How does cleaning piston rings reduce oil consumption?

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With the advent of Valvoline Restore and Protect, I'm seeing reports of reduced oil consumption. Assuming piston rings are being cleaned, how does this reduce oil consumption? My initial thought of a dirty piston ring is that carbon is building up, which in my mind, would improve the seal, not lessen it. How do dirty piston rings increase oil consumption?
 
Getting carbon buildup in the ring lands doesn't allow the rings to move and adjust to heat expansion and the cylinder wall's imperfect surface. Tolerances get looser in the middle of the stroke as miles rack up and the rings can't compensate as well, IIRC. Something along those lines.
 
A visual.

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Think of windshield wipers when they're frozen or stiff (old rubber), they leave streaks or are basically useless. Fresh clean wipers can follow the surface and leave a smooth clean surface.

Oil rings that can't move properly can't wipe the cylinder. The extra oil left behind ends up in the combustion chamber to be burned.

Compression rings that can't move properly don't seal properly, so you loose combustion gasses to the crankcase, loose power and push more oil out of the crankcase. That oil is either leaked out or ends up in the intake or directly into into the combustion chamber.
 
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Oil control rings are thin, somewhat flimsy rings with a spacer between-they get clogged with carbon, they can’t do their job of scraping most of the oil off the cylinde4 walls. Blue clouds & massive oil consumption result! Poor compression rings cause low power, excessive blowby & contaminate oil with combustion byproducts-but oil control rings seem to cause even more oil burning (along with worn valve guides & seals).
 
Thanks everyone. It makes more sense now. In my mind, I was picturing the the sludge acting as a putty: filling in gaps thus allowing less blowby.
 
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