Part 3/3 2017 Ford Focus RS, 2.3 EcoBoost, ~34k mi; 5w50 Amsoil SS, 8,922 miles on oil.

[Enviro5609]

Part 3 is available here.
Part 2 is available here.

This will be the last entry. I could have gone longer, per the lab, but the fuel dilution was unacceptable for me given the application and how hard this car gets run. The real grim reaper for these cars isn’t the head gasket once that’s been fixed— it’s LSPI. Fuel dilution is not something I’m willing to play with. There’s over 3 quarters of a cup of fuel in the oil at this point.

I took an early sample because the intelligent oil life monitor went off. I was curious to see how accurate that would be.

Quick takeaways are this oil is good, the oil life monitor is surprisingly accurate, and I’ll probably just trust that going forward. That’s not the result I expected.

I’m personally impressed with ~9,000 miles/10 months. Most of the common wisdom from enthusiasts was 3-5k miles for a change interval.

This is a 2.3 EcoBoost DI engine, on a platform already pushing the stock parts to its limit, that’s also tuned, taken to 10 autocross events, and daily driven.

The wear numbers and viscosity/base number remaining are compare favorably to other engines I’ve seen with less miles and much lower oil change intervals. (See here) While my iron numbers are higher, other wear metals are much lower, and titanium is entirely absent. I think the bearings and rings are happy.

Overall, I think Amsoil SS 5w50 holds up very well in this application. Yes it sheared down pretty quickly to 40 weight, but it held there. Motorcraft in other analysis in this engine sheared down to 30 weight within a couple thousand miles. Additive package held up till the end. Boron did deplete faster than the rest. That being said, I would not trust this oil in this platform to make the 15k within a year advertised by Amsoil with this filter/oil combo. Maybe it could have made it. The fuel dilution is out of Amsoil’s control, in fairness.

I’m particularly surprised by the accuracy of the oil life monitor. Many swore this platform had a dummy monitor that just tracks miles. The OEM interval is 1 year / 10k miles. Clearly the monitor saw something in temperatures and service time to call it early. I checked with ForScan and the oil life remaining was actually at 0%. Not an early warning at 10% that would have tracked with it just being a mileage timer.

I’m also happy with the performance of the KN air filter in terms of silicon and dirt.

I am not happy with how much manganese got in the oil from just 3 tanks of race gas/Boostane during autocross events. If I had used it at all 10 events, the numbers would be much higher. I may need to reevaluate the cost/benefit of extra knock protection during hard use versus thoroughly contaminating the oil.

I’ll post further long term updates going forward on the new oil, but it won’t be the same kind of testing frequency. I think I’ll back off to when the monitor shows 50% and 0%.

 

[TiGeo]

Part 3 is available here.
Part 2 is available here.

View attachment 255001

This will be the last entry. I could have gone longer, per the lab, but the fuel dilution was unacceptable for me given the application and how hard this car gets run. The real grim reaper for these cars isn’t the head gasket once that’s been fixed— it’s LSPI. Fuel dilution is not something I’m willing to play with. There’s over 3 quarters of a cup of fuel in the oil at this point.

I took an early sample because the intelligent oil life monitor went off. I was curious to see how accurate that would be.

Quick takeaways are this oil is good, the oil life monitor is surprisingly accurate, and I’ll probably just trust that going forward. That’s not the result I expected.

I’m personally impressed with ~9,000 miles/10 months. Most of the common wisdom from enthusiasts was 3-5k miles for a change interval.

This is a 2.3 EcoBoost DI engine, on a platform already pushing the stock parts to its limit, that’s also tuned, taken to 10 autocross events, and daily driven.

The wear numbers and viscosity/base number remaining are compare favorably to other engines I’ve seen with less miles and much lower oil change intervals. (See here) While my iron numbers are higher, other wear metals are much lower, and titanium is entirely absent. I think the bearings and rings are happy.

Overall, I think Amsoil SS 5w50 holds up very well in this application. Yes it sheared down pretty quickly to 40 weight, but it held there. Motorcraft in other analysis in this engine sheared down to 30 weight within a couple thousand miles. Additive package held up till the end. Boron did deplete faster than the rest. That being said, I would not trust this oil in this platform to make the 15k within a year advertised by Amsoil with this filter/oil combo. Maybe it could have made it. The fuel dilution is out of Amsoil’s control, in fairness.

I’m particularly surprised by the accuracy of the oil life monitor. Many swore this platform had a dummy monitor that just tracks miles. The OEM interval is 1 year / 10k miles. Clearly the monitor saw something in temperatures and service time to call it early. I checked with ForScan and the oil life remaining was actually at 0%. Not an early warning at 10% that would have tracked with it just being a mileage timer.

I’m also happy with the performance of the KN air filter in terms of silicon and dirt.

I am not happy with how much manganese got in the oil from just 3 tanks of race gas/Boostane during autocross events. If I had used it at all 10 events, the numbers would be much higher. I may need to reevaluate the cost/benefit of extra knock protection during hard use versus thoroughly contaminating the oil.

I’ll post further long term updates going forward on the new oil, but it won’t be the same kind of testing frequency. I think I’ll back off to when the monitor shows 50% and 0%.

Why are you using Boostane for autocross? AutoX is hardly hard enough to push the car to the limit in a 40 sec run vs. say 25 min on a track. I assume tune is for 93? Have you logged it to see if you are getting enough knock to warrant running the octane booster? If so, is this just an issue with the tune?

 

[fantastic]

My rough math has the GC fuel dilution at 3% when your ODI reaches 8,325 miles. I'd say an 8k run would still work out well as a general guide for that viscosity. Good notes you presented. Thanks for sharing your experience w/this oil in your Focus.

 

[thastinger]

No shortcuts available, all of the octane boosters that actually boost octane...contain MMT.

 

[thastinger]

Have you logged it to see if you are getting enough knock to warrant running the octane booster?

Any is enough but I'm assuming his ECU will add timing until detonation is detected or it reaches the max timing allowed based on the load table.

 

[TiGeo]

Any is enough but I'm assuming his ECU will add timing until detonation is detected or it reaches the max timing allowed based on the load table.

Some level of feedback on the sensors can be quite normal on tuned cars and stock ones. On the tuned VWs like mine, typically over 3 degrees of correction is enough to think about fuel quality issues but not small background levels when using it hard like on track. I have lots of logs of me beating on mine and you will always seem some low levels. Tunes that show zero knock typically either 1) are weak/not pushing it hard or 2) the tuner has "numbed" the knock sensors to not pick up the lower level stuff.

 

[Enviro5609]

Why are you using Boostane for autocross? AutoX is hardly hard enough to push the car to the limit in a 40 sec run vs. say 25 min on a track. I assume tune is for 93? Have you logged it to see if you are getting enough knock to warrant running the octane booster? If so, is this just an issue with the tune?

Some level of feedback on the sensors can be quite normal on tuned cars and stock ones. On the tuned VWs like mine, typically over 3 degrees of correction is enough to think about fuel quality issues but not small background levels when using it hard like on track. I have lots of logs of me beating on mine and you will always seem some low levels. Tunes that show zero knock typically either 1) are weak/not pushing it hard or 2) the tuner has "numbed" the knock sensors to not pick up the lower level stuff.

Pretty much this. It’s tuned for 93, and there are no issues with it at this point. It holds at -1.00 OAR without issue and there are no serious negative corrections under WOT through an 3rd gear pull.

That being said, it’s always going to find knock. Even on the stock tune it knocks a bit now and then. It’s a noisy engine, and it’s always pushing timing until it detects knock, then pulls it back. The purpose of the Boostane was just to work out if I was getting any false corrections from my exhaust/skid plate during some tune revisions, and then after that just for a margin of safety while under heavy load.

LSPI is the real killer on these engines, and in autocross you are wailing it WOT at low RPM repeatedly.

I don’t think it’s really worth the trade off at this point. The tune is dialed in, so I’ll either go with race gas or pump, no MMT heavy boosters.

 

[fusseli]

Nice report! Do you have a catch can? I put one on my 2.3 as soon as FP put one out for my 2.3eb application. In the winter months it always fills up with watery gas and surely helps lower the fuel dilution.

 

[kschachn]

LSPI is the real killer on these engines, and in autocross you are wailing it WOT at low RPM repeatedly.

I don’t think it’s really worth the trade off at this point. The tune is dialed in, so I’ll either go with race gas or pump, no MMT heavy boosters.

What are you doing to try and mitigate the possibility of LSPI?

 

[TiGeo]

Pretty much this. It’s tuned for 93, and there are no issues with it at this point. It holds at -1.00 OAR without issue and there are no serious negative corrections under WOT through an 3rd gear pull.

That being said, it’s always going to find knock. Even on the stock tune it knocks a bit now and then. It’s a noisy engine, and it’s always pushing timing until it detects knock, then pulls it back. The purpose of the Boostane was just to work out if I was getting any false corrections from my exhaust/skid plate during some tune revisions, and then after that just for a margin of safety while under heavy load.

LSPI is the real killer on these engines, and in autocross you are wailing it WOT at low RPM repeatedly.

I don’t think it’s really worth the trade off at this point. The tune is dialed in, so I’ll either go with race gas or pump, no MMT heavy boosters.

Really? Never heard of that on these...it's typically v. small displacement turbo 4s which this is not.

 

[kschachn]

Really? Never heard of that on these...it's typically v. small displacement turbo 4s which this is not.

I was wondering that myself.