Bypass Filter

[James614]

They say "heat is controlled by your cooling system". Believe it or not, most cars don't have anywhere close to enough oil cooling to avoid thermal breakdown of the oil when they're driven hard. And turbocharged vehicles during normal driving probably generate more heat than an N/A car being run to the ground. For them to just completely brush it off and pretend like filter-able dirt is the ONLY thing that breaks down your oil nowadays is pretty silly.

I'll bet that's the reason why even though they claim you can run a year plus on the same oil, they strongly recommend getting an oil analysis done after your initial filter change. That way you can't come back and sue them after you ruin your motor trying to go 40,000 miles on the same oil if the oil analysis suggested 15,000 change intervals.

[SubyFusion]

15,000 is still better then 3,000

[Legacy777]

As it's been stated.....it is the additives that break down over time, not the oil. Depending on the engine, driving conditions, engine application, oil type, viscosity, etc will determine when those additives wear out or break down. Turbo charged engines will definitely see a quicker break down of the additive package than normally aspirated engines.

The way oils are designed today, the additive packages are a very critical and important part of the oil and help provide its ability to protect the engine in very wide operating conditions. Not saying that this bypass filter wouldn't be a good idea, but it's not going to keep me from changing my oil around the same oil change interval I'm performing now. I could push the interval a little if I performed a couple oil analysis to determine when the additive package starts to break down. But honestly....for how little I drive the car, it's just cheaper to change the oil.

[evolutionmovement]

I wonder what it does to restrict flow. That extra filtration would slow down the oil flow. If that would be an issue at all, under high g-load conditions, or cold temps (which may or may not be fixable by a change in weight) I don't know. I do 10k mile oil changes in the Mazda and it still looks good and barely uses any in between (the car will probably rust away before the engine dies—the rust protection on this thing is inferior to the early Legacys). The 7500k+ oil changes in the Subaru looked like ass, but poured decently and the 1/4 million mile internals looked great. I had an old boss with a Taurus that he claimed never changed the oil with over 50k miles in it. Seemed to run fine.

[James614]

I would stick this on my wife's Escort and risk going with change intervals however long it was suggested for, even if it did turn out to be 15,000 - 30,000 miles. As an N/A car that's just driven regularly, I don't think there'd be much if any risk.

On my TW however, if I did add one of these it would solely be for having cleaner oil for the sake of the turbo's longevity, I would still probably change the oil every 5,000 - 7,000 miles. It may just be paranoia, because large turbodiesel trucks run these and can go pretty long between changes, and they produce their fair share of heat and blow-by too.... but it's like a mother wanting her kids to wash their hands compulsively, even if it's pointless it just makes you feel better.

[James614]

I wonder what it does to restrict flow. That extra filtration would slow down the oil flow. If that would be an issue at all, under high g-load conditions, or cold temps (which may or may not be fixable by a change in weight) I don't know.

I had that same concern at first, but it passively feeds from where the oil pressure sensor is. It doesn't interfere with the volume of oil being pumped through the rest of the engine.

[SubyFusion]

I wonder what it does to restrict flow. That extra filtration would slow down the oil flow. If that would be an issue at all, under high g-load conditions, or cold temps (which may or may not be fixable by a change in weight) I don't know. I do 10k mile oil changes in the Mazda and it still looks good and barely uses any in between (the car will probably rust away before the engine dies—the rust protection on this thing is inferior to the early Legacys). The 7500k+ oil changes in the Subaru looked like ass, but poured decently and the 1/4 million mile internals looked great. I had an old boss with a Taurus that he claimed never changed the oil with over 50k miles in it. Seemed to run fine.

The bypass filter does not restrict the flow of oil as it is just a secondary oil filter, you retain the stock free flow filter while part of your oil is slowly and throughly filter by the bypass filter.

[SubyFusion]

I would stick this on my wife's Escort and risk going with change intervals however long it was suggested for, even if it did turn out to be 15,000 - 30,000 miles. As an N/A car that's just driven regularly, I don't think there'd be much if any risk.

On my TW however, if I did add one of these it would solely be for having cleaner oil for the sake of the turbo's longevity, I would still probably change the oil every 5,000 - 7,000 miles. It may just be paranoia, because large turbodiesel trucks run these and can go pretty long between changes, and they produce their fair share of heat and blow-by too.... but it's like a mother wanting her kids to wash their hands compulsively, even if it's pointless it just makes you feel better.

Ya the diesel engines run a dual filter setup, but they have shorter oil change intervals on diesels.

The added filtration makes you feel better knowing that its getting everything that your regular filter can't! it's like the mom making sure her kids were using antibacterial soap to

[evolutionmovement]

Yes, but antibacterial soap leaves your immune system with little to do but cause annoying allergies. Pretty sure cars lack immune systems, though.

[James614]

I could go on a very long rant about antibacterial soap...

Your boss's Taurus with 50k oil in it... that's scary. Yeah, it may run fine, but that doesn't mean it's not being slowly killed. I'm willing to bet his filter is shot and the engine is seeing deposits form prematurely. It wouldn't kill it fast, but 5 years down the road I'm willing to bet he'll have some problems. I've seen people do that before with VERY expensive results.

[evolutionmovement]

It's not a recommendation, only a recitation of his claim. Being a Taurus, its life span wouldn't probably be a hell of a lot longer anyway.

[James614]

I still feel bad for the poor schmuck that buys that car off of him.

[kimokalihi]

I could go on a very long rant about antibacterial soap...

Your boss's Taurus with 50k oil in it... that's scary. Yeah, it may run fine, but that doesn't mean it's not being slowly killed. I'm willing to bet his filter is shot and the engine is seeing deposits form prematurely. It wouldn't kill it fast, but 5 years down the road I'm willing to bet he'll have some problems. I've seen people do that before with VERY expensive results.

You think that's bad, a girl I work with had me change her oil a while back and her spark plugs, wires and air filter/oil filter. She had NEVER done any maintanence on the car before and it had like 130,000 miles on it! Needless to say the oil was jet black and the air filter was black as well but the car seemed to run fine.

[James614]

Thinking back at the engines I've seen fail from over-used oil, they were iron blocks. Iron blocks are definitely way more reactive to acidity and moisture than aluminum engines (heck, even running too diluted on the coolant will cause rust and scaling inside the block). I'll bet that aluminum engines, when not exposed to high stress/heat (like any Taurus driver probably drives), probably aren't bothered much by depleted additives. Especially an engine that has a good working PCV system and solid ring seals. And by not bothered much, I mean not enough for us to perceive catastrophic failure. An engine can have bearings and ring lands scored quite a bit and still run just fine.

But then again, I've heard about horror stories from a local dealer (Toyota?) where leased vehicles would go their entire lease without an oil change and come back with all kinds of sludge damage at trade-in. But I don't remember if those problems were just found when inspecting the engine, or if it was noticed from the way the cars ran...

[evolutionmovement]

I think it's several issues. VW (of course) also had a huge problem with sludge-caused engine failure due to a faulty oil pick up on the 1.8Ts and I think that and Toyota's problems were design faults. In Toyota's case, their generally clueless customer base probably didn't help, although, with the more gentle driving those types tend to do, that may have cancelled it out. IIRC, though, Toyota's issues were predominately centered in high-temperature climates. Not VWs, though, as I am personally familiar with 5 engines that lunched before 50k miles (and that last one made it the farthest). One of them, an Audi, died maybe 20 miles after an oil change. I can tell you the mechanic who did the job was very nervous until he got the car in and could confirm that, yes, he DID refill it with oil!

I also—and this is speculation on my part based on the 3 VWAG cars that I knew what oil they ran were running dino—think it wouldn't happen with synthetic.

I've read several times (for whatever it's worth—this is one of those subjects where 10 "experts" all disagree) that oil changes are more important for changing the filter than the oil. Like most things, I think in some cases it may be true, and in some cases it isn't. Engines and their usage vary widely so I don't think there's a 1-size-fits-all. I go by my own observations and, were it not my concerns about the filter, the Mazda 2.3 would be going longer between oil changes than the ~10k I go with, but the Subaru I probably could've done more frequently. Then again, the internals at a 1/4 million looked really good, so changing the oil more often would've probably only meant it looked nicer pouring out rather than adding any protection. And I only use Mobil 1 synthetic. Could other oils be better, could I go farther between changes? For whatever reason, people get into bitter battles about this stuff, but I don't know or care since what I do tends to be working just fine for me. I feel any added protection from "cool" oils would be entirely academic and annoying in that they would be hard to find. As for change schedule, I might be able to go longer, but I get nervous extending the oil change interval, so this is just what I do. If I had something higher performance, going through more abuse, or old, I'd adjust however I felt happy with.

[bry]

use the stock oil filter, and if you're worried about quaility, go buy a WIX or OE filter. geez, why are you trying to make your life complicated over one of the least complicated cars I've ever worked on?

tribology, that's the study of oil, i have some experience with it and can assure you, oil does in fact go bad... oil oxidizes, just like your car rusts... the additives oxidize, especially at elevated temps, so basically anytime you start your engine. mult-visocisty oils, i.e. 10W40 shear down. that means the polymer chains that allow it act like 40W get broken and this thins your oil to somewhere in between 10 & 40. however, oil can actually become thicker as it accumulates carbon from unburned fuel creating SOOT. soot does not have great lubricating properties... anyway, you can tell when your oil is needing changed, it starts turning black. simple, no?

here's some stuff you don't know.... oil used to be better, but the epa told oil mfrs to quit adding so much zinc and phosphate! when a car's rings get weak, these elements blow-by and out the exhaust. the catalytic converter becomes contaminated and suddenly you gots yourself a smogger! unfortunately, zinc and phosphate are that great combination that soaks into cast iron and provides residual lubrication! you have heard or seen commercials for ZDDP? well, that's what it is. today, automotive oils have special frictional modifiers to replace the reduced zinc and phosphate. do they work as well, not really and especially not on motorcycle wet clutches... but, all is not lost! oils marked for use in Diesel applications are exempt. even better, diesel oil is cheap! i use rotella 30W in nearly everything from EJ22 to honda 2.0 to chevy 5.7L.... it works great, and doesn't shear down being a straight 30.

Synthetics are nice, but expensive. And how many of you can actually drive 7500 miles without having to add a quart? Synthetics have come a long way since they became popular in the early 90's. Back then, synthetics would actually cause nitrile rubber to shrink. That means your front and rear main seal.... To compound the problem, syn is a smaller molecule so it will leak from a smaller hole. These days however, they have "additives" (there's that word again) that keep the nitrile from shrinking, i.e. fatty acids....

BTW, duration between oil changes is directly related to the efiiciency of your fuel and spark delivery. in a carbuerated vehicle, 3000 miles is all it takes to turn the oil black. on deb's 2.0 Honda CRV, we can go 5500 miles before the oil needs changed.

OIL FILTERS - I ONLY CHANGE THEM EVERY OTHER OIL CHANGE... i'm gonna get flamed for it, but many owner's manuals state this. it's silly to change it unless you have driving conditions that warrant such. go ahead, flame away! it's okay and eliminates 50% of your filter changing woes....

[SubyFusion]

All I was saying is that it would be nice to have a secondary filter to get ride of the Carbon and SOOT that the free flow filter won't, whats wrong with that! and it also filters water out of the oil!

[bry]

that's cool, but if it's a daily driver i adhere to, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it!"...

[evolutionmovement]

The Subaru used a quart and half between 7500 changes, the Mazda maybe half a quart in 10k. The cost is minimal. Maybe it's because I have no vices, but $10 over a few months is pretty short money to me. That's a 6-pack, which coincidentally, on the average lasts me about the same length of time.

I've heard the opposite about changing filters, which never made sense to me—there aren't a lot of cars where you can change the filter without the oil, or at least a good portion of it. With the Mazda, it's the filter that's the part I hate. It's a damn cartridge, which I can only get at the dealer, and the hole they provided in the aero panel under the engine bay is about 6" off target, so I had to cut my own hole and the design of the plastic reinforcements that keep the panel from flexing too much catch the damn thing EVERY time. I used to be able to change the filters on the Subarus and other cars without spilling a drop (even sideways filters and when reinstalling, I always put oil in them first). With the Mazda, I feel like friggin' BP every time no matter what I do. Yeah, I put down old rags, but it still sucks and I have to clean the tools.

[James614]

It makes me angry to know that manufacturers are making oil filters more difficult than the one on our Escort. A cartridge with an off-set access hole? Seriously? It's obviously done to keep more business at dealers, but did they consider that the techs probably want to shoot themselves after mucking with them all day long? Or do they have some sort of $900 special tool that can change it in a snap?

[evolutionmovement]

There's no special tool beyond the metal cup thing to fit around the plastic housing in the sump. I wouldn't want to do it as a tech. You can only charge so much for an oil change and without cutting a new hole (which I doubt too many customers would be happy with), you have to remove the panel, which uses a bunch of small screws of the type that are prone to breakage. And the oil just pours out from around the sides of the cartridge housing as you pull it down. You can try tipping it to the side so it spills in a more controlled way, but that's difficult to get it so it falls into the oil pan and not onto the top side of the aero panel so that it can travel down its length and spill off the end. Even draining it out the center allen bolt first only reduces it so much and you're asking for bigger trouble every time you remove and replace plastic threaded parts. I'd rather make a mess of an old bed sheet than leak out the bottom or have to borrow a car to go to the dealer, if they have it in stock, and replace that piece. It's a Ford block, so I wonder if there was a disconnect in engineering somewhere with who was designing the aero panel and where the oil filter would end up. Even so, the car came out a few years before I bought mine—plenty of time to correct the issue.

[bry]

that's one of the great things about the EJ subie. you can change oil and filter without even jacking up the car! subaru engineering has totally failed status quo. everyone knows that engineers are not supposed to consider maintenance accessibility as part of the design!