?

I don't believe any of the diesel additives have Cu in them, no. Even if they did, I don't know how they would make it into the oil if I wasn't otherwise experiencing fuel dilution. Per Blackstone Labs, copper usually comes from brass or bronze parts, copper bushings, bearings, oil coolers.

Automakers used to use lead in the bearings but started eliminating that around 2012 for the sake of the environment. The bearings are the only thing that I can think of in my motor that might have Cu in them.

 

[Popsy]

It doesn't take much to show in an oil analysis sometimes
I (unknowingly) used some diesel fuel additive that contained lead, and it showed around 50 in the uoa, without fuel dilution either. Different engine, different conditions, different era, etc.

 

[AirBull]

It doesn't take much to show in an oil analysis sometimes
I (unknowingly) used some diesel fuel additive that contained lead, and it showed around 50 in the uoa, without fuel dilution either. Different engine, different conditions, different era, etc.

Interesting. The motor otherwise runs stout and purrs like a kitten. I found some UOA's from some F-150 3.0L Powerstroke motors and Cu was not near my levels. My MY20 Lion Td6 should have been assembled with the latest improvements to the product line gleaned from the F-150 development, including the upgraded crankshaft. The long block should be identical.

 

[wings&wheels]

Your Disco is a nice truck.

Good call on protecting the SCR...that engine is rather sensitive to emissions faults, at least that was my experience in my '17 Range Rover HSE with the same engine. I loved the truck and engine, great for towing, quiet and 28MPG in a full size SUV, but it didn't age well. Final straw was the second 'car will not be able to be started in 240 miles' after several emissions incidents.

I'm hoping yours and the later generations are better as I will go back to a diesel RR.

 

[AirBull]

I think I may have figured out the anomaly on the wear items. Hot Shot's Secret FR3 Friction Reducer.

https://www.hotshotsecret.com/fr3/

When I went with the HSS Gray Diamond Euro 5w30 I didn't quite fully realize that it already contained their FR3 friction reducer. I later read somewhere (that I no longer appear to be able to find,) that you maybe want to let your motor finish breaking in for 10k miles before using FR3, but if that were such a reason or even still an issue, I would think it would be stated more clearly somewhere. I can't find it anymore. I know my motor was not fully broken in at 2k miles when I dumped the factory Castrol C1 fill for this new oil, and a friction reducer additive would go a long way to best explain why the reduction in wear metals I subsequently observed.

I wanted to move to a 5w40 for reasons I discussed earlier, but I didn't like the ACEA C3 5w40 product that HSS offered, (Noack was too high at 10.3%) so I went back to the MOTUL brand and their Gen2 version of their ACEA C3 5w40, X-clean 8100, as I thought that was a solid product. It shouldn't be any surprise in retrospect that the break-in metals (Cu and Fe) went back up as they continued to wear in with the motor, (as Blackstone alluded to), when I switched to an oil without such a friction modifier.

So I think that may be the best explanation for the inversion of the break-in metals trend, but that doesn't necessarily explain the shearing. Shearing is just not acceptable. While still higher than the 30w viscosity numbers, that is part of the reason I went to a 40w viscosity. So, what I am going to do is cut in half my normal (desired) 8k OCI and dump my current fill at 4k miles, and perform a UOA then. I have one remaining oil change worth of the MOTUL but I'm not sure I want to continue to run it in my motor if it is going to shear in just 8k miles. So the dilemma is what to use at my next oil change while I wait for an updated UOA on the current fill?

I've decided to try TRiAX's VX 5w-40 and will see how that looks. If the second UOA on the MOTUL oil pans out I may consider using the last of it up or if it looks like it's on it's way to shearing again at just 8k miles, I will probably do one more oil change with the TRiAX and wait for the UOA on it.

I think the jury is still out on TRiAX but I like what they are saying and they are local (sorry, France) in the Dallas, Texas area. I had the specs for the previous version of the product, Euro Ultra VX 5w40 and liked those, but I'm waiting on a reply on the specs of the current formula. I can't imagine they are anything but equal if not better than the previous version.

https://www.triaxlubricants.com/triax-euro-vx-5w-40-full-synthetic

 

[ceecbtg]

I don't use that engine and not familizarized with wear, but a question, is it new engine? If so it's break-in so first miles wear will be higher and changing. If you use different oils each run all is worse, compare data is less accurate.

I don't see big problem there for now. Copper is going down with different oils and higher runs, so good trend. 15k miles is break-in time for most engines.

I would keep Motul for two runs more (8k miles) and with 23-31k miles data will be accurate to think about oil.

 

[AirBull]

I don't use that engine and not familizarized with wear, but a question, is it new engine? If so it's break-in so first miles wear will be higher and changing. If you use different oils each run all is worse, compare data is less accurate.

I don't see big problem there for now. Copper is going down with different oils and higher runs, so good trend. 15k miles is break-in time for most engines.

I would keep Motul for two runs more (8k miles) and with 23-31k miles data will be accurate to think about oil.

Yes, the motor and the vehicle is new and still breaking in. My preference is to find an oil the motor likes and that provides for adequate protection, which is why I dumped manufacturer spec ACEA C1 5w30 for an ACEA C3 5w40. I wanted a higher HTHS while still being cognizant of my SCR and DPF.

I had a four-day trip take us up to Iowa this past weekend. I went out of my way to avoid any pump with the "may contain anywhere from B5 to B20" label so that I only put at max B5 in it. Same thing that I do around home. Could the shearing of my oil been a result of biodiesel content as low as B5? I'll have to monitor the oil level and if it rises any bit whatsoever, I'll be quick to change it. On the fence to run until 4k or 6k OCI now on the current oil.

 

[ceecbtg]

Viscosity drop for that Motul 5w40 and 8k miles is the expected because it's chemical nature. The same for 5w30, they had less visco drop. Real working conditions from 2-3k miles are not so different from both. I recommend you to maintain same 8k interval, it's not problem and it's the way to evaluate breaking-in process. Fuel have little influence so most of time try to use the same for next 2 or 3 oil analysis.

pd: bearing wear depend on lubricity efficiency more than lower/higher visco, additives or acea. You need to find the oil with best lubricity balance for bearings without increment Iron and Alum. Some engines have less general wear with low visco oils and other with higher. You should wait 2-3 uoa more when wear is estabilized.

 

[kschachn]

Viscosity drop for that Motul 5w40 and 8k miles is the expected because it's chemical nature. The same for 5w30, they had less visco drop. Real working conditions from 2-3k miles are not so different from both. I recommend you to maintain same 8k interval, it's not problem and it's the way to evaluate breaking-in process. Fuel have little influence so most of time try to use the same for next 2 or 3 oil analysis.

pd: bearing wear depend on lubricity efficiency more than lower/higher visco, additives or acea. You need to find the oil with best lubricity balance for bearings without increment Iron and Alum. Some engines have less general wear with low visco oils and other with higher. You should wait 2-3 uoa more when wear is estabilized.

Not sure what "lubricity efficiency" means but bearing wear is dependent on an adequate MOFT.

 

[KSCMaint]

I'm not if it what you are seeing here but we had a few freshly rebuilt engines that showed copper. What we found was that there was a place on our engines that they were sealing them with copper gasket maker. Once they went a few changes it went away.