Oil Filter Particulate Loading

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Feb 8, 2019
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For those who cut open filters,

For years now I have had no problem running a high end 20K mile rated filters for two oil changes...6000 - 7500 miles per change. And actually back in the day when I was working full time, three kids driving, and five vehicles I did the Amsoil + Amsoil filter on my wife’s car per the 20K or once per year oil/filter change guidance they gave...and believe me she drove 20K per year!

So my question,
With GDI/turbo engines has anyone noticed that the filters are loaded with more “particulates” with these sorts of engines, and maybe I should move away from the two oil changes per filter. Oh, I do 5000 mile oil changes on these engines...the vehicle maintenance minder is usually showing 50% oil life left.
Thanks,
 
All I can say is that since the introduction to DI and seeing more frequent combinations of turbos/DI, the oil changes just look different...oil looks darker, it smells like fuel (more often), oil consumption (cars/trucks coming in with less oil on those dipsticks) and oil filters looking "dirtier". Not sure what it all means long term.
 
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Years ago I tended 5 turbocharged Saabs concurrently. They all drained truly stinky oil.
All these cars had throttle bodies and multiport fuel injection so GDI comparisons can't be drawn but the turbos were there.
The vehicles in the immediate family got 5K OCIs. I never did an analysis.
I did my friends' Saabs whenever they came around.
 
All I can say is that since the introduction to DI and seeing more frequent combinations of turbos/DI, the oil changes just look different...oil looks darker, it smells like fuel (more often), oil consumption (cars/trucks coming in with less oil on those dipsticks) and oil filters looking "dirtier". Not sure what it all means long term.
I agree with you. I also don't know what it means 'long term' but it means that I'll be doing more frequent oil changes. After years of doing 3K OCI's I had finally gotten the cujones to extend out to 6 to 7.5K changes due to reading BITOG experiences. I'll probably stay at that OCI (on full synthetics) but certainly no longer than that....less if I ever buy another small turbo GDI (I bought a new Cruze in 2011 with the 1.4T....it was very telling that GM 'recalibrated' the OLM (downwards) in the second year.)
 
Some of the companies that do UOA also will do oil filter analysis. Obviously an extra cost.

I have run my bypass filter for around 35K miles and then cut it open. The media only looked like black diesel oil had flowed through it. It was not covered in a layer of anything I could see with reading glasses. Maybe the media was starting to get blocked by tiny particles that are hard to see without a microscope.

My point is I do not think we can cut open a filter and look at the media and conclude anything about it being 5% blocked or 95% blocked.
 
For those who cut open filters,

I've never cut any filter, but two of my cars use 'open' filter elements,
making it very easy to examine.


With GDI/turbo engines has anyone noticed that the filters are loaded with more “particulates” with these sorts of engines..... (?)

Whenever I inspected the filter during an oil change I didn't find a sign
for any kind of particle contamination. Only mild if any darkening and
fortunately no (visible) metallic particles at all. However I did observe
some iron deposits on magnetic drain plugs, but a small amount just
enough being visible. I'm certain iron particles will have accumulated on
the filter media but probably sufficiently distributed all over its surface
for making them somewhat invisible.
.
 
I agree with you. I also don't know what it means 'long term' but it means that I'll be doing more frequent oil changes. After years of doing 3K OCI's I had finally gotten the cujones to extend out to 6 to 7.5K changes due to reading BITOG experiences. I'll probably stay at that OCI (on full synthetics) but certainly no longer than that....less if I ever buy another small turbo GDI (I bought a new Cruze in 2011 with the 1.4T....it was very telling that GM 'recalibrated' the OLM (downwards) in the second year.)
I'm kind of in a different boat at the moment, after years of owning direct injection cars and trucks, my latest daily driver is a tuned port injected 2016 Avalon. It's a little refreshing to have a car be able to go 5,000 miles and seemingly not lose a drop of oil, whereas my previous two would be burning through a couple quarts (I even installed a catch can on one). So, I'm debating on extending my oil intervals out past my usual 5,000 mile OCI's (because of me reading BlTOG experiences, and others on youtube). I might give 7,500 a try - toyota does "recommend" 10,000 mile intervals but those are under "normal" driving conditions that I don't meet. It's amazing what opinions on here can do to you...or watching people on youtube do 10,000-15,0000 mile drains without issue. I might give the longer interval a try just for fun to see how it goes with this engine.
 
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Bunch of questions. How does DI and gasoline make particles? Carbon left over from burning? DI is supposed to be more efficient, isn’t this why it’s used? Is it like the “soot” from a Diesel engine? Some cars have DI but they also run clean?
 
Bunch of questions. How does DI and gasoline make particles? Carbon left over from burning? DI is supposed to be more efficient, isn’t this why it’s used? Is it like the “soot” from a Diesel engine? Some cars have DI but they also run clean?
I believe, and could be wrong, that where DI is injecting right before ignition that the fuel has less time to evaporate. It's sprayed in under high pressure, making small droplets, so it should have lots of surface area to burn quickly and completely. As opposed to a port injected engine, where the fuel gets pulled in through the valve, then gets compressed, all the while having some level of turbulence, plus the heat of compression. This leads to extra time for that gasoline to fully evaporate during the compression stroke port injection that the direct injection lacks.

Pure speculation on my part, but perhaps DI just can't inject small enough, or consistently small enough, to prevent some droplets being a bit larger than the other droplets, and thus leading to something that lends itself to carbon buildup. Pure SWAG on my part.
 
Bunch of questions. How does DI and gasoline make particles? Carbon left over from burning? DI is supposed to be more efficient, isn’t this why it’s used? Is it like the “soot” from a Diesel engine? Some cars have DI but they also run clean?
IDK the answer to your question but I can verify that the 2.0 GDI Duratec in my Focus gets dark very fast while the 2.5 PI Duratec in my Escape isn't very dark even after 5 or 6K.

I think Supton may be right about the reason.
 
Familiar with a DI turbo Ford Escape, and the tail pipes on that thing had a thick layer of black soot built up on the inside. I saw it first hand because I spent 30 minutes cleaning it all out of the tailpipes. I've see port fuel injected N/A engines (like the Ford Coyote) that burns so clean that after 5000 miles of driving you can barely see any soot build up on the inside of the tail pipes. How can a DI be "burning cleaner" when there's a thick layer of soot inside the tail pipes.
 
For those who cut open filters,

For years now I have had no problem running a high end 20K mile rated filters for two oil changes...6000 - 7500 miles per change. And actually back in the day when I was working full time, three kids driving, and five vehicles I did the Amsoil + Amsoil filter on my wife’s car per the 20K or once per year oil/filter change guidance they gave...and believe me she drove 20K per year!

So my question,
With GDI/turbo engines has anyone noticed that the filters are loaded with more “particulates” with these sorts of engines, and maybe I should move away from the two oil changes per filter. Oh, I do 5000 mile oil changes on these engines...the vehicle maintenance minder is usually showing 50% oil life left.
Thanks,
DI soot is way smaller than even the best single stages ability to filter out they are in the nanometer range vs microns.
 
I believe, and could be wrong, that where DI is injecting right before ignition that the fuel has less time to evaporate. It's sprayed in under high pressure, making small droplets, so it should have lots of surface area to burn quickly and completely. As opposed to a port injected engine, where the fuel gets pulled in through the valve, then gets compressed, all the while having some level of turbulence, plus the heat of compression. This leads to extra time for that gasoline to fully evaporate during the compression stroke port injection that the direct injection lacks.

That's pretty much correct, it's the time span. (y)

The favourable way to solve this DI engine's disadvantage is to further increase
fuel pressure. This increase in pressure allows for injectors with even smaller bores
resulting in smaller droplets and much less soot. Early DI engines' HPFPs did like
1450 - 1750 psi (100 - 120 bar) while more recent HPFPs do 2900 - 3600 psi (200
- 250 bar). Despite my GTI not having a GPF the tail pipes remain absolutely clean
while I had visible soot on them on my previous GTIs.
However that increase in pressure comes at some price. The HPFP will require more
power to drive and of course it's also more expensive to build. Stricter emissions
requirements are forcing the manufacturers using higher pressures anyway though.
Personally I strongly prefer increasing fuel pressure over using GPFs as the first
results in cleaner combustion (and cleaner blow-by as well as exhaust recirculation)
while the latter only results in cleaner emissions, leaving blow-by > oil contamination
as well as exhaust recirculation > IVD issues unsolved.
.
 
Familiar with a DI turbo Ford Escape, and the tail pipes on that thing had a thick layer of black soot built up on the inside. I saw it first hand because I spent 30 minutes cleaning it all out of the tailpipes. I've see port fuel injected N/A engines (like the Ford Coyote) that burns so clean that after 5000 miles of driving you can barely see any soot build up on the inside of the tail pipes. How can a DI be "burning cleaner" when there's a thick layer of soot inside the tail pipes.
Attached is a picture of a 2016 GDI with 70K miles, never been cleaned…honestly, I have never cleaned a tail pipe.
 

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