LILBENZ230

Mods - posted in a new thread for maximum exposure, feel free to merge with other 120K thread when you want.



Looks like my car is in great shape at 120K miles!

Glyn M Ruck

Nothing wrong there. A great report. Lot's of life left in that engine.

johnand

. Nice report. Nothing much else to say.

samaritrey

I can't wait to see what my oil looks like next change in a few weeks. This time I have to remember to collect a sample.

Looks like your car goes on to live another day matt

splinter

Those long highway drives are ideal for minimal wear and long engine life

I think you should keep it at least a while longer. :)

LILBENZ230

Actually John, the 12,600 miles on this oil were the first in the car's life not spent doing a lot of highway driving. I've had an 8 mile commute to work each day all of those miles and been doing a lot of short, city type driving. I'm very pleased with this report! I'll have it analyzed again at 146,000.

Glyn M Ruck

Matt. I always like to see reports like this because it proves my point. You don't need to baby a Benz - you just need to do the standard recommended maintenance. Even with the fleece filter worry you have stuck to the long drain interval with premium oil & the results are there for all to see. It also proves that the sump capacity is well selected by Benz for expected oil charge stress between maintenance intervals & that you have kept the car in a good state of tune. (no dribbling injectors - wrong AF ratio, clean filters etc.) Interesting that the car has been on an in-town cycle & shows no fuel dilution. This is another reason for sticking to approved products & spares. You have also achieved this without going to a rip off dealer.

LILBENZ230

Good point, Glyn. People continuously question Mercedes on the forum and their extended oil change interval. There are no fleece filters available for the M271 and according to dealers there never was here in the states. I use Mahle-Knect paper filters from RME and they seem to work fine. The air filter had 26,000 miles of usage at the time this oil was sampled.

The mileage I'm putting on the car has slacked off a good bit in the past six months due to my commute. Flipping back through some records it was nothing unusal for the car to do 2800-2900 miles a month last year. Now I'm down to about 1600-1700, still above average for the USA. But Monday-Friday it pretty much is on a city cycle. I don't know if extended drives on the weekend clear up the fuel dilution or not.

I keep the level at a steady 5.5L in the sump, topping up as needed. In 12600 miles, I only needed 1/2 of a US quart to maintain the level.

LILBENZ230

Glyn.. where would the elevated levels of Molybdenum, Calcium, and Phosphorus come from?

Glyn M Ruck

The oil additive system. The moly is a high temp anti oxidant. The others are part of the detergent/dispersant, antiwear & alkalinity package.

It's likely that your TBN retention would have been excellent.

johnand

Here is a M1 0W-40 VOA (Virgin Oil Analysis) to compare:



Glyn, is right, your TBN would likely be high, as you can see compared to VOA your additive system is similar to new oil.

LILBENZ230

How is that possible after so much use? I am not easy on this car. Those 12600 miles were from April to October including some record hot weather in GA. My work place has a huge gravel lot you have to drive through that is always blowing dust everywhere. Is there a chance Black Stone has made an error?

Glyn M Ruck

No problem. Good oil & good air & oil filtration.

mac911

This is a fun report to see, thanks for sharing.

It shows, broken in, one can truly go the full oil change interval. We don't have to feel "bad," about it in most cases.

It was time to change the oil, but it was still working up to that point, which is what is important!

Really nice report! I feel bad my car just had oil changed at 4,900 miles. ha. Still had 1/2 of your wear.

AdidasC230

How does an oil analysis tell you whats shape your engine is in? Isn't it telling you simply how good your oil is?

What indicates on those charts a good engine? I saw you mention a few things but not why there where good?

Is this why you guys always get upset dealer use diesel oil or whatever incorrect oil you say they put in gas cars?

ncmudbug

Glyn and others can certainly speak more authoritatively, but one thing you can look at is if there is more iron in the oil which could alert you to wearing rings (cast iron) or other steel components. I'm guessing that copper could be bearing wear.

LILBENZ230

What shows up in the oil reveals the condition of the engine. As you can see, no fuel dilution, no coolant, etc.. shows my engine is in a very good state of tune. Also, no signs of undue wear.


We get upset because Mercedes-Benz corporation is not ambiguous about it. 229.5 and 229.51 are not interchangeable. One does not meet the requirements of the other - that is not an opinion, that is a fact. No one at a dealership is qualified to make a decision otherwise, period. Hell they barely know the cars as it is.

Glyn M Ruck

Adidas. In very simple terms used oil analysis tells you the condition of the oil & the condition of the component it is lubricating - in this case the engine. To know the state of the oil you must understand it's VOA & then interpret it's deterioration in use such as additive depletion & level of contamination by coolant, soot/carbon, silica (sand & dirt), wear metals & other insolubles & fuel etc. and of course Viscosity.

Elemental analysis & wear metals give you an indication of what components in the engine are wearing and at what rate. Ideally this should be a trend tracked over a number of samples. Interpretation of engine wear can be extremely accurate but requires a clear appreciation of what is normal and the materials used in a specific engine's components.

As an example:

Wear Metal--------------Possible Sources (Engine)

Iron (Fe)-- Cylinder walls, gears, crankshaft, wrist pins, rings (cast), valve train and pistons in the case of Benz
Chromium (Cr)-- Rings, roller/taper bearings (some), liners, exhaust valves
Copper (Cu)-- Wrist pin bushings, bearings (near failure), cam bushings, oil cooler, valve train bushings, thrust washers
Aluminium (Al)-- Pistons, bearings, bushings, blocks (some), housing, oil pump bushings, blowers, thrust bearings
Nickel (Ni)-- Valve guides, bearings, shafts
Lead (Pb)-- Bearings, fuel octane improver
Molybdenum (Mo)-- Rings, additives
Silicon (Si)-- Sealant, anti-foam additive, ingested dirt
Tin (Sn)-- Pistons (overlay), bearings (overlay), bushings

I have explained in detail on the W204 forum why 229.51 diesel engine oils should not be used in 229.5 gasoline applications. Simply put, insufficient of the desired additives, does not need to pass the same level of HTHS (high temperature high shear) for valvetrain wear protection so it can be formulated with cheaper base oil & the fact that Diesel oils are formulated to control high temperature sludge, while gasoline engine oils are formulated to control low temperature sludge. Gasoline engines run far more aggressive cams & operate at higher RPM. Max RPM on a diesel engine is limited by the time taken for the diesel combustion process.

AdidasC230

thank you for all the super info, Ill go ask what oil we have, and let you know if any of us dealers are doing it right.

I really learned a lot, thanks for putting up with my dumb questions :-)