Home Forums Gear Hunting Trucks and Four-Wheel Drives Engine oil?

I never had any experience with a Fram filter as I've never put one on my engine. I was referring to dodge technical service bulletin 09-004-01. My engine has used a fleetguard stratapore oil fiter, part #LF3894, since it's first oil change. The truck now has 382,000 miles on it. The fleetguard filters were purchased from the local cummins supplier, not the dodge dealer.

Fleetguard is the brand name that cummins filtration markets it's filters under. Cummins filtration has been wholly owned by cummins since day one.

Fram has been owned by multiple players including Bendix, Honeywell, and now the Rank Group which is an investment company owned by a New Zealand billionaire. Cummins never owned them.

Who has owned Cummins / Fleetguard filtration?
I know their air filtration division is Nelson who Cummins bought because I remember doing business with "Nelson" before they changed.

What does Dodge use on their engines? You can't guarantee its a Fleetguard product...

I feel your engine's long life is a function of a better air filter more than a oil filter. Most engine oil filters are so loose that anything will work and its keeping the oil TBN and wear metals in line more so than the oil filter.

I don't think it's the plastic parts...

Yep... the fram filter doesn't look good there and there is pleat distortion, BUT you are not comparing 2 of the same filter and the napa filter is not used. Try again with an apples to apples comparision please.

All oil filters get a little ugly by the end of their life and you need to do a media integrity test to really know if the filter was sucessful.

actually that is one of the better fram pics if you google 'fram filter cut open'. the cardboard end plates are a deal breaker for me.

I think you'd better quit while you're (sort of) ahead here. You missed the point entirely on the cutaway photos of the Fram and NAPA filters.

Hint: Pleat count is somewhat critical to filtration capacity. Also, your blathering about Fram/Cummins etc is clearly a not so eloquent backpedal. I also use Fleetguard oil filters exclusively, Mopar air filters and Fleetguard and Racor fuel filters on my 2014 Ram. Racor incidentally, is the O.E. supplier for the rear frame mounted fuel filter.

"You missed the point entirely on the cutaway photos of the Fram and NAPA filters."
NO - I got it exactly right - there is substancial difference in the filters because the media area (IE pleat count) are differnet as well as the length. You need to compare 2 of the same filter in the same condition to make a real comparision. Who knows if the person making those pictures didn't rig the photos by distoring the end caps and moving the pleats over?

I applaud you for using the OEM filters.

You may not like the looks of the Fram filter, but it was doing its job and pleat distortion is a funcion of flow and media velocity and those were not too bad looking. The amount of media in that flter may be all that is needed for the application and they save consumer cost by designing the filter pack that way. End caps don't mean a thing if the media passes the integrity test in the end.

Withdrawn - may rock the foundations of how much "value engineering" filters can have and still perform well.

Kind of a left turn here, but I just took over maintenance duties for the GF's Expedition. When I looked at the last service sticker, I just about stroked out... over 10k miles overdue for an oil chance. So I stopped at NAPA and picked up a Gold oil filter, and filled it up with whatever Mobil 1 calls it's high mileage formula. Apparently, it was also at least three quarts low (of a ~6 quart capacity) and freakin' nasty black. Ouch! Question: Do I just leave the oil and filter on for a normal interval, or do I want to shorten up the first change interval?

KDK,
You may want to run a shorter interval just because the fresh oil may clean out some sludge that formed and it may load the filter quickly.
Changing oil brands around can cause cleaning effects due to the additive package differences.

H

I'd at least change the filter again, say @ 500-1K miles. the synthetic will dissolve sludge build-up and the solids will eventually wind up in the filter.

+1

If the engine is sludge up bad then also watch for oil in the air filter box. That sludge can clog up or at least restrict the crankcase venilation system.

I use Mobil 1 and Puralator filters. I also slap on a FilterMag on newer engines. May be un-necessary, but I like to think it pulls any metal particles out during the break-in process.

Okay, thanks, fellas, that's what I was thinking as well. It never hurts to get confirmation, though.

+1 to this, change the filter after 1000 miles

Doyou remember when you bought a new car that the dealers did the first oil change for free? I think that was to keep the people from freaking out at the metal filings they would find in the oil!
And all the loose stuff that needed to be tightened.

I like the mag idea. May be able to do the same with a stout mag on the filter bottom.

If your engine oil is that black, I would just do an engine flush. I bought an audi one time that probably never had it's oil changed in the first 40,000 miles. It was sludged up bad, and three consecutive oil changes didn't fix it.

My ex hitting the oil pan and busting it (requiring replacement) DID fix the problem.

I have about 500 miles on the fresh oil, and have been checking it (almost neurotically ) and it still has a very light golden hue to it. I'll keep checking as I go, but I think I might be alright...

I understand the point that filtration efficiency can't be judged by the looks of old filters, and that oil analysis would tell the actual tale.

I also know that spending an extra $3 to $5 to get a "prettier" filter on my 3 oil changes per year, would buy me a whole lot of peace o' mind. I'm weird that way. And in many others, actually.

FC

psted this before, but I picked up a Honda Prelude ( 88 model, with 100,000 on it ) for $2500 around 2000 or so...

had been owned by a woman and she ran Pennzoil in it...the last oil change had been at 97,000, but that had been 3 years earlier...

tuned it up and pulled the valve cover... the entire head looked like the highway dept had just paved it with fresh asphalt...

I scooped out the big globs I could get at with an old spoon... put a new gasket on it, and did an oil change of Mobil 1, 0W40 ( or 0W 30, can't remember which, but wanted to try a ZERO weight oil to see how it held up or if an engine would use it..)

Although the body was in great shape, I was concerned about the sludge in the engine, so I decided this car would be a disposable test rig... just run it until it blew up....

Never had any intention of changing the oil, just change the filter every 5K, and add as needed.... test just how good Mobil One really was in the long run...

40,000 miles later a friend was just getting divorced and wanted a car with good gas mileage and was "sporty".. so he hammered me to sell him the Honda....wouldn't let up.... was even offering me the $2500 I paid for it....

I finally let it go to him... Del is a mechanical idiot, so being a friend, I went thru the car before I turned it over to him... new tune up, radiator flush and fill, complete break job, transmission change ( manual )....

When I took the valve cover off to see what the inside of the engine looked like, after 40,000 miles of Mobil One with no changes... and only had to add oil when I changed the filter every 5K..... I was shocked at the look of the upper end of the engine...

All of that sludge was totally GONE... the inside of the engine had zero sludge on the head...had very light varnish coating, but considered what it looked like previously, I had no issue with that...

So I can verify that Mobil One really does work... that is why I pretty much run it exclusively, minus little tests I do when an engine has high miles and so does the car....

and example is on my 94 Camry.. at 310K, I filled it with Mobil 15W40 Diesel truck oil... changed the filter every 3300 miles ( 3 times in 10K) and added as needed... ran that oil 20K and then took the valve cover off to see what it looked like underneath...

that compared to what the head looked like before the change... surprisingly, 20K on 15W40 dino oil, I only saw a slight bit of varnish, but ZERO sludge build up... most of this was Highway Miles.. but I was pretty darn impressed with that...

I think frequent filter changes, on engines that are not just used for short trips, like my wife's car is...good oil can give a pretty decent life span of itself... at least the right oil will...