Oil Analysis on new Generator Engine

[Alaskan Sea-Duction]

Food for thought. I asked Blackstone Labs: when should I start doing oil samples on my new generator.

Hi, Thomas. Thanks for the email.

A new engine will naturally go through a period of break-in before
getting down to normal wear, so it's up to you if you want to start
sampling right from the beginning and monitor that process, or wait
until things "should" be down to normal and establish your baseline there.

Typically, the wear-in period is over pretty quickly, but it takes
several oil changes for the residual wear-in material to wash out of
the engine, so we'll usually see high levels of wear metals and
silicon for two or three oil changes. If you just want to see the
"normal" wear levels for your engine, you'll probably have to wait
until at least the third or fourth oil change before sampling. If you
don't suspect any problems, then it's probably fine to wait until
then to start sampling.

The advantage to sampling from the very beginning is that you can see
the trends developing right from the start. Metals should read fairly
high in the first sample from a new engine, along with silicon, but
things should gradually improve from sample to sample until
everything gets down to normal. If you're sampling right from the
start, you can monitor that process, and if things suddenly start
moving the other direction, that could be an issue. Plus, if you wait
until the third oil change to do a sample, and metals are high, we
won't know if that's an issue, or if the metals just haven't gotten
down to normal yet... if we have the full history, we'll know if the
metals are still trending down, or if they've already dropped and are
coming back up.

Hope that helps. Thanks!

Travis Heffelfinger
Senior Analyst
Blackstone Laboratories
416 E. Pettit Ave.
Fort Wayne, IN 46806
260-744-2380
www.blackstone-labs.com

 

[BandB]

Excellent information and consistent with what we've always seen. I would say it hasn't taken as many oil changes as they indicate, but our new engines and generators have typically been through two or three oil changes rather quickly and we do initial changes sooner than some do.

 

[O C Diver]

So here's my thought: oil and filters on a generator are cheap.

When I broken in my main engine (John Deere 4045), JD said 100 hours on break in oil to seat the rings. I did the next few changes after 25 hours to remove the metal and break in oil residue. If you're doing it yourself, the changes are cheap and get you to the baseline quickly. If I were breaking in my current Onan, the cost per oil change is about $20. Pretty cheap to flush the crankcase out.

Ted

 

[BandB]

So here's my thought: oil and filters on a generator are cheap.

When I broken in my main engine (John Deere 4045), JD said 100 hours on break in oil to seat the rings. I did the next few changes after 25 hours to remove the metal and break in oil residue. If you're doing it yourself, the changes are cheap and get you to the baseline quickly. If I were breaking in my current Onan, the cost per oil change is about $20. Pretty cheap to flush the crankcase out.

Ted

We do the early changes more frequently than required to remove the metal.