Horrible oil analysis 10k miles brand new Audi A8.

[maxdustington]

Originally Posted by Tom NJ
You have a lot of dirt in that oil sample (Silicon = 67) which could be responsible for some of the high wear metals. Suggest you check the air filter.
I read a post on here from a dude who bought a new car sans air filter and found out 1000 miles or so later!

 

[StevieC]

Originally Posted by maxdustington
Originally Posted by Tom NJ
You have a lot of dirt in that oil sample (Silicon = 67) which could be responsible for some of the high wear metals. Suggest you check the air filter.
I read a post on here from a dude who bought a new car sans air filter and found out 1000 miles or so later!

It could also be sealant material leaching into the oil. This is common as well. My Santa Fe had really high levels for the first 10K miles (12,000km) and then it started falling. It had the same air filter the whole time.

 

[Stevie]

I shutter when I think about having all those contaminates for 10k miles running through my new engine wearing on it. I guess that is why I changed the the oil first time on my wife's Elantra at 1k and my Ninja 1000 at 100 miles. Maybe I'm weird but I want that stuff out of my engine.

After seeing that oil analysis, I would probably trade the car in.

 

[Cujet]

The Euro's are nuts with the extended drain intervals. Those engines are stupidly expensive and a little preventative maintenance is in order. Many of the cars serviced by BMW and Mercedes dealers, right on the schedule are chock a block full of sludge. They come on the market after a few years and the next owner gets to deal with it.

I am absolutely not a fan of extended drain intervals. It's well known that timing chains wear faster with extended drain intervals. Why risk expensive repairs if you plan to keep it. Interestingly, even if you don't plan to keep it, just how much have you saved by not changing the oil.


Folks, there is no magic inside engines. Today's engines are just engines. They are not full of new wear surfaces that can tolerate abuse. They have hardened camshafts, steel timing chains, iron or "Nikasil" bores, iron crankshafts, aluminum pistons, chrome faced rings, soft metal bearings and ferrous oil pump materials. Just like they've had for the last 40++ years. The difference are in the tuning, direct injection and variable cam timing. Turbo's still coke up, bearings still wear and timing chains are just as wear prone as 50 years ago.,

Anyone that says things are better today is incorrect. Today's oils contain even fewer anti wear additives.


TAKE CARE OF YOUR ENGINE. Choose a good quality synthetic oil of sufficient viscosity and change it frequently. There is no other way to remove contaminates from your engine. Period, end of story.

 

[Mackelroy]

10,000 miles and first oil change?

Id expect it to be worse

 

[Spector]

Don't panic,. engine is breaking in and could be for up to 50,000 miles. The numbers should start to decrease as the miles pile on and if you do further UOA they will come down. remember, UOA is trend analysis, one UOA does not mean much if anything it is a base number and on a new engine, truly a base number, all kinds of reasons for high wear metals. So, sleep well and do a UOA at next change and see where the numbers are going but first one, definitely do not panic.

 

[webfors]

Originally Posted by Cujet
The Euro's are nuts with the extended drain intervals. Those engines are stupidly expensive and a little preventative maintenance is in order. Many of the cars serviced by BMW and Mercedes dealers, right on the schedule are chock a block full of sludge. They come on the market after a few years and the next owner gets to deal with it.

I am absolutely not a fan of extended drain intervals. It's well known that timing chains wear faster with extended drain intervals. Why risk expensive repairs if you plan to keep it. Interestingly, even if you don't plan to keep it, just how much have you saved by not changing the oil.


Folks, there is no magic inside engines. Today's engines are just engines. They are not full of new wear surfaces that can tolerate abuse. They have hardened camshafts, steel timing chains, iron or "Nikasil" bores, iron crankshafts, aluminum pistons, chrome faced rings, soft metal bearings and ferrous oil pump materials. Just like they've had for the last 40++ years. The difference are in the tuning, direct injection and variable cam timing. Turbo's still coke up, bearings still wear and timing chains are just as wear prone as 50 years ago.,

Anyone that says things are better today is incorrect. Today's oils contain even fewer anti wear additives.


TAKE CARE OF YOUR ENGINE. Choose a good quality synthetic oil of sufficient viscosity and change it frequently. There is no other way to remove contaminates from your engine. Period, end of story.



Amen. That's why I change the ATS oil twice as often as the OLM tells me to.

 

[jongies3]

Switch to SuperTech, that'll fix it! At least it seems to be the new BITOG favorite anyway. I'd personally go with Edge 0W-40 next time as the 5W isn't that impressive on paper compared to the German/Belgian made stuff.

 

[simple_gifts]

Quote

Anyone that says things are better today is incorrect.


? Really?; I am not disputing your strategy for more frequent oil changes for certain vehicles, but emissions, fuel control, reliability are all better.

Modern cars may have different challenges than years ago or maybe the same challenges from different sources, but I'll gladly continue on with my 10-14K OCIs.

It is not the OCI for many; but the concept of "things being the same as 40 years ago....." i don't think that is too valid. JMO

 

[Mainia]

Don't worry at alI, you should of dumped it at 3,000 miles, but you did not. Lesson learned. I assume they dumped the oil put in new oil and new filter? Pull another sample at 3,000 miles into the next oil change. And as one of the other posters said GDI turbos need max dump at 5,000 miles. I would not worry, you did no damage. It just would of been "nice" to dump even at 5,000.

 

[OVERKILL]

This is perfectly normal and why generally one doesn't do a UOA on the first few OCI's. If you do another, which will be just as much of a waste, you'll observe things trending down and the break-in material is flushed out, things take a while to normalize and you aren't there yet, all you've done is set yourself up to freak out over "bad" results, which were never going to be good in the first place.

Question: What were you expecting to see and why? IE, what was the purpose of your UOA? I doubt your intention is to run longer than factory intervals.

 

[rubberchicken]

Originally Posted by Danh
The comments about wear metals in a factory fill sample are valid and who knows how the sample was taken. Nonetheless, the fuel dilution is extreme and deserves a second look. Don't think I've ever seen a flashpoint that low.

Does this engine have a dipstick? If so, you can order a kit from Oil Analyzers that will allow you to extract a sample from the dipstick tube on your own, ensuring you have a good sample.

Either way, I'd take this UOA to your dealer and insist on some kind of follow-through. This isn't normal and your car was far from cheap.


You can get a similar kit from Blackstone, which allows you to take a oil sample without draining the oil. This assumes that the A8 engine has a dipstick.
The tool is very nice quality- https://www.blackstone-labs.com/vacuum-pump.php

 

[rubberchicken]

Originally Posted by Cujet
The Euro's are nuts with the extended drain intervals. Those engines are stupidly expensive and a little preventative maintenance is in order. Many of the cars serviced by BMW and Mercedes dealers, right on the schedule are chock a block full of sludge. They come on the market after a few years and the next owner gets to deal with it.

I am absolutely not a fan of extended drain intervals. It's well known that timing chains wear faster with extended drain intervals. Why risk expensive repairs if you plan to keep it. Interestingly, even if you don't plan to keep it, just how much have you saved by not changing the oil.


Folks, there is no magic inside engines. Today's engines are just engines. They are not full of new wear surfaces that can tolerate abuse. They have hardened camshafts, steel timing chains, iron or "Nikasil" bores, iron crankshafts, aluminum pistons, chrome faced rings, soft metal bearings and ferrous oil pump materials. Just like they've had for the last 40++ years. The difference are in the tuning, direct injection and variable cam timing. Turbo's still coke up, bearings still wear and timing chains are just as wear prone as 50 years ago.,

Anyone that says things are better today is incorrect. Today's oils contain even fewer anti wear additives.


TAKE CARE OF YOUR ENGINE. Choose a good quality synthetic oil of sufficient viscosity and change it frequently. There is no other way to remove contaminates from your engine. Period, end of story.



I am going to disagree here with one specific item: manufacturing tolerances on the engine. The uniformity from unit to unit is far better for the average engine, than 20-30 years ago. Source - lots of background in IT collecting manufacturing data (GPIB FTW ! )

 

[Hall]

Originally Posted by Danh
Either way, I'd take this UOA to your dealer and insist on some kind of follow-through. This isn't normal and your car was far from cheap.

The OP can 'try' but the dealer has no obligation to answer to what the analysis found.

 

[SonofJoe]

A couple of comments...

I'm a bit out of date now but since the mid-90's VW Factory Fill was always 0W30. Your viscosity numbers are entirely consistent with this.

VW FF oils are extremely high quality. VW make suppliers jump through all sorts of hoops to get these oils perfect & the FF oil will have had to pass sophisticated RNT wear tests to get qualified. That said, any FF oil will contain a disproportionately high amount of wear metal at the first OCI. It's just bedding in wear which the engine designers have allowed for.

The oil has a low Calcium content presumably because this is a low SAPS oil. The fact that the oil's TBN is 4.8 after 10k miles says to me the oil is rock solid stable; probably a PAO/Group III mix with a splash of ester. Remember that if the base oil isn't oxidizing to form acids, you won't delete your TBN reserve by much.

Boron isn't a contaminant. It's almost certainly coming from an ashless dispersant that's been borated to make it friendly to seal elastomers (VW seal tests are probably the toughest to pass of any OEM).

The FF oil doesn't contain Moly, very likely because it doesn't need it. I have a recollection at the back of my mind that RNT wear testing doesn't much care for Moly and is far more sensitive to what type of ZDDP you use.

This isn't my car but if it was, I really wouldn't worry about this first oil analysis. I would actually rate it as quite good (I've seen many that are way worse!). Just a thought but why would you use a 5W40 in this engine? It may be what's recommended but you've just run the engine, presumably without issues, for 10k on 0W30 (possibility 5W30 but I think it's the former). I'd stick with it.

 

[SonofJoe]

I take a shot at the guy's car (not him) but you elect to take a shot at me, regardless of the fact that I posted quite a lot of very pertinent information.

And then you say more or less everyone who contributed to the thread is insane.

And according to you, I'm the [censored]? See the inconsistency?

 

[Hounds]

Nazmorgul: If you're still reading this thread, I think the takeaway from this thread is you should ensure you keep a copy of the oil analysis you received in the event you experience engine problems that can be traced to oil contamination or inadequate lubrication.

Also, FWIW, I, too, recommend Castrol's 0W-40 weight oil for your engine. There are several threads in the European and Imported Oil panel that discuss this product. See, e.g., https://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/4816570/3

 

[Lubener]

Didn't do the engine any favors by running the original oil for 10k. Should have been done loooong ago.

 

[alarmguy]

Nothing at all wrong with that UOA.

1. UOA wasnt done by you.

2. The only way to correctly do a UOA is the oil must be up to FULL operating temperature when the sample is taken and sample should be taken about the middle of the drain. Roll of the dice for a dealer to do that.

3. Your engine is brand new and nothing at all wrong with that UOA.

4. I understand you are freaking out but assure you, there is absolutely nothing wrong with your UOA. Your engine was breaking in for those 10,000 miles.

 

[Danh]

Originally Posted by alarmguy
Nothing at all wrong with that UOA.

1. UOA wasnt done by you.

2. The only way to correctly do a UOA is the oil must be up to FULL operating temperature when the sample is taken and sample should be taken about the middle of the drain. Roll of the dice for a dealer to do that.

3. Your engine is brand new and nothing at all wrong with that UOA.

4. I understand you are freaking out but assure you, there is absolutely nothing wrong with your UOA. Your engine was breaking in for those 10,000 miles.

Nothing at all wrong with that UOA.

1. UOA wasnt done by you.

2. The only way to correctly do a UOA is the oil must be up to FULL operating temperature when the sample is taken and sample should be taken about the middle of the drain. Roll of the dice for a dealer to do that.

3. Your engine is brand new and nothing at all wrong with that UOA.

4. I understand you are freaking out but assure you, there is absolutely nothing wrong with your UOA. Your engine was breaking in for those 10,000 miles. [/quote

There is no way a flash point of 260F and absolutely trashed viscosity suggests there's "absolutely nothing wrong" with this sample. There are questions about how the sample was taken, but, having embarked on this exercise, there's no way the OP can relax and assume all's well.