Oil Filter Value Analysis

Just looked at the STP website. Interested to see what the filter options are for my vehicles. Surprised to find they don't even reference/acknowledge oil filters among their products. A bit ominous?
I found it pretty difficult to get specs from STP. STP would say contact Autozone & then Autozone would say contact STP. It was a runaround!
 
The filters chosen are the brand of the manufacturer that have a website with product specifications and information on construction. Others can be added if the specs are available. If you have a filter you'd like added please share a link to a site and I'll add it.
Premium Guard has thorough specs on their site.
 
Hi Mphilleo,

Premium Guard had a good website. I added the Premium Guard Standard Life filter. They also have an extended life filter but I could not list it because it was not specified for the 2021 Subaru Forester. The data is sorted by the OEM OCI rank column.



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You do realize the Purolator Boss is greater than 99% at TWENTY-FIVE microns, not 20 microns, right? The Champ Ecore filters fron RA and Walmart that are around $2 and good for ~5000 miles should be on the list too, they’re a really good underrated deal.
 
Thank you for the correction on the Boss! I've entered it and updated the table.

I went to the CHAMP filter website and could not find a statement of their filters efficiency, micron level and mileage life. These are required for the table to work. The site did a good job on their products construction and they offer both a Regular and an 'XL" choice for my Subaru. Please share if I need to look somewhere else on their site to get the data.

Below is the updated table reflecting the correction. I made some format changes to make it easier to update. I also moved the warranty info in with the construction information to make it easier to read across a row of information.

Thank you.

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I went to the CHAMP filter website and could not find a statement of their filters efficiency, micron level and mileage life. These are required for the table to work. The site did a good job on their products construction and they offer both a Regular and an 'XL" choice for my Subaru. Please share if I need to look somewhere else on their site to get the data.
All I can add, and it's just theory that maybe you can verify through Champion Labs, but the "STP XL Extended Life" and the "CampXL" filters seem to be the same filter in a different can. The STP XL is rated at 99% >20u per Autozone's website.
 
Glad to check it out, I'll do the research.

I have a question I need help understanding. I just added two Ecoguard brand filters to the list; their Standard and Synthetic that is Item 10 on the table. Their website claims 99.9% efficiency @ 25 microns. How are they achieving this very high efficiency?

Thank you!


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I have a question I need help understanding. I just added two Ecoguard brand filters to the list; their Standard and Synthetic that is Item 10 on the table. Their website claims 99.9% efficiency @ 25 microns. How are they achieving this very high efficiency?
By not saying it's 98% at 20 microns. It's probably 100% @ 28 microns and above. Every oil filter has an efficiency vs particle size performance curve, like shown here.

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Not sure if it's too subjective but if you really want to be thorough, you can include some weighing criteria or intangible for build quality. Because I have to say, those Premium Guard Extended Life (Microgard Select, Parts Plus EX, etc) filters are works of art. I don't even blink that they're out of Vietnam when the build quality is just that good.
 
I've also emailed Champ Filters via their website for the information.
A BITOGer asked Champ Labs back in '21, Champ stated they were 90% at 20 microns, for an ST3614 Super Tech filter (they also stated the low end Champ, Luberfiner, and base white ST Ecore filters all had the same efficiency). Not the greatest, but for sub-$2 at Rock Auto), pretty good-
 
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A BITOGer asked Champ Labs back in '21, Champ stated they were 90% at 20 microns, for an ST3614 Super Tech filter (they also stated the low end Champ, Luberfiner, and base white ST Ecore filters all had the same efficiency). Not the greatest, but for sub-$2 at Rock Auto), pretty good-
Great timing. I just finished adding the Supertech filter to the table. They are rated at 99% efficiency at 30 microns and 10,000 mile life. I found this data is on the box the filter comes in. The picture of the box is on the Walmart website. Here's the latest table. The filters represent those for a 2021 Subaru Forester with 2.5L Engine. I couldn't include the heading because the table is getting long!


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OP, thanks for this work but I have one suggestion that is important for accuracy here.

It is important to understand that filter manufacturer's only claim that their filter is xx% efficient at yy microns for certain filters in that family, not all filters in that family.

As you've seen with Purolator Boss, this is a misleading indication of overall performance and is often done for it's marketing advantages.

The Wix 99% efficient at 23 microns claim is a generic marketing statement that can be found in many places, but the 57055 that you have put against that specification does not list a specific efficiency (whereas Wix often does divulge it's beta ratios for individual filters).

Here is Wix's page for 57055: https://wixfilters.com/Lookup/PartDetails.aspx?Part=1870865

They only say that the nominal filtration is at 15 microns with no mention of efficiency and in any case this is not a measurement that is comparable to the result format that comes out of ISO-4548 testing.

My suggestion is as follows:

1) You should put in the filter model column the actual filter model number(s) that the manufacturer states were tested to arrive at the claimed filter efficiency numbers.

2) In the case of Wix (and maybe others), you can actually get hold of the filter efficiency for their versions of the filters that the competitors are basing their marketing claims of efficiency at yy microns.

3) So for Wix, I would suggest you do a cross reference to these competitor filters and put those numbers in as well. For the Fram comparison, you can take the average just as Fram do.

Example: Wix equivalent of Purolator Boss marketing claim

1) Purolator say the Boss is 99% efficient at 25 microns. This is based on PBL30001:

https://www.purolatornow.com/en/products/oil-filters/purolator-boss.html

2) Wix lookup does not have a cross to PBL30001, but Fram do! It is TG8A:

https://www.fram.com/en/elasticsearch/index/display?typeofsearch=1&search_query_adv=PBL30001

3) Wix cross of TG8A is 51515:

https://wixfilters.com/Lookup/InterchangeMultiSearch.aspx?q=TG8A&o=me

4) And 51515 has a beta ratio 2/20=6/20. This is 50% at 6 microns and 95% at 20 microns.

https://wixfilters.com/Lookup/PartDetails.aspx?Part=193964


The more like for like you can make your comparison, the more accurate it would be.

If you did this same exercise against Fram's designated filters, it would be very interesting to see the results.



nb: somewhat interestingly, Wix 51515 has nominal micron rating of 21, so the micron rating of 15 for the Wix 57055 for Subaru might make it a very efficient filter
 
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Here's a better example of where the marketing claim becomes very misleading:


They include Wix's generic marketing statement: "Laboratory Test Performance per ISO 454812: dirt-holding capacity of 18 grams and 99% efficient at 23 microns" without stating which filter it is based on.

But the beta ratio on the same page is listed as: 2/20/75=21/30/35

This is 50% at 20 microns, 95% at 30 microns, 98.7% at 35 microns

Wix at least share the actual efficiency per filter (except for the XP), and in this case it matches the requirement of the German vehicle manufacturer / the OE product made by Mann.

As you can see, if we don't do a like for like comparison, your table somewhat becomes a ranking of marketing claims.
 
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To make the comparisons consistent could you share a site that has the SuperTech filter specifications and construction and I'll add it. Thank you!
Both the ST and MP supertechs are 99% @30um and, at least for the 4967 size (shown below, ST on left), both are ecore. The only advantage of MP line is the silicone valve.
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Also, it would be helpful if this table were a Google doc. This way you could just share the link and others could see the most up-to-date info.
 
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Thank you for all of your insights and ideas for the table. The following are my thoughts and updates that have been made.

1. There was an idea to try to apply a weighting method to the construction features in the Remarks. I decided against this because it would be me injecting my opinion of what one construction feature is better than another and we want to avoid that. Having the features available does allow a person that has a requirement, for example a silicone anti drain back valve, to help choose between multiple filter choices.

2. I was asked to try and find an equivalent filter to the STP brand filter to find performance specs and I could not find one.

3. It was suggested to put in the filter model column the actual filter model number(s) that the manufacturer states were tested to arrive at the claimed filter efficiency numbers. I have added the information in the SKU number column.

4. Table Updates
  1. A column titled "Sources" that documents where the product, performance and construction data is came from.
  2. Added - Mobil 1 oil filter.
  3. Replaced - Wix 57055 with the NAPA Gold Fil-57055. I was using the NAPA filter performance data for the Wix sku. It needs to be stated for the NAPA sku.
  4. Removed - Wix 57055XP. O’Reilly has removed the performance data for this SKU from their website.

Thank you again for sharing your feedback and ideas!

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Table not showing up well ... blacked out, at least for the guys using the dark color mode. Shows up OK in dark mode in post #52 but not in post #56. 🤷‍♂️

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