Here are Premium Guard's main Oil Filter suppliers

[CharlieBauer]

Vietnam

1) VAFI / Vietnam Advanced Filtration Inc. Founded 2018.

https://afifilter.com.vn/doi-tac/

China

2) Guangdong Advanced Filtration Inc. This was the first AFI founded in 2003 with Korean capital.

http://www.afifilter.com/en/p1.asp

3) Boshifilter. Founded 1985 and is an OE supplier

http://www.boshifilter.com/intro/

Boshifilter have also supplied Champion, Fram, Napa and Purolator directly

Korea

Filtermaster. They have the worst website and I may have crashed it by visiting

http://www.filtermaster.co.kr/

There is another Korean company called Eco Korea and a couple of other smaller companies from China that have supplied oil filters to Premium Guard.

There are also many other companies supplying Premium Guard with other parts such as air filters, wipers etc.


As to Pentius, it does not seem they use any of the same suppliers. Their main supplier for oil filters appears to be Hebei Shengcan Auto Parts in China and they have several suppliers from South Korea.

 

[DannyM]

Vietnam

1) VAFI / Vietnam Advanced Filtration Inc. Founded 2018.

https://afifilter.com.vn/doi-tac/

China

2) Guangdong Advanced Filtration Inc. This was the first AFI founded in 2003 with Korean capital.

http://www.afifilter.com/en/p1.asp

3) Boshifilter. Founded 1985 and is an OE supplier

http://www.boshifilter.com/intro/

Boshifilter have also supplied Champion, Fram, Napa and Purolator directly

Korea

Filtermaster. They have the worst website and I may have crashed it by visiting

http://www.filtermaster.co.kr/

There is another Korean company called Eco Korea and a couple of other smaller companies from China that have supplied oil filters to Premium Guard.

There are also many other companies supplying Premium Guard with other parts such as air filters, wipers etc.


As to Pentius, it does not seem they use any of the same suppliers. Their main supplier for oil filters appears to be Hebei Shengcan Auto Parts in China and they have several suppliers from South Korea.

Great info .. VAFI is the mother load and only Vietnam source from what I have seen in the past and they put the organizations who they produce for right on the front page

 

[DannyM]

.
Pentius Korea are made by a company (no website) called "SamWon Air Tech" .. If you Google you will mostly find SamWon Tech which has NOTHING to do with SamWon Air Tech.

 

[CharlieBauer]

.
Pentius Korea are made by a company (no website) called "SamWon Air Tech" .. If you Google you will mostly find SamWon Tech which has NOTHING to do with SamWon Air Tech.

Pentius has dealt with several suppliers of oil filters from Korea. Sh Filter, Kc Filters, Daehwa, Songlim, Jaihyun.

I didn't see anything for Samwon. I have found the company and it's apparently 7 employees so maybe not the manufacturer?

 

[DannyM]

Pentius has dealt with several suppliers of oil filters from Korea. Sh Filter, Kc Filters, Daehwa, Songlim, Jaihyun.

I didn't see anything for Samwon. I have found the company and it's apparently 7 employees so maybe not the manufacturer?

Well they were definitely supplying at one point which could be multiple companies now of course. .. SH filter showing 25 people and I don't think they would be getting by with that few so I don't think employee count is accurate.

 

[fantastic]

Excellent work!

 

[Glenda W.]

From the Pentius website.

“However, the Daewoo brand was absorbed worldwide by General Motors in 2003. In the U.S. market, Pentius Automotive Parts was initially established to provide continued exclusive distribution of OE parts to support U.S. owners of Daewoo vehicles. This favorable association with a leading South Korean
automobile manufacturing entity, GM-Daewoo, provided the foundation for the successful development of Pentius Automotive Parts. The Pentius UltraFLOW filter line was launched in the aftermarket in 2004, through an aggressive marketing campaign which focused on a high level of media visibility.”

If there’s a connection between PG and Daewoo in Korea that might be the link. Filters are identical.

 

[CharlieBauer]

If there’s a connection between PG and Daewoo in Korea that might be the link. Filters are identical.

I was going through WCW's videos to try and make sense of media differences in the PG offerings. In the 100x magnification, the media looks the same between STP XL, Carquest Premium, Microguard Select, Ecoguard Synthetic, Napa Gold.

There was at most a 5% difference in media thickness. Carquest Premium seemed to be ever so slightly thicker. But visually, the media looked identical magnified or not.

I think I would buy on the basis of price which makes the Carquest Premium the best choice imo.

The Pentius XL media did not look the same. So along with the baseplate difference and a different supplier in the import records, safe to say it is not a PG.

I think these companies are using some of the same tooling. Apparently, some of tooling is made in Korea and the AFI companies set up in China and Vietnam have Korean owners and imported the tooling, so the similarity is down to a Korean influence rather than a formal link.

 

[factorytuned2012]

I support them all

 

[Glenda W.]

I was going through WCW's videos to try and make sense of media differences in the PG offerings. In the 100x magnification, the media looks the same between STP XL, Carquest Premium, Microguard Select, Ecoguard Synthetic, Napa Gold.

There was at most a 5% difference in media thickness. Carquest Premium seemed to be ever so slightly thicker. But visually, the media looked identical magnified or not.

I think I would buy on the basis of price which makes the Carquest Premium the best choice imo.

The Pentius XL media did not look the same. So along with the baseplate difference and a different supplier in the import records, safe to say it is not a PG.

I think these companies are using some of the same tooling. Apparently, some of tooling is made in Korea and the AFI companies set up in China and Vietnam have Korean owners and imported the tooling, so the similarity is down to a Korean influence rather than a formal link.

Thank you for all your research!! Much appreciated. I believe you are correct. I actually just picked up a microgard select for a run.

 

[KevinMalone]

Seems to correspond with their import data

https://www.importyeti.com/company/premium-guard

 

[Glenda W.]

Grabbed this PG made filter yesterday!! In a few months I’ll c&p.

 

[CharlieBauer]

Another one with no reference to micron size on the box?

 

[Glenda W.]

Another one with no reference to micron size on the box?

Correct. I’ve only seen the reference on the website with iso 4548-12 99%@25.

 

[Glenda W.]

For those following PG efficiency claims Napa Gold(PG built) now has ISO 99%@23.

 

[CharlieBauer]

For those following PG efficiency claims Napa Gold(PG built) now has ISO 99%@23.

View attachment 242253

Is it a coincidence that those are exactly the same numbers for the same filters given by WIX customer service to a member here in Jun 2023?

Post in thread 'Wix = Nominal (50%) at 21 microns? (Corvette LT1 Filter Options)'

Jun 26, 2023

“99% efficient at 23 microns (Based on WIX 51515, WIX 51356, WIX 57060)”
That’s really good! When was this email correspondence - recent?

• Robvette

• 

 

[drtyler]

Is it a coincidence that those are exactly the same numbers for the same filters given by WIX customer service to a member here in Jun 2023?

Post in thread 'Wix = Nominal (50%) at 21 microns? (Corvette LT1 Filter Options)'

Jun 26, 2023

“99% efficient at 23 microns (Based on WIX 51515, WIX 51356, WIX 57060)”
That’s really good! When was this email correspondence - recent?

• Robvette

• 

Might be that NAPA hasn’t updated the website text yet which still has the old Wix numbers?

 

[Glenda W.]

Is it a coincidence that those are exactly the same numbers for the same filters given by WIX customer service to a member here in Jun 2023?

Post in thread 'Wix = Nominal (50%) at 21 microns? (Corvette LT1 Filter Options)'

Jun 26, 2023

“99% efficient at 23 microns (Based on WIX 51515, WIX 51356, WIX 57060)”
That’s really good! When was this email correspondence - recent?

• Robvette

• 

Guess we’re back to Micrgard Select as the only confirmed ISO tested efficiency PG filter.

 

[CharlieBauer]

Guess we’re back to Micrgard Select as the only confirmed ISO tested efficiency PG filter.

Well it seems the PG made Napa Gold is 99% at 30 microns. See video below.

The media between all of the PG 10,000 mile filters looks the same to me so that is what I am going to assume they all are. In fact, some Carquest Premium listings also say 99% at 30 microns.



In one of WCW's videos, the Napa Proformer looks like it has the same 10,000 mile PG media.

 

[Mewbs]

Great work OP on doing the homework, yeah Premium Guard is just good at sourcing stuff from east Asia though from what we're seeing lately overseas manufactured filters with actual quality control are certainly doing a better job at making filters compared to the states here.

I come to think the STP S3600XL sample I sent to WCW goes to show the media looks better than I expected from the microscope images. Still no clue where these factories source the media from since its likely a trade secret for them.