2014 Chevrolet Cruze Diesel Delco Dexos 2

[jkhawaii]

About 5000 miles and 38% oil life. Been using B20 for the entire interval. AC Delco 5w30 Dexos 2 oil was used
Looks like using B20 in a engine with post injection regen does have fuel dilution issues. I'm going to reduce my Biodiesel blend to B5 for the next oil change interval to see if it helps.

 

[jkhawaii]

Heavy traffic and short distances also did not help. (Oahu Hawaii has terrible traffic!)

 

[Jetronic]

2014 makes this a Fiat engine I think. Does it have the oil plug on the passenger side facing the wheel?

I use a thicker oil in mine for that reason, and with stronger add pack. But I also run more miles on one fill, Fiat wants me to run 22k, I chicken out at about half that.

I average about 20-25 mph sadly.

 

[Boomer]

Higher biodiesel concentrations can really push that material into the crankcase and you'll see your oil level rise as a result. Also, Google the Mercedes study on biological growth problems in biodiesel in car engines. Nasty.

However, biodiesel at about a 2% concentration in diesel fuel replaces the lubricity lost when we went to ULSD. So a little is a good thing, a lot may not be so good.

 

[dlundblad]

Originally Posted By: Jetronic
2014 makes this a Fiat engine I think. Does it have the oil plug on the passenger side facing the wheel?

I use a thicker oil in mine for that reason, and with stronger add pack. But I also run more miles on one fill, Fiat wants me to run 22k, I chicken out at about half that.

I average about 20-25 mph sadly.


20-25 mpg with a diesel and highway miles?

 

[Jetronic]

no, miles per hour average, traffic limited

 

[A310]

Originally Posted By: jkhawaii
Heavy traffic and short distances also did not help. (Oahu Hawaii has terrible traffic!)


Do you monitor your regen's at all and if so how often is it regenerating? Thanks for the post

 

[UltrafanUK]

Nasty case of fuel contamination resulting in rather thin oil. I would move up to an Xw40 AND cut the OCI to 3000 miles.
I would also try using a direct feed injection cleaner fuel additive like Liqui Moly Diesel Purge every time the fuel filter is changed. All you do is fill up the housing with purge when changing the element, that way you can make sure the fuel contamination is just a DPF short tripping issue, rather than gum deposits in the injectors. They tend to form when using cheap fuel and short tripping a lot.

Also if you are stuck with a fuel contamination thin oil issue, use an oil that has both Moly and Boron additives. The alternate approach if you have a stash of cheap oil is to use a major brand additive. I use Ceratec which contains both Moly and Boron Nitride in hexagonal form, although it's not cheap.

 

[4WD]

What would be the downside of D1, TDT, or T6 ?

 

[jkhawaii]

Seems to regen every 300-500 miles.

 

[jkhawaii]

This is why most manufactures recommend up to B5 on DPF equipped engines, that do not have a separate fuel injector for regen.

 

[Jetronic]

Originally Posted By: UltrafanUK
Nasty case of fuel contamination resulting in rather thin oil. I would move up to an Xw40 AND cut the OCI to 3000 miles.
I would also try using a direct feed injection cleaner fuel additive like Liqui Moly Diesel Purge every time the fuel filter is changed. All you do is fill up the housing with purge when changing the element, that way you can make sure the fuel contamination is just a DPF short tripping issue, rather than gum deposits in the injectors. They tend to form when using cheap fuel and short tripping a lot.

Also if you are stuck with a fuel contamination thin oil issue, use an oil that has both Moly and Boron additives. The alternate approach if you have a stash of cheap oil is to use a major brand additive. I use Ceratec which contains both Moly and Boron Nitride in hexagonal form, although it's not cheap.


not so nasty... the ac delco oil is around 3.1 hths when new, and the engine only requires 2.9 as a minimum.

an A3/B4 C3 rather than C2 would be a step up, but I would (and did) go up to an A3/B4 so the fuel contamination doesn't result in a serious watering down of the additive concentrations. Don't forget that any moly or boron you add (esp hexagonal-colloidal) adds to the SAPS level in a serious manner.

 

[pb379]

Originally Posted By: jkhawaii
Heavy traffic and short distances also did not help. (Oahu Hawaii has terrible traffic!)


I think this is the biggest problem for you. I doubt the move from B20 to B5 will make much of a difference.

 

[jkhawaii]

Originally Posted By: pb379
Originally Posted By: jkhawaii
Heavy traffic and short distances also did not help. (Oahu Hawaii has terrible traffic!)


I think this is the biggest problem for you. I doubt the move from B20 to B5 will make much of a difference.



We will see. It seems to be common knowledge that higher biodiesel consentrations cause higher fuel dilution.

 

[UltrafanUK]

Originally Posted By: jkhawaii
Originally Posted By: pb379
Originally Posted By: jkhawaii
Heavy traffic and short distances also did not help. (Oahu Hawaii has terrible traffic!)


I think this is the biggest problem for you. I doubt the move from B20 to B5 will make much of a difference.



We will see. It seems to be common knowledge that higher biodiesel consentrations cause higher fuel dilution.


Yes that is true if you have an early model DPF fitted and push your luck with the OCI. If you have a 5th injector on the DPF or a seperate cleaning fluid burner, it will make no difference.
The flash point of normal diesel is about 50c which is below the normal oil temp once the engine is warmed up, so it tends to evaporate off unless you do a lot of short tripping. The flash point of Bio is around 80c, which unless you have some type of tuned up race diesel is similar to normal oil temps, so once it gets into the oil Bio diesel not much will evapourate off.

When taking an oil sample for a UOA, make sure to drive for at least 30 minutes, or you will get a slightly higher fuel contamination figure and slightly lower wear metals.