Oil Testing?

[RRose]

Do any of you have oil anaylisis done to your oils? I am considering sending a sample of the oil from my Diesel Super Duty to Blackstone Labratories. It cost about $20 after shipping and they send you a complete spec sheet on your test. What do you think?

[picone]

What are they claiming to be able to tell you from the test?

[RRose]

Here's their website: http://www.blackstone-labs.com

[jeff]

If they actually send your results from YOUR oil it's worth it. Watch out for scams where they just take your oil and send back a generic test result. Not sure about the company you are asking about but the test themselves are worth it... especially if the truck still has a factory warranty. It'll alert you to all sorts of interesting things that would normally require a teardown.

Aloha

[Harpo]

Working for the military, I have a HMMWV issued to me , they take quarterly oil samples and do not service them until they fail the test

[michael_loomis]

i send at many oil samples at my work ... you get a pretty good reading of a major problems on the horizon .... however , i had a mechanic send in to bottles with THE SAME OIL IN IT by accident ... one came back bad , one came back perfect ??

[jeff]

And that my friends is a perfect example of the oil test scam. http://www.race-dezert.com/vb3/attachments/old/images/graemlins/confused.gif

Aloha

[picone]

Ryan:

Are you having problems and looking for an answer through this testing? This sounds like an awesome way to find out which oil filter works the best. Keep in mind that when you drain your oil into that dirty old bucket, you've got all the junk already in the bucket (you are looking for ppm here) AND you've got 6-12 qts of oil to pull a sample from (sediment drops to the bottom). For the most accurate of results you would want to give them many samples, like maybe 5-10% of the total amount of a well mixed oil sample. Try cutting your oil filter open sometime to see whats in there before you find out what the oil filter isn't catching. As far as looking for coolant, you should already know if your motor is eating coolant. There are so many different motors out there that the PPM for each different element in each different motor have to vary (Aluminum blocks, Iron Blocks.....). So what is their Universal Average? I think the best use for their machine is to check oil filter quality UNLESS, they know what every part in your motor is made of and can compare to other like motors. For $20 it certainly couldn't hurt unless you start tearing into your motor looking for a problem they are diagnosing.

[RRose]

I want to do it so that I can have a baseline on how my motor is working. And they can also tell me what is going on with the motor and what I should do or what I should know about it. With the problems that they have with the 6.0L diesel... I wanna make sure mine is running ok.... while its on warranty!!!

[Billy_the_Kid]

Do not take an oil sample from your drain plug. Your best bet is to take your sample from the pressure side of things and not from the drain plug in the pan or even through the dipstick. Neither is representative of what oil your bearings are seeing. By taping into a pressure point somewhere (like putting a Tee in the line that feeds your OP gauge with a valve on it) you are getting a sample that has already gone through your filter and is on it's way to the bearings.

Also, don't just dump some oil into an old Pepsi bottle or Budweiser bottle. Trust me, that doesn't work. Any good oil lab worth their salt, will have clean sealed oil sample bottles available at a resaonable cost.

Remember, garbage in is garbage out. If your gonna take the time to test oil and trend it, do it right or your wasting your time.

[hoeker]

i have had several oil samples done by Royal Purple, they provide me with my oil and samples when requested. they're very interested in staying up to date on the oils durability and performance since we are a factory supported team and what i have learned is that you must do several samples to develop "patterns" for your engine. especially when the testing company doesn't know the baseline formulation for the oil you run.
an example of this. i blew a frost plug out of my engine 2 years ago in a race. my spotter didn't see it go and temp gauges don't work very well with no water in the system. anyway, 2 laps later the engine was low on power so i went into the pit, as soon as the engine rpm's dropped it siezed up. the engine detonated and burned a couple pistons so the oil sample was just to see how well the oil handled the heat. one of the test results showed that the RP oil was fine when compared to competitor brand oils but since they knew what the baseline was they knew they had lost some of this property(i'm no oil expert, and can't remember what the test was for) but we were still better than any other oil off the shelf.
FWIW that engine needed 2 pistons and we put it back together as good as new, i have had similar experiences a couple times since this. I'm a believer in RP (http://www.royalpurple.com) for life! it's a little more money, but worth every penny.

www.rosshoek.com (http://www.rosshoek.com)

[RE_Todd]

My dad does for his fqll time RV'er rig. He uses it as a baseline for the chemical additives and the baseline for oil changes.

[FABRICATOR]

That's funny...this was covered exactly a year ago to the day in the shop section. oil analysis (http://www.race-dezert.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=shop&Number=45165&Forum=sh op&Words=oil%20analysis&Match=Entire%20Phrase&Sear chpage=0&Limit=25&Old=allposts&Main=45165&Search=t rue#Post45165)

[TRDshaunTRD]

As per what I wrote a year ago: "A friend of mines Father owns Annalist Inc., which does oil analyzing for major oil companies. They are located in Torrance, CA. All you have to do is call them and they will send you a bellow to put your oil in, and then you mail it back to them. I have no clue how much they charge, but talk to Eric at 310-346-5063, that’s his cell number; I don't know his work number."

[PBR]

ryan - i have blackstone analyze the oil on my diesel, most of the diesel guys are using blackstone. most of the info i get back from them is way beyond my knowledge but when i do something new or different on the truck it helps to understand what is good and what is not so good for the motor. (ie: airfilters/boxes/etc). i think it us just cheap insurance for a long engine life.

[RRose]

Thanks for the info Ollie.