Amsoil AFL 5W40, 5807 miles, 2008 VW GLI 2.0T

[rprx]

2008 VW GLI 2.0T
Amsoil AFL 5W40
Miles on oil 5807
Miles on unit 23704
Time on oil: 4 winter months, December - March.
Zero makeup oil.
Mann Oil Filter
Oil history: Factory fill drained at 4k, Amsoil AFL 5W40 ever since, including this refill.

This is not my car, so I do not know how it is driven. It has been "chipped" (don't know the details,) otherwise, stock.

I don't think this oil should be pushed any further. Given the drop in viscosity, I was wondering if 0W30 SSO might be an alternative despite calling for a 5W40? I was hoping for longer drain intervals. Comments/suggestions appreciated.

OAI did the Analysis, anything not listed is zero.

iron 37
aluminum 6
copper 8
lead 2
silicon 5
sodium 12
potassium 3
boron 38
magnesium 30
manganese 1
calcium 1564
phosphorus 713
zinc 826
fuel < 1%
soot < .1%
water < .1%
oxidation 15
nitration 22
visc@100c 10.8

TBN 3.82

 

[d00df00d]

TBN is nice and strong and wear metals don't look too bad for a relatively new (and chipped) engine, but there's gotta be a ton of fuel dilution for the oil to have thinned out that much. Amsoil's stuff doesn't shear easily...

 

[addyguy]

For 6k miles, that's a LOT of iron, even for an engine with 23k on it. With that and how badly it sheared, i'd be inclined to look at something else - Amsoil's new DEO 5W-40 might just give you the extra bit of protection you need.

There was recently a UOA posted for the same engine on HDD 5W-30, and it did well. Might want to look at that oil as well. Pablo/Gary will be able to give you the best advice....

 

[buster]

AFL used to be more shear stable, but has been downgraded in that area to meet fuel efficiency requirements. Fuel dilution does not help. DEO is a better choice.

You'll find much like M10w40, AFL ends up being a high/mid 30 grade after use in some vehicles.

 

[Pablo]

Hard to say about the Fe. Is this the first UOA on the car?

I would also agree, that is more than shear. Did you get a FP?

I wouldn't change viscosity. I agree with the others at this point: Stick with 5W-40 and go with DEO (link)

 

[lazaro]

Originally Posted By: addyguy
For 6k miles, that's a LOT of iron, even for an engine with 23k on it. With that and how badly it sheared, i'd be inclined to look at something else - Amsoil's new DEO 5W-40 might just give you the extra bit of protection you need.

There was recently a UOA posted for the same engine on HDD 5W-30, and it did well. Might want to look at that oil as well. Pablo/Gary will be able to give you the best advice....


The iron is fine no problems there, if this is the first batch of AMSOIL the iron level can be from the previous oil that didnt make it out of the engine on the drain. This UOA is in great shape and will make it another 5000 miles, any additional makeup oil will replenish the inital fill and keep the TBN up!
RELAX!
the range for iron PPM gas engine is 5/25, Abnormal starts at the 350 PPM and Excessive coming in at 500 PPM

 

[addyguy]

Originally Posted By: lazaro
Originally Posted By: addyguy
For 6k miles, that's a LOT of iron, even for an engine with 23k on it. With that and how badly it sheared, i'd be inclined to look at something else - Amsoil's new DEO 5W-40 might just give you the extra bit of protection you need.

There was recently a UOA posted for the same engine on HDD 5W-30, and it did well. Might want to look at that oil as well. Pablo/Gary will be able to give you the best advice....


The iron is fine no problems there, if this is the first batch of AMSOIL the iron level can be from the previous oil that didnt make it out of the engine on the drain. This UOA is in great shape and will make it another 5000 miles, any additional makeup oil will replenish the inital fill and keep the TBN up!
RELAX!
the range for iron PPM gas engine is 5/25, Abnormal starts at the 350 PPM and Excessive coming in at 500 PPM


WHAT? Doesn't abnormal iron, by almost all counts, start at 150ppm?

 

[saaber1]

How do you define "abnormal"? I think throwing 150, 300, 350, whatever ppm numbers out there is pretty much meaningless. We have 39 UOAs on this engine and we know what "normal" ppm is for this engine at least for that data set. The OP's iron is 6.4 ppm/1000 miles at about 24k miles. That is just below the norm. Sorry this chart hasn't been updated but here it is.

To revisit the other threads about "are UOA metals an indication of actual wear?", I would summarize three posts that are very illustrative to me:

(1) One describes a real-world example where teardown showed large amounts of cam wear and the corresponding UOA sequence showed only a rise from 15ppm to 18ppm. In other words 15ppm was normal for that vehicle and it rose to only 18ppm when the wear problem occurred.

(2) another post describes catastrophic failure of the cam follower on the same engine as the OPs and it showed only 25 ppm during that time which is well within "normal"

(3) Buster's post from the redline guy that showed UOAs don't pick up the large particles and can show higher ppm due chemical "wear" which does not mean the engine is wearing faster

As countless others have said, contamination or wear metals can be helpful to show if you are out of the "norm" and should investigate things farther. But IMO putting "arbitrary" numbers such as 500ppm is really meaningless.

 

[Pablo]

saaber1 once again proves himself as "poster of the year award" material. Excellent post.

 

[lazaro]

Originally Posted By: lazaro
Originally Posted By: addyguy
For 6k miles, that's a LOT of iron, even for an engine with 23k on it. With that and how badly it sheared, i'd be inclined to look at something else - Amsoil's new DEO 5W-40 might just give you the extra bit of protection you need.

There was recently a UOA posted for the same engine on HDD 5W-30, and it did well. Might want to look at that oil as well. Pablo/Gary will be able to give you the best advice....


The iron is fine no problems there, if this is the first batch of AMSOIL the iron level can be from the previous oil that didnt make it out of the engine on the drain. This UOA is in great shape and will make it another 5000 miles, any additional makeup oil will replenish the inital fill and keep the TBN up!
RELAX!
the range for iron PPM gas engine is 5/25, Abnormal starts at the 350 PPM and Excessive coming in at 500 PPM

The examples I posted are for mineral oil with normal Manufactures recommended OCI.
Taking multiple oil analysis on the same fill of oil, over a period of time and taking advice from you oil analysis lab can recover much better data than one 5000 mile oil sample with each brand of oil.
If the OP goes the distance and takes another sample at 10,000 the results will be easier to read, and the wear numbers will level off.
the addition of a bypass filter will also aid in extended drain intervals and better oil analysis results.

 

[rprx]

Originally Posted By: Pablo
Hard to say about the Fe. Is this the first UOA on the car?

I would also agree, that is more than shear. Did you get a FP?

I wouldn't change viscosity. I agree with the others at this point: Stick with 5W-40 and go with DEO (link)


Yes it is the first UOA.
No on the FP.
Since I refilled with the same, I'll let in run 5800 again, dump it, and have it checked to get a feel for the FE, and then switch to DEO.

Thanks for all the replies folks.

 

[JosephH1]

I have a 2.0T and I ran the Euro formula. My UOA is posted elsewhere and it is reflected in SAABER1's chart. Terry Dyson advised me to run this oil no more than 5k or so due to the fuel dilution and acidity. FWIW

 

[RI_RS4]

saaber1

you're getting a lot of "mileage" out of that chart!

 

[rhouse181]

Here is another interest trend graph for the 2.0T using saaber's database. Miles on the oil for the x-axis and iron ppm on the y-axis.

You are pretty much on the trendline for iron ppm at 5k miles. Iron wear definitely looks normal. Viscosity, like everyone has said already, is lower than I would feel comfortable with. Seems like 5k is a good change interval.

 

[tig1]

If this report was with M1 many would tag that as high iron and high wear.

 

[RI_RS4]

Originally Posted By: tig1
If this report was with M1 many would tag that as high iron and high wear.


I can't speak for anyone but myself, but the only reason I would flag M1 would be if it consistently fell significantly above the trend lines. At least on this engine, there is enough data to develop consistent trending.

My beef with M1 is in a few specific engines where it performs poorly. In most engines, it is unremarkable, when compared to other synthetics.

 

[Pablo]

Originally Posted By: tig1
If this report was with M1 many would tag that as high iron and high wear.


If this was M1, the Fe would be 72 ppm.

Sorry couldn't resist. I was ONLY KIDDING. THIS IS A JOKE POST. Stay calm. Sarcasm, no extra charge.

 

[RI_RS4]

rhouse181

The problem with your fit is that it does not compensate for variable wear vs. vehicle mileage. Once there is significant mileage across all of the engines, and they are out of the steep break-in wear curves, then if you filter out the early vehicle mileage samples you will then see curves that are much more linear. But, without further correction of the data, there will still be a tail at the lower mile on oil side, due to the particle residue from the previous oil, which is a constant, and especially elevates the low oil mileage samples.

You might also be able to take the previous fit that saaber1 shows, and use it to normalize the data in the plots that you show.

 

[tig1]

Originally Posted By: Pablo
Originally Posted By: tig1
If this report was with M1 many would tag that as high iron and high wear.


If this was M1, the Fe would be 72 ppm.

Sorry couldn't resist. I was ONLY KIDDING. THIS IS A JOKE POST. Stay calm. Sarcasm, no extra charge.


Amsoil is a great oil, I posted that for our M1 basher friends who often try to analyze the longevity of an engine by UOAs.

 

[pickled]

It's interesting to see that approximately 50% of the observed variation relative to iron wear ppm in the datasets analyzed can be explained by the mileage. There are so many other confounding factors that other than making an intriguing looking quadratic fit the 95% prediction interval could fall anywhere between 5 and 50 for up to 8,000 miles of service. Definitely many other variables have come into play here, but an iron level of 37 does not look freakish at all.