2003 Dodge Ram CTD

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Feb 22, 2004
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First UOA. 16398 miles on the engine. Shell Rotella T 15W40 w/ 3905 miles on the oil. Changed oil with this sample. This is a baseline analysis. Switched to Amsoil Marine 15W40 and installed a Frantz bypass oil filter.

Next sample will be w@ 6000 miles on the Amsoil.

ALUMINUM 1
CHROMIUM 1
IRON 10
COPPER 2
LEAD 1
TIN 0
MOLYBDENUM 1
NICKEL 0
MANGANESE 1
SILVER 1
TITANIUM 0
POTASSIUM 3
BORON 1
SILICON 5
SODIUM 2
CALCIUM 4557
MAGNESIUM 5
PHOSPHORUS 1027
ZINC 1397
BARIUM 0

SUS Viscosity @ 210ºF - 82.5
Flashpoint ºF - 435
Fuel % - Antifreeze % - 0.0
Water % - 0.0
Insolubles % - 0.2
 
Yes, I'm going to try for 3k. I think 3k is pushing it for a diesel due to soot, but almost all of my miles are highway and I'm not towing. My 6k sample will determine whether I stick with 3k TP intervals.
-john
 
John, I've owned 2 CTD powered trucks. Just use Rotella T 15w40 year round and change it every 5K miles with the fleetguard or Mopar filter (samething) and you should get 500K+++ miles out of the engine. It's the truck that will die long before that Cummins. If you are doing all of the bypass and UOA just for fun then have a ball, but the CTD is one of the best made most durable engines you can buy and regular oil/filter changes with the recommended oil/filter is all you need. I know of several CTD's that have over 1 million miles on them running Rotella T 15w40 and OEM filters.
 
For the last oil change I tried a blend of 3 qts Mobil 1 Truck & SUV with 9 qts of Delvac 1300 in my 2003 Dodge, which is what I'll use for next change. I had noticed that an Exxon XD-3 Elite blend resulted in a quieter engine, less ticks and clicks and such, but couldn't find anymore of it so I made my own blend. The Delvac blend seems to work just as well. If you prefer Rotella you can make an even cheaper blend as the Rotella synthetic is about $12 a gallon at WalMart.

I'm using a similar Delvac blend, 2 qts T&S with 3 qts of 1300, in an older Taurus which has over 170k miles on it, and it runs quieter as well as using less oil.
 
Need... want... it all begins to blur after a bit.

Here's my thinking. When I've owned this truck for 10 years, at which point I'll have put about 250k miles on it, I want the engine to be in the best condition I can afford. Will it survive 250k on dino with 3-5k changes? You bet it will. But I'm certain that if I give it full synthetic and run the bypass filter, it will suffer significantly less wear and be far cleaner than with the dino. So that's what I'm going to do. As far as cost goes...

Over 250,000 miles...

Running dino w/ 5k changes...
50 changes @ $20/change
Total: $1000

Running synthetic+bypass w/ samples @ 7500 miles
Samples......................... $666
83 TP elements @ $.80/element... $66
83 top-offs @ $3/each........... $250
8.3 oil changes @ $75/each...... $625*
One time cost of bypass filter.. $120
Total: $1727

*Assumes 30,000 change interval
 
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