MC FL820 6,000km's Cut Open

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Here's the last MC FL820 I'll ever use, which came off my Mustang 4.6 3V, which sees a fair bit of track use and daily driving.

I was running Castrol Edge 5W30. Oil has only been in since October 2015 and the car sat for the winter, so no cold weather starts.

Not too impressed.








Wow... that is one sorry looking filter. The pleat spacing reminds me of the OCOD's before Fram stepped up their QC.

Now here's where things start getting worse..

I noticed some glue on the end caps, so I gave a very, very gentle pull, and off came the whole cap, and out fell a bunch of chunks of hardened glue. I've never been able to pull off an end cap so easily. I easily tore off the whole filter element with my hands. No tools required. Never been able to do that on any other filters I've cut. Yikes. Note that the glue on the top of the filter element was cracked when I removed the end cap.

Hopefully there aren't any chunks of glue in my engine now.








Say what you will about MC filters, but this has completely turned me off from using an FL820 ever again.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: Ohle_Manezzini
And the problem is? Wavy pleats?


And chunks of hardened, cracked glue, brittle media that can be torn by hand.

Keep in mind, this was only a 6000 km interval (3700~miles), imagine if it were used for the whole mfr recommended interval of 8000km's? (or up to 16000km's for a 6.2 F-150).
 
Originally Posted By: SVTCobra
And we have a UOA to back up that this is a bad filter?


UOA won't necessarily show anything, except for perhaps more insolubes, and this car's only had one UOA done before, so we don't have a solid baseline for comparison.

Simply put, I've never seen an oil filter look this bad - not Wix, Hastings, Fram, Kubota, etc.
 
FRAM TG2 is your friend sir
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Originally Posted By: car51
And XG2 I should have mentioned


An XG2 is on both of my cars right now. Awesome filter.

I'm gonna run them both for 20,000km's and do a cut and post (although I only drive about 10k per year so it's gonna be a while) so stay tuned!
 
The end cap potting material becoming all brittle with such a short use period certainly isn't normal.
 
Originally Posted By: ZeeOSix
The end cap potting material becoming all brittle with such a short use period certainly isn't normal.


No kidding. The car was tracked, which obviously elevates oil temps, but it shouldn't cause the glue to harden and crack like that.
 
The media was not torn before you tore it..so the problem is? Same with the glue. It was fine before you tore into it. Installed in your engine, the filter did not fail. It failed your torture test afterward..so what? It did it's job.
Originally Posted By: Canadastang
Originally Posted By: Ohle_Manezzini
And the problem is? Wavy pleats?


And chunks of hardened, cracked glue, brittle media that can be torn by hand.

Keep in mind, this was only a 6000 km interval (3700~miles), imagine if it were used for the whole mfr recommended interval of 8000km's? (or up to 16000km's for a 6.2 F-150).
 
I think what he's getting at is that for a under 4K OCI, he doesn't like that the media is cheap and brittle. Just my un-educated thought
 
Originally Posted By: Canadastang
Originally Posted By: SVTCobra
And we have a UOA to back up that this is a bad filter?


UOA won't necessarily show anything, except for perhaps more insolubes, and this car's only had one UOA done before, so we don't have a solid baseline for comparison.

Simply put, I've never seen an oil filter look this bad - not Wix, Hastings, Fram, Kubota, etc.


A UOA would show if wear metals were getting past the filter as well if this truly was a poorly constructed filter. After all it's the wear metals that can get past a filter and wear the engine out, not some poorly glued end cap.
 
I hope the 822 and 836 are better. Does anyone know about those filters? Since that's what I'm using now. Thank you in advance kinds sirs.
 
Originally Posted By: SVTCobra
Originally Posted By: Canadastang
Originally Posted By: SVTCobra
And we have a UOA to back up that this is a bad filter?


UOA won't necessarily show anything, except for perhaps more insolubes, and this car's only had one UOA done before, so we don't have a solid baseline for comparison.

Simply put, I've never seen an oil filter look this bad - not Wix, Hastings, Fram, Kubota, etc.


A UOA would show if wear metals were getting past the filter as well if this truly was a poorly constructed filter. After all it's the wear metals that can get past a filter and wear the engine out, not some poorly glued end cap.


Threads like this mean nothing as the filter is no doubt doing a fine job. MC FL 820s are on hundreds of thousands of engines that are performing well.
 
Originally Posted By: KCJeep
The 820 has unfortunately established itself as the ugly duckling of the Motorcraft line of late.

+1. Clean and accurate description.
 
they may be on hundreds of thousand of engines but there is no proof they are performing well at all their quality went into the garbage can..They used to be good filters but not anymore I am switching to the Fram Ultra XG-2 on all my fords the only thing is my Moms Mercury Grand Marquis has such a tight squeeze im not sure if im going to like that on there but i won't use Motorcraft anymore thats for sure.

Im Wondering Why Ford puts up with these quality issues... Sooner or later something has to change.. Everyone should write to Ford..
 
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