Used Oil Analysis

Is it FE wear, or cleaning?

If its FE wear, is it too small to be caught by the filter?

If another oil has less FE in the UOA, does that mean that the engine is wearing in chunks that the oil filter can filter out easily?

I guess some say that UOAs are for trending and direct comparisons shouldn't be made.

Also, you never know how someone drives with any brand of oil for that UOA.

Give me any oil or additive and I WILL MAKE THAT UOA LOOK BAD!

You will find tha Mobil 1 will clean your system and the detergent/dispersant system will hold more particles in suspension (ie your normal oil may be dropping out wear metals in sludge at the bottom of the sump which is not seen in your oil sample). You should also remember that the wear metal analysis done by most UOA labs is based on ICP and the wear metal particles reported are less than 10 microns in size. Some of the iron you are seeing is in the form of metal soaps which will be more soluble in a good detergent/dispersant package.
Mobil did some engine tests switching from a mineral oil to Mobil 1 and saw increased wear metals in UOA. Engine strip down actually showed less wear in comparison to the mineral based engines.

You really can't draw any definitive conclusions about engine wear using only ICP oil analysis. For example, what if <some of> the iron content in the oil was due to moisture (rust <iron oxide> caused by moisture inside the crankcase) in the oil rather than sliding/abrasive/cutting wear? In that case Fe would exist as an oxide (rust) rather than a wear particle. The ICP oil analysis scheme can't distinguish the difference between the two. It only shows the presence or absence of elemental Fe (iron), and, if present, and existing in particles below about 8 microns in size, what the parts per million (PPM) concentration is. The same is true for all the other elements (about 19 more) that will show up on an ICP oil analysis report.

Chumley

True about the FE post by Chumley .

Same goes for Si .

It's proven there is a boron additive that once heated it turns into a hard Iron Oxide layer that no doubt could possibly be scraped off the cylinder walls , cam lobes ect and picked up in analysis as wear metals when in fact ths particular type would be an additive .

The main concern I've seen about the few extra PPM of Fe from the synthetic Mobil oil seems to come from it's competition

haaa. Motorbike is right. It's the Amsoil crew that always brings up the M1/Fe. Motorbik, their is a new formulator on the board. bruce...nice guy and has been in the business for 32 years.

In order to "get their job done most efficiently, marketing people generally rely on, and attack, their target markets weakness which is usually, . . . their ignorance.

Education seeks to avoid ignorance and is the enemy of marketing/advertising.

So, . . . . the million dollar question. Where do you want to get your education? From qualified, well respected experts in your field of choice, (you'll have to work hard and pay dearly for that) or, for free from someone <on the internet> you don't even know?

Your education <automotive or otherwise> will ultimately be worth what you pay for it, and, how hard you work to obtain it! Who is that guy, Molekule anyway?

Chumley

Partially good standpoint!
If you want (certified) education you have to pay "qualified well respected experts". Things are made by that way without so much our influence. Point is in money earning (certification) - not in (your) knowledge.
If you want knowledge you can obtain it by all possible means: books, other’s experience, internet,... All of us have talents for particular things and if we want to upgrade knowledge in these areas we do not need (regular) education. Basic education is already considered (to understand terms, processes,...)and sometimes that surfing through "pile of knowledge" reveals you particular things what you are interested in.
For instance, I have kept (very successful) carburetor service for 10 years without any(official) certification. But, not in Canada (read: N.America) where certifications are needed for everything.

This topic got tossed around our shop last year, so we tried an experiment. We had a car, driven by a reasonable driver on a 20 mile commute every day, using M1 5w-30 oil that was showing higher Fe, like 70ppm and wondered if that was worse for wear than another case that had 7ppm. So we changed the oil in the high Fe car to a dyno 30w and drove the car around for about a thousand miles, until we became worried about engine wear. A uoa, just before the change showed 10ppm Fe. The new M1 5w-30, after the 30w, showed 100ppm. This was all summer driving in Southern California. So if we are to believe all the uoa experts, the 30w dyno is better than M1 5w-30. I don't think so, but the numbers say something different. The numbers say dump the M1 right away and go back to that wonderful 30w dyno oil and stop messing with success. And don't complain about the lack of control in our test or that the test is flawed. After all this whole thing was done to settle a twenty dollar bet. It appears to me that a uoa is best when looking for gross problems and trends over several samples with known conditions.

Let me (try) to resume things. We are discussing now how oil analysis results depend of oil brand used. Nice topic for discussion board with all these approaches, experiences,... and we use that opportunity.
But, are we going to be able to interpret oil analysis results and (even) our conclusions to common users? Advice like "do not believe to oil analysis results because of ..." couldn't be so acceptable. As a general approach it is supposed that used oil analysis, made at any of available laboratories should be real indicator of oil condition. If there is certain quantity of Fe ppm - there is. That is revealed fact. It should warn user that things with engine wear are not going so well.
We are now telling to (same) user that oil brand can increase Fe ppm and that fact should be counted for. What is supposed to do if increased Fe is result of real engine wear and we still count it as "oil brand"?
Isn't it (at least) a little bit complicated? Do I (as supposed customer) really have enough time to use one oil brand than make an oil analysis than switch to another oil brand, make oil analysis confirming myself that engine wear is OK and use the first oil brand later again because of its qualities? Don’t we have here another sort of advertising - defending bad Fe results of M1?
My interpretation should be: if someone is "in love" with any particular oil brand (M1 here) there is no enough argument(s) to convince him that his/her choice probably is not the right one. Isn't it simplest to use another oil brand with "no false alarms" and be warned about engine wear at the right time? Why should I take care about increased Fe if oil manufacturer do not take care about it through adittive package change, warning of customers, noticing of laboratories,...

Do you guys really think that any company that builds <let's say> 100,000 engines a year doesn't do their own very extensive used oil analysis before they come up with their own "official position" regarding the oil specifications and the change interval specifications which they publish IN WRITING in their owners manuals? If you do, that's just ignorance talking!

This is just so comical. I'm an engineer. When I design a mass produced product and see a specific trended failure rate of 10% or more, I KNOW I screwed up, and I need to change the specifications because they surely aren't meeting at least the "SEVERE USE" applications where the product I designed is being used. <In a general sense, that's when you see highly successful class action lawsuits, worldwide TSB's, factory recalls, etc.>

There is a slippery slope somewhere in between.

But on the other hand, when I see a failure rate of less than 5% and out of those 5% more than 80% of those users have modified their vehicle <voiding the written warranty>, failed to do the scheduled maintenance, and/or used non-specified oil/fuel, and used the vehicle outside of it's intended use, my sympathy is nil for those "internet educated" experts.

The internet generates a lot of automotive traffic. It would be a lot more useful/helpful if it was actually going somewhere!

Chumley