Mobil 1 0W/20 AP, 12,045 Miles, 2005 Civic 1.7 w PC/ISO + TAN

[DuckRyder]

Car needed to be ready for a trip in Sept that would have put it in the 16,000, in light of Mobil's silence on TAN and the exceeding of the "annual" I elected to change this. It likely could have gone longer though the TAN is a bit of a Question mark.

Samples were sent to Blackstone and ALS.

Filter is here:

FRAM XG7317

 

[deoxy4]

Looks very good to me. Over what time period?

 

[DuckRyder]

Slightly over a year. The last 3 samples are the same oil (look at miles on unit vs miles on oil) on the Blackstone report for same reason the two samples immediately prior to this one are reversed.

The oil immediately prior to this one was not known - it was installed by a dealer and is possibly Mobil Special.

 

[Patman]

It's interesting to see that the results weren't that far off from each lab, in the past when people have sent samples to two different places they have usually resulted in drastically different results.

 

[DuckRyder]

The results have been fairly consistent for me. these two labs measure TBN differently but otherwise the numbers are close.

 

[DuckRyder]

Incidentally the PC doesn't look especially good here. Shame about the filter thread or we could discuss that there.

 

[Astro_Guy]

IIRC that engine takes just over 3 quarts, and you added 1.5 quarts or half that amount along the way. Basically you nudged the TBN and viscosity upwards and the wear metals downwards by pulling and replacing 4 samples. It would be interesting to compare the last result with a straight run of 12K without the intermediate sampling and replenishment.

 

[dave1251]

I would not be concerned about the TAN. I would have re-sampled around the 15K mark.

 

[DuckRyder]

Originally Posted by Astro_Guy
IIRC that engine takes just over 3 quarts, and you added 1.5 quarts or half that amount along the way. Basically you nudged the TBN and viscosity upwards and the wear metals downwards by pulling and replacing 4 samples. It would be interesting to compare the last result with a straight run of 12K without the intermediate sampling and replenishment.


It takes 3.75QT on refill with a 7317 size filter.

There was only .75 QTs total make up, I actually should have only accounted for .50 at the interim sample because I added the other .25 post sample (approximately)

You will probably get your wish for a 12,000 mile straight run as I don't think that I need to do the interim samples based on these results and there doesn't seem to be either a significant interest or a significant variation in particle counts which was part of this little experiment.

I will likely pull a 12,000 sample and send it in on the current sump, as it has what should be a markedly less efficient (and smaller) filter on it now and the particle counts may be interesting.

 

[Astro_Guy]

Thanks for the clarification; those figures were easily misunderstood. The impact of 0.5 quarts added to 3.75 is far, far less significant. IIRC my '05 Civic took 3.1 quarts to change, and I never really paid much attention to how much went in the filter or was added then next day to bring the level to the top of the stick.

 

[CharlieBauer]

Originally Posted by DuckRyder
Incidentally the PC doesn't look especially good here. Shame about the filter thread or we could discuss that there.


Thanks for getting such comprehensive testing done and sharing.

The PC is yet another data point that confirms to me that the Ultra's capacity means you won't get the benefit of filter caking for most of the filter's life (unless you run it to 40k miles). It's probably better to run a Toughguard or another high efficiency regular capacity filter for 10k to 15k filter changes. Even if you run an Ultra to 40k miles, you will have less filtering for the first 15k miles compared to a Toughguard.

 

[DuckRyder]

Originally Posted by CharlieBauer
Originally Posted by DuckRyder
Incidentally the PC doesn't look especially good here. Shame about the filter thread or we could discuss that there.


Thanks for getting such comprehensive testing done and sharing.

...


You are welcome of course.

My intent for the PC was to see if a high efficiency filter made any real difference in real world PC and possibly if PC increased or decreased over time. The TAN raised concerns and I wasn't prepared to risk my originally panned 20,000 mile run so the data isn't as comprehensive as I had hoped.

I did put the HAMP "shortie" on it which should be about the least efficient filter available (tiny with no end cap design) and I will pull a sample at the next 12,000 miles and get a PC to see if its better, worse or the same.

It won't - in my opinion - really prove anything, but if more people would do something similar it might generate enough data to form a hypothesis...

I will likely not continue with this oil (unless it gets within a few bucks of EP) past the sump currently in the car, since my usage model doesn't rack up 20,000 in a year.

 

[4WD]

Not sure about how TAN vs TBN rule of thumbs apply … still decent TBN …
While the UOA is interesting … seems in 0W20 the M1 EP is such a bargain on PAO and additives … Therefore Tig might have the best pattern at EP OCI of 10k and no money spent on UOA …

 

[DuckRyder]

Originally Posted by 4WD
Not sure about how TAN vs TBN rule of thumbs apply … still decent TBN …


True, and Mobil seems silent on application of the relationship. One VOA seems to indicate this oil starts out with about 2.5 TAN which seems rather high. Some sources indicate that certain types of oil can produce misleading TAN readings, Mobil seems unwilling to say if this is one such oil.

Originally Posted by 4WD
While the UOA is interesting … seems in 0W20 the M1 EP is such a bargain on PAO and additives … Therefore Tig might have the best pattern at EP OCI of 10k and no money spent on UOA …


0W/20 EP is good oil no doubt, probably any reputable oil at reasonable intervals and no money spent on UOA is the best pattern... I'm not fooling myself that UOA's actually prove much (if anything) it is interesting, can provide trending and may detect a relatively small set of issues but by and large UOA are a waste.

 

[DuckRyder]

Mobil will say that their condemnation limits for engine oil do not include TAN and that any TBN/TAN relationship rule of thumb should not override an acceptable TBN.