Our in house oil program is looking into purchasing an instrument to measure ( PPM ) and identify elements in used oil samples. We have been doing basic testing including particle counting and patch testing in house for 5 years. The people using the instruments come from a mechanical background and are not trained Chem techs. So thats a bit about our background. My question is what should we buy? We are currently looking at RDE technology ( what our outside lab uses now ) and EDXRF which seems to be simpler to use and detects a wider range of wear particles but for some reason is not widely used. Anyone have any experience with either of these instruments that they could share.

Try an ICP (inductivly coupled plasma) it is more labor intensive but you will recieve accurate results.

Hi Allen,

what are your applications, if mainly compression ignition and sprk ignition engines, then the ICP is the best as the all these systems wear with small particle and the oil test ICP have to "Nuke" the oil and are size limited to detecting <10 µm particles, larger particles are not detected,
If your applications are gear drive and hydraulics then what you are doing is far more accurate with less false alarms and if the latter you could add viscosity, water by crackle and a ferrogram maker as this will identify by magnetic separation and then post heat the slide to check grade of steel.
We have completed a good comparence between ICP and WDA that you can get/anyone can get by emailing us @ lab@rttech.com.au. there is a 2-3 year old version on our website
rttech.com.au
but the newer one is easier to understand,
Hope this assists

Regards Rob S

Hi Allen,

Yes EDXRF is a very simple tool to use. It is not widely used because in the past the detection limits and accuracy were not good enough for these types of applications.

It also depends on your exact requirements of testing to which EDXRF would be suitable.

Using ICP is difficult for those not experienced and there is more work involved but you will not detect the larger particles..

typically with xrf you can run the solution through a filter to obtain the larger particles, measure those and then run the filtrate to measure the rest..

if you need information on anything to do with XRF just send me an email on info.australia@panalytical.com