ion-man said:
Sorry Rich... I didn't mean to imply that the ONLY reason the Amsoil was still good was that you replaced 25% of it... Now that I look back on what I posted it does read that way, doesn't it?
Also, not to be a total sh*t, but I did say "If you ended up filling up more than a quart" which would include oil you added at the filter change, and any top off oil you have had to add due to oil consumption. If you go just a tick more than 1qt 6oz, than my statement of 25% IS correct. However, if you used much LESS than a quart (I don't know how much oil is lost during a filter change if you don't drain the oil first... I'd think MOST of it???) If you say you've added less than 10%, that's great.
That in no way takes away from the fact that I said, "...obviously the synthetic oils (and specifically this Amsoil) are pretty amazing stuff. "
I understood what you were aiming at by pointing out that interval top off when needed, and then allowing for loss during oil change. I'll go one further here, the loss was marginal with the filter. I cleaned the area like a surgery was going to be done, and when I pulled the filter I used a brand spanking new paint tray made of plastic and freshly washed to drain that oil from the filter into. I did this because I thought maybe I can see some aluminum particulate, but in the amount reported, I found out that you can't see that with the naked eye. I cut the filter in half (curious minds love to have dirty hands) to see what causes or could cause a by-pass, but I could not see anything and threw the sliced filter away. I rubbed the filtration material with my finger before dumping it, to see what would come off the filter itself, and it was just oil, no sludge or anything, and with that, no sludge was seen anywhere in the filter either.
There was little oil that came from the filter and was filtered for reuse by myself in the system. I was thinking when I did this, a coffee filter for AMSOIL, I wonder if this is going to cause problems. No problems from that at all.
Sounds crazy, but the goal I am working towards is to use as little "new" AMSOIL as possible, and to see how far I can go before the report says to change it.
The cannisters that are filled for send in hold about 3 to 6 oz of oil, and if you fill them up completely I would say no more than 8 oz, but I don't go that far. They can test it on 4 ounces, and I send in about that much.
There has been one time the motor required top off since AMSOIL was added, and I think that was because I did not fill up completely with 5 quarts. It was about a third of a quart shy, and that 1/3 was put into the motor about 1,000 miles after the last change.
By the way, the 10 bucks for the analysis also covers postage too, so it is a deal to do this. I figured I have saved about 200.00 bucks so far, a few hours driving as well as labor time for the work required to replace the oil at 3,000 mile interval.
The motor pulls as strong as ever, no new noises have been heard, no oil leaks anywhere. The darn thing just does what it is supposed to do, run.
I figured the aluminum was from chain rub caused by the cam chain tension not being tight enough, cause I am at 15,000 miles shy about 300 miles to do the clearance check for the cam and valves, but I am beginning to wonder how far I could go with that too, before the motor starts complaining. Since the aluminum reported seem to uptick from bypass, I am not sure now when I should do the cam and valve check.
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