Ash from burning metallic additives

JAG

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I was scrolling through some of my photos and thought I’d share what motor oil ash looks like. See the cup on the right. These oils unintentionally autoignited in a test. It was VRP’s fault and it caught the other two oils on fire. VRP burnt very far to completion, allowing it to form a lot of ash from the metallic additives. The other oils burnt for a while then the fires stopped while quite a bit of the oil still existed, so there is not much ash in those cups.

The ash’s consistency is crunchy. Ash used to be important for cushioning the valves when they slammed into the valve seats. That requires a sufficient amount of oil consumption. I think it was much more necessary in the past than now, since I think the metallurgy has improved. With many modern engines, oil consumption is very low and not much ash is formed. If anyone knows anything else about this, let us know.

In the sulfated ash test, the oil is burnt in the presence of sulfuric acid to maximize the separation of the carbonaceous material from the metals in the additives. http://www.uspbpep.com/usp29/v29240/usp29nf24s0_c281.html

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Was that the order they were in when they ignited? It just seems like the farther away from the source V R&P the less heat to burn off the oil. Interesting to see the leftover material on the V R&P though. That is somewhat similar to crank cases I've seen but not quite as "Gritty" or "Crunchy" as you called it.
 
The order in the picture is the order they had in the oven. I agree that Amsoil experienced more heat by being next to VRP that burnt so completely. QS Ultimate Durability 10W-30 has extremely low volatility, so that likely had a role in how soon its fire went out and how much oil remained.

I should have been more clear in my original post. This was a volatility test that was not supposed to have any oils autoignite. The purpose of this thread is show the ash.
 
About 40 years ago in a shop I worked at we ignorantly spoke of “crispy deposits “ in motorcycle engines. They caused pre ignition, If they were not removed completely during a decoke. They would fight the wire brush and just wear down instead of flaking off. Maybe we weren’t as ignorant as I thought. Thank you for posting.

FWIW, the individual , He Who Must Not Be Named on BITOG- who has a blog, has commented that some QS oil has a high breakdown temperature and doesn’t lose his test criteria at high temperature.
 
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I will try to find another picture later showing the VRP cup after I cleaned it with soap, water, and paper towel. There was an unevenly-distributed black film deposit with enough thickness that it could be felt. I think it was additive-derived, not oil-derived. Due to the color, one guess is it had significant molybdenum content and another is nearly pure carbon but I doubt the latter. The only way I could remove it conveniently was with sandpaper. Same goes for baked-on varnish though. The most effective liquid cleaner I’ve tried on baked-on varnish is the oven cleaner, Easy-Off, but that still was not effective enough to be worth it.
 
I will try to find another picture later showing the VRP cup after I cleaned it with soap, water, and paper towel. There was an unevenly-distributed black film deposit with enough thickness that it could be felt. I think it was additive-derived, not oil-derived. Due to the color, one guess is it had significant molybdenum content and another is nearly pure carbon but I doubt the latter. The only way I could remove it conveniently was with sandpaper. Same goes for baked-on varnish though. The most effective liquid cleaner I’ve tried on baked-on varnish is the oven cleaner, Easy-Off, but that still was not effective enough to be worth it.
Kinda makes you wonder 1. How Valvoline can remove the very same stuff from an oil burner’s coked rings when burning it leaves what appears to be the exact same remnants as the previous oils that jammed up the rings, and, 2. Is the black carbon people are finding in their filters merely the VRP itself and not previously accumulated crud being cleaned away?

I’ll hold further comment until we see some more data & proof, but color me even more skeptical that the cleaning they claim can be completed without any physical characteristics that can be tested & identified to assess the cleaning mechanism.
 
It does make me wonder too, Subie. One thing that is clear is that burning oil leaves a mess, so it is at least somewhat of a vicious cycle. I think oil consumption is kept in check partly by really thick deposits being more fragile mechanically and being more prone to heating up more and burning off. We all know that there are things that can be done to improve or worsen oil consumption. Sometimes we have no explanation for why some thing changed it. I doubt that the carbon people are finding in their filters with VRP is from VRP itself, but I can't be certain about that. Yes we need more data and proof. Being open-minded, rational, and skeptical is the best mindset.

Attached are pictures of the cups after cleaning with warm soapy water and paper towel. QS's cup had what was originally oil in one corner of the cup with a consistency of old shoe polish. I had to scrape it off using firm finger nail pressure. Some still remained. The toothpick shows what I scraped off. VRP's black deposits were no match for the toothpick. Amsoil just had varnish on the side of the cup above the oil line.

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I was scrolling through some of my photos and thought I’d share what motor oil ash looks like. See the cup on the right. These oils unintentionally autoignited in a test. It was VRP’s fault and it caught the other two oils on fire. VRP burnt very far to completion, allowing it to form a lot of ash from the metallic additives. The other oils burnt for a while then the fires stopped while quite a bit of the oil still existed, so there is not much ash in those cups.

The ash’s consistency is crunchy. Ash used to be important for cushioning the valves when they slammed into the valve seats. That requires a sufficient amount of oil consumption. I think it was much more necessary in the past than now, since I think the metallurgy has improved. With many modern engines, oil consumption is very low and not much ash is formed. If anyone knows anything else about this, let us know.

In the sulfated ash test, the oil is burnt in the presence of sulfuric acid to maximize the separation of the carbonaceous material from the metals in the additives. http://www.uspbpep.com/usp29/v29240/usp29nf24s0_c281.html

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thanks for this.

notice the colour of the ash, it's grey to white and not black. Nothing like the stuff found on intake valves.

I used to work at a waste water treatment facility and we used to test for ash deposits in the dry matter we got out of the water, it's the same thing except we dried it out to weigh it.

if you have hardened valve seats (like any alloy head?) there's little need for ash or lead.
 
JAG, I agree and like I said I’m not making that claim against VRP yet (partly because I have no need of using it), but because I know there’s a lot that I don’t know, and I’d even be willing to accept there’s something so novel that actually does what they claim if it was say MolaKule or HPL (sworn to detail secrecy, of course) that said, “Yep, stuff that doesn’t change or make itself known in any physical characteristics at the bench-test level exists & does what VRP claims,” and isn’t simply AN or POE. Not scientifically provable, but those folks have earned our trust.

In the meantime, I’ll sit back and let the VRP fans do the legwork like you’ve started here, and hold my final judgment (for myself, of course, not trying to change anyone else’s mind). Thanks for the info though… every “answer” elicits new questions!
 
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