M&H makes a huge volume of filters in Poland. Similar to how many they make in Germany.
Used premium guard PG5250, 10,500 miles
- Thread starter qvalff8
- Start date
M&H makes a huge volume of filters in Poland. Similar to how many they make in Germany.
The Mann and auto xtra do look the kind of similar, using a rubber seal up top and bottom. They don't look like they came from the same CAD file though; different shapes up top.
The other two use felt seals top and bottom. I recall this being the OEM design in the past but I'm not certain. Maybe felt bottom and rubber top?
If you google the VW part number, it seems the VW part is made by Hengst in Germany which has a reasonable price on rockauto.
As to what the design is on the top or bottom, it can change over time. I saw a bulletin from Mahle on a different filter where they said they added a micro fiber / felt seal to better separate clean and dirty oil.
All the ones in your picture look good. I would think the highest quality will be the German made ones, but all of those look significantly better made than most US made spin on filter elements.
Yeah I rank them Germany, Korea, Poland, China ( Mann, k&n, auto xtra, champion), but the first three and are all very good, and China is more than acceptable. I also feel like the size is very good. I'm saving the used premium guard to measure media area, so I can compare to the Auto Xtra when the time comes. Just gotta make time to deal with that mess
I've cut up the premium guard filter with a hacksaw. 10 pleats has a length of 36cm (14 inches). There are 74 pleats in total (not counting the seam please which is glued and therefore not open to flow). 7.4*36cm is 266cm. The height is 10cm( 4 inch). Total area is 2660cm^2 or 14*7.4*4=410in^2
I feel like that's pretty decent holding capacity for a cellulose filter.
I didn't see anything silver in the bottom of the pleats but there are a few small black flakes that give me pause (see penultimate photo). I picked one up (well below 1mm by 1mm and much thinner, maybe 0.05mm or less) and it dissolved into much finer gritty stuff, not hard like sand but very solid. Is this soot that the oil agglomerated? I estimate there are 25-100 of these particles in the filter, but they're definitely not going through the media.
I've done 2 more cold starts without startup clatter. So maybe this filter was the cause. What does that mean? Either the 0.5qts of fresh oil rejuvenated the otherwise spent oil and that mixture cleaned up the physical check ball that acts as a bypass/adbv. Or the filter was somehow compromised and allowed oil to drain down through itself. I held the cut up media to the sun and didn't see anything amiss. Or something else. It hasn't been really cold yet (all startups the last months have been between 50 and 90F), but I'll keep an ear on it.
The last photo is my business card test. The middle dot is from a long time ago, but the big one that's overflowing into that one is from the filter drain plug. On the far left is a tiny drop from the dip stick after adding the makeup oil and driving 40 miles, and the strip between the center dot and the far left is where, a month ago, I tried to get the dip stick to leave a drop before getting frustrated and just mashing it into the card.
I'd say all of the dots look mostly fine, especially for oil with 10k mi on it.
I just checked both. ProSelect uses cellulose, while the Gold uses enhanced cellulose whatever that means for other applications, but not the OP's VW.
Last edited:
I was basing it off looking at WCW's spin on teardowns and 100x magnification. The Napa ProSelect media matched the PG Premium variants including Napa Gold rather than the PG Standard variants.
Last edited:
My opinion on PG filters is that the foremost design criteria is stoutness. That has implications for the media they use. For the US market, they are additionally supposed to have higher efficiency than typical European and Asian filters.
To keep cost low, they won't be using the latest and greatest media. It will be of high quality but it won't be a media that manages to be class leading in terms of flow as well as efficiency and durability.
Take that all together and I believe you have media on the more restrictive end of the spectrum. Also, basic cellulose does not have high dirt holding capacity. As cars get older, they may have more junk that gets caught in the filter.
In fact, if you look at the Brand Ranks test of the STP XL, it had worse flow than Wix & Napa Gold as well as the joint lowest holding capacity of any filter they tested.
So a European filter will have less efficiency for more flow may also be a better enhanced cellulose to hold more contaminants. It will last 10,000 miles with headroom.
The PG filter, and bear in mind they superseded the one you used with an Extended Life version, may have higher efficiency to match US requirements and a stout media to avoid tearing while having less enhancement to the cellulose to capture in depth.
So I would say it did well considering it may very well be more like a 5000 mile filter than a 10000 mile filter or even if it were a 10000 mile filter, it doesn't have the same media characteristics as a European brand filter and there is potentially less headroom in an older engine.
PG seem to be quite adamant that their filters should only be used for 5000 or 10000 miles / 12 months. And I think that Napa specified the media that is in the PG extended life filters for their ProSelect for a reason.
Last edited:
The NAPA ProSelect or the NAPA Gold? Isn't the ProSelect a bottom tier NAPA filter compared to the Gold?
ProSelect I believe has the same media as the Gold. I am basing that from a WCW side by side teardown.
NAPA advertise any efficiency info on both?
99% at 30 microns on the Gold.
Just realized that the correct name for the basic filter is ProFormer and they are saying 96% but using "as small as 20 microns" and no mention of which filter.
I suspect it is because they want you to upgrade to the Gold. On the Proformer they say "NAPA ProFormer oil filters are designed and engineered to meet OEM requirements".
Also, they seem to have updated the website:
Napa Gold: Laboratory Test Performance per ISO 454812: 18 Grams Dirt (NAPA Gold # 1515), 99% Efficient At 30 Microns (Based On NAPA Gold # 1515, 1356, 7060)
Napa Proformer: 96% Multi-Pass efficiency and removal of particles as small as 20 microns
Probably final update on this filter change: No more cold start rattle. It's been weeks, and it's been started below 40F a few times, even with days of no use. No more 1-2 second startup rattle. Maybe I ran the old filter too long, and I'll change it again when it rattles again.
