Some Filtration Comparisons from the Bench

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Originally Posted By: SuperBusa
Rob is now a certified "oil filter testing mad scientist".
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...and just in time for Halloween. Think I'll dress like a big, scary Fram!
Originally Posted By: qship1996
Sure makes me glad I installed a Pure One filter along with 6 qts of Redline 0w-30 last Thursday!
You can feel good about that!
 
Wow, fantastic thread! I'd like to add some comments, if I may.

I don't think this test is valid in testing flow rates. I think the rate in which oil flows from outside to inside of the element has just as much to do with media porosity and osmosis, rather than flow created from a pressure differential between the outside and inside of the filter. At 6" of head, pressure at the bottom of the pan would only be 0.2 PSI.

I'd also like to say some things about efficiencies and beta ratios. As most of you have already commented, you have to take efficiency ratings with a grain of salt. Not only is it absolutely mandatory to communicate what particle size is being measured, beta ratio is a more important number than efficiency.
Any beta ratio over 10 looks like a fantastic number, because it would be 90% efficient (Eff=[beta-1]/beta). Even 97% or 99% looks like a great number. Still, a beta ratio of 100 (which is good in the automotive world) is [censored] in the fluid power industry.

A beta ratio is derived from counting the particles upstream of the filter, and dividing it by the particles counted downstream of the filter, normally in a multi-pass test. So if you had 10,000 particles upstream, and 1000 particles downstream, your beta ratio would be 10 (which is [censored]). If you had 10,000 particles upstream, and 10 particles downstream, your beta ratio is 1000, which is the common standard for high quality hydraulic filters (beta ratio 99.9%).

So big deal, 99.9% isn't that much better than 98%, right? Well 99.9% is a beta ratio of 1000, and 98% is a beta ratio of 50. That means that if you have 10,000 particles upstream, only 10 particles got through the beta 1000 filter. And if you have 10,000 particles upstream of the beta 50 filter, you have 200 particles downstream.

So that's 10 particles downstream compared to 200 particles downstream. The beta 1000 element is 20 times better at removing dirt than the beta 50 element.

Also important is the particle size that's listed with the beta ratio (a particle size must be listed, or it's a useless number). Any old filter can get 99% efficiency at 20 micron. Show me a automotive filter than can do 99% at 3 microns.

Hydac makes hydraulic filter elements that have a beta ratio of 1000 at 3 microns (99.9%), and you could even use them in your car.

river rat, I might be able to send you one of those elements for testing...

edit: wow, I can't believe c r a p gets censored!
 
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Most of us here are versed on the Beta ratio deciphering Gen1 ..what we don't have access to is the ISO protocols that are used in the determination. Former insiders to the industry have implied that anyone can manipulate their numbers due to loopholes in the protocol.

Sure, you can use hydraulic filters in a filthy automotive environment ..but probably at 1/3-1/2 the service life. It's very hard to trump the filtration triangle of size/efficiency/lifespan. Under no circumstances that I can figure, even with fancier depth medias, can you do so under the restraints of $$$/mile using industrial filtration of inordinately high efficiency.
 
Signed up just to comment...Great thread! A lot of work too! Picked up a free K&N HP-1004 filter with 5 qts of GC from Vatozone for $28 and didn't know anything about the quality of the KN...thank you. :)
 
Originally Posted By: Gary Allan
Most of us here are versed on the Beta ratio deciphering Gen1 ..what we don't have access to is the ISO protocols that are used in the determination. Former insiders to the industry have implied that anyone can manipulate their numbers due to loopholes in the protocol.

Sure, you can use hydraulic filters in a filthy automotive environment ..but probably at 1/3-1/2 the service life. It's very hard to trump the filtration triangle of size/efficiency/lifespan. Under no circumstances that I can figure, even with fancier depth medias, can you do so under the restraints of $$$/mile using industrial filtration of inordinately high efficiency.


Well, if most of you are versed in beta ratios, then I hope my post was new information to the few whom didn't. The thing about the higher-end hydraulic filter manufacturers, is that they publish a lot of engineering data that allows you to make competent choices, regardless of your knowledge of ISO protocol. Those high-end manufacturers publish the exact conditions in which they do their testing. Hydac for instance, even with their extremely high filter quality, stops the multi-pass test at 33% before bypass pressure. They also publish their flow charts, pressure drops of both elements and housings, dirt holding capacity, collapse pressure etc.

I know an engine is a very dirty place compared to hydraulics, and the extremely low oil pressure means particles do less damage (which is why engines last a ridiculously long time for a piece of machinery). But the example I use with hydraulic oil, is that the dirtier your oil is, the more it's like a lapping compound. Dirty oil causes and exponentially high rate of wear, and consequently, that wear causes the oil to be dirtier. If a 3 micron filter with a beta ratio of 1000 was used in either a hydraulic or automotive situation, the initial rate of clogging would be high. As the oil got cleaner from multiple passes through the filter, the rate of wear also goes down, and then the number of particles that are causing wear goes down too.

Running a remote oil filter may allow you to use a way larger filter element, with much higher dirt holding capacity over an automotive style spin-on element. Equipped with a clogging indicator or differential pressure gauge (not that expensive when the filter head is equipped for it. Princess Auto sells them for like $8), you'd never have to guess at how clogged your filter is, and it may even say you money over time by not replacing filters at regular intervals.
 
Well, I don't think I can agree with all that. There are surely studies that conclude that getting below the 10um level indeed reduces wear, the study was in a diesel where soot production and control is serious business. Oils have managed to keep the stuff from forming up into larger abrasive particles and bypass filtration filters out the rest.

It still, more or less, works out to how long you can keep the sump in place.


I'm not saying this well here. Yes, you can do as you prescribe. You won't typically get the sump to last long enough (for other reasons) to make it work in a gas engine. You'll be ditching the sump and resetting the particle counter, so to speak.

So, to make it work you would need someone like Bill in Utah ..that's done 60k/year from the day he got his license ..and have him manage one OCI/year to warrant the cost difference over cheap oil and filters.

..but that $8 filter minder isn't going to work on a full flow filter. It will probably work on a zero pressure return bypass filter if you have an intermediate orifice/restictor.
 
Originally Posted By: Gen1GT
... beta ratio is a more important number than efficiency.


Beta Ratio IS the way the filter efficiency is expressed. They are tied at the hip.

Originally Posted By: Gen1GT
Gen1GT said:
edit: wow, I can't believe c r a p gets censored!


Guess you better go to the forum (can't remember which one) where the board owner has posed a thread about profanity use on this board.
 
Originally Posted By: Gen1GT
Any old filter can get 99% efficiency at 20 micron.


There are TONS of "any old filters" on the market that don't come close to 99% efficient at 20 microns. Your statement might be more true if it was more like "any old filter" can get 90~95% at 20 microns.
 
Originally Posted By: Gen1GT
Wow, fantastic thread! I'd like to add some comments, if I may.

I don't think this test is valid in testing flow rates. I think the rate in which oil flows from outside to inside of the element has just as much to do with media porosity and osmosis,

Thank you.

Please let me clarify a couple things:

1. No, It's not intended to be a test of flow rates. Too any variables.
At no point will I state that if filter A fills 3 x faster than filter B, then your engine will see 3 x more oil flow.
What I am trying to show here, for example, is that filter A's media will create a bigger pressure drop than B's, at the same flow rate and viscosity--which in turn is more than filter C's pressure drop (resistance).
It would be silly to not include this information, IMO.

2. Osmosis doesn't enter into the physics here. Osmosis is based on diffusion of solutes from high to low concentration through a membrane on which both sides are covered with solution.

Thanks for reading and for your input though.
thumbsup2.gif
 
Originally Posted By: SuperBusa
Originally Posted By: Gen1GT
... beta ratio is a more important number than efficiency.


Beta Ratio IS the way the filter efficiency is expressed. They are tied at the hip.

Originally Posted By: Gen1GT
Gen1GT said:
edit: wow, I can't believe c r a p gets censored!


Guess you better go to the forum (can't remember which one) where the board owner has posed a thread about profanity use on this board.


What I'm saying, is that efficiency ratings are way too misleading, because all the numbers look high. 90% sounds like a high efficiency, but it's very poor. And there's a big difference between 99% and 99.9%.

And if automotive filters can't do Beta20 > 100, then that's pretty sad. I didn't realize how poor automotive filtration was.

With language: I understand it's sometime neccessary to censor, but odd that that word is considered foul.
 
Originally Posted By: Gary Allan
Well, I don't think I can agree with all that. There are surely studies that conclude that getting below the 10um level indeed reduces wear, the study was in a diesel where soot production and control is serious business. Oils have managed to keep the stuff from forming up into larger abrasive particles and bypass filtration filters out the rest.

It still, more or less, works out to how long you can keep the sump in place.


I'm not saying this well here. Yes, you can do as you prescribe. You won't typically get the sump to last long enough (for other reasons) to make it work in a gas engine. You'll be ditching the sump and resetting the particle counter, so to speak.

So, to make it work you would need someone like Bill in Utah ..that's done 60k/year from the day he got his license ..and have him manage one OCI/year to warrant the cost difference over cheap oil and filters.

..but that $8 filter minder isn't going to work on a full flow filter. It will probably work on a zero pressure return bypass filter if you have an intermediate orifice/restictor.


Perhaps I will install an oversized Hydac filter on my work vehicle, and monitor differential pressure to see how long my chosen filter becomes clogged. It's definitely not a cost senstative application, but it could be a worthwhile experiment.
 
Don't get me wrong, Gen1. I'm all about fine filtration. I've just sliced and diced it from every angle I can think of. I've always slammed up against one of the many "triangles" that tend to form in many (for lack of an all encompassing term) "processes". These triangles tend to be immutable.

You can reduce wear with finer filtration. That's easily reasoned by just inverting the simple concept that no filtration will result in higher wear. But it's something like the Laughing Curve (Laffer Curve) in that if lower taxes yield higher revenue, then zero taxes should yield infinite revenue. Bringing that back into a plausible scenario, one would have to say that next to no tax should yield tremendous revenue, but the size of the tax base has to be nearly infinite ..which it isn't.

That is, in our scenario, while fine filtration will indeed reduce wear, the scope of how wear effects longevity would have to be measured beyond our (even exceptional) span of ownership. To see the benefit, one would have to own the thing over a couple of generations. Taxis can already get 400k with standard filtration. That's simply a product of the elimination of most of the unavoidable wear. That wear is Castrol's "90% of all wear occurs at startup", which is the first 20 minutes of operation. A pan warmer and block heater would eliminate most of that and would prove beneficial even for someone in Texas ..but that benefit would be hard to extract in added or prolonged utility.

We'll retire even cleaner and more OEM spec engines to the junkyard.
 
Excellent points, but those taxis probably run regular dino oil too. One could argue the requirement for synthetic fluids to be nearly as useless as ultra-fine filtration.

But just like synthetic oil which has higher performance in addition to better longevity, I'm prone to believe that using a large aftermarket filter will reduce filter change-out frequency.

On topic...how much dirt holding capacity does the average automotive filter have? Also, has anyone seen or heard of a remote filter location kit for a Mazda3? They have drop in elements, which makes it difficult to modify.
 
what rob is doing is obviously not top of the line testing with state of the art equipment but it gives some sort of insight on how these filters perform,and until someone steps up to the plate and can do better this works for me...

go rob!!!!!
 
Originally Posted By: Gen1GT

I'm prone to believe that using a large aftermarket filter will reduce filter change-out frequency.

On topic...how much dirt holding capacity does the average automotive filter have? Also, has anyone seen or heard of a remote filter location kit for a Mazda3? They have drop in elements, which makes it difficult to modify.


My hydraulic filter sitting here alleges 8gms holding capacity. It's a Beta10=2/20=20/22=75 filter. Purolator allegedly has a 12gm holding capacity ..at least one number.

Yes, bigger filters of like efficiency would tend to reduce change out frequency if one is exhausting your filtration before your oil fatigues ..or you're willing to swap out the sump without changing the filter. Cost is the ultimate governor there.

I think there's a spin-on conversion for your Mazda if it has a Ford counterpart.
 
Thank Dan. Well you know it's a comparison.
Some filters elements stop more dirt than others and its not hard to prove that in a basement. Buy the one that keeps stopping more dirt, even after it's been dunked many times and plenty loaded up with heavily fine particle contaminated oil.

Its pretty simple: What is on the market is what we can choose from it wouldn't matter how the factories rated them--A, B, C, or whatever.
Buy the one that keeps performing well in actual filtering and is solidly built. This is the missing element in those filter tests/examinations out there in internet land. None of these I've seen ever actually filtered anything with the filters.

Here is an interesting experiment I did today. There is a test for mean pore size called a bubble point test. The test, when accurately done with fluids of known characteristics, actually allows the tester to calculate average pore size in microns. This test is used bothe with membrane filter in biotech, and depth media for mechanical applications such as ours.
The theory is that when a filter media is thoroughly wetted with a fluid (usually alchohol or pure water) the air pressure it takes to break the surface tension of the fluid is proportional to the pore size.
In practice, a soaked filter element is submerged in the fluid with air pressure on one side. The air pressure is increased gradually until, at a fairly sudden point, a steady stream of bubbles is produced.
Interestingly, the pressure needed to reach this bubble point is relatively independent of the amount (square inches) of filter media used. This is completely different than measuring pressure drop when fluid is flowing--which does depend on amount of media surface area.

Well, I'm not setting up a laboratory at home when a comparison will do.
Submerged in a pan of WD40 (yes I buy it by the gallon) air pressure needed to burst into the bubble (more of a fizz) point was approximately:

PureOne = 5.5 to 6 inches water column

Mobil 1 = 4.5 " "

Denso = 2.5-3.0 " "

Wix = Disqualified because two in a row leaked air badly at the top junction of the end cap and media. Disturbing.

This surely seems to correlate with relative the filtration of these three.

These tests were as accurate as I could do with my Dryer manometer and pressure regulator. Not perfect but ballpark accurate. A little trick because I have to apply a bit of air pressure to the core of the filter to keep the inside empty of fluid for a valid test.
Slighty pressurized, I lower it into the pan and start running up the air pressure.
 
Great testing. Grease's filter study used a real bubble test machine at PALL Filtration. A fellow member, Schultz, is an engineer there. The data is long lost. It was parked on a site for a while, but then went away. They even did flow rates at 10psi with swatches of the media.
 
Originally Posted By: Gary Allan
Great testing. Grease's filter study used a real bubble test machine at PALL Filtration. A fellow member, Schultz, is an engineer there. The data is long lost. It was parked on a site for a while, but then went away. They even did flow rates at 10psi with swatches of the media.

That would be sweet.
We had a Pall filter validator when I worked in the biotech field, but they'd-a killed me if I used it.
 
Hello river_rat,

Unless you have more test results coming up shortly, would you mind summimg up again for how you would rank the filters based on your tests and observations?

Thank you.
 
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