Champion filters are back

[mhrivnak]

The Champion 48103-1's I ordered in February from spruce finally arrived. It feels like my birthday! But curiously, they're both stamped with the date 8/24/2021. I wonder if they've actually been hiding somewhere all this time!? Or maybe someone at the factory forgot to increment the year before they resumed production.

[philiplane]

the 48103's are less popular and have been available all along from Champion and Tempest, through most distributors. The date on this filter is  correct, it's been in hiding somewhere. It's a bit odd that Spruce didn't ship until now. My local distributors have hundreds of these in stock, and never ran out like they did with the 48108/48110/48111  filters.

[carusoam]

Champion is best known for not controlling their business… starting with their variable resistance spark plugs…

Add this to the pile of reasons to buy from the competitor…

-a-

[A64Pilot]

I’ve been a Tempest fan forever, but having done a little research lately it seems the Champion filter filters to a lower micron level, making it in my mind a better filter 

[mhrivnak]

FWIW I ordered two Tempest filters from spruce in August because it said they were expected to ship in a few days. That got pushed back at least three times, and now the website says Oct 4. If they're widely available from either manufacturer, it seems spruce isn't in the loop.

[RobertGary1]

They expect another 8,000 to arrive end of next month 

[0TreeLemur]

36 minutes ago, RobertGary1 said:

They expect another 8,000 to arrive end of next month 

Good.  I just use my last one.   Still waiting on six-pack I ordered in June!   I e-mailed AS and they replied in essence "be patient"...

[RobertGary1]

I think people change them too often.  50 hours regardless of calendar time is good. 

[Guest]

8 hours ago, 0TreeLemur said:

Good.  I just use my last one.   Still waiting on six-pack I ordered in June!   I e-mailed AS and they replied in essence "be patient"...

You might try ordering 6X1 as opposed to 1X6, we’ve encountered this before.

[Guest]

7 hours ago, RobertGary1 said:

I think people change them too often.  50 hours regardless of calendar time is good. 

Somewhere in the past, I believe that Cessna said a long filter like the 104, 109, 111 could go as much as 100 hours, 

[Boilermonkey]

I got my six pack of Tempest 48110-2 this month after waiting 3 months.   Just in time too, the AF1B engine requires an oil change every 25hrs and since we are breaking it in we are using a filter at each change for the first 100hrs.   Patience....they are trickling out.

[Pinecone]

9 hours ago, RobertGary1 said:

I think people change them too often.  50 hours regardless of calendar time is good. 

Based on what?  And do you include turbo motors in that also?

[Boilermonkey]

3 minutes ago, Pinecone said:

Based on what?  And do you include turbo motors in that also?

Here's what we go by:   https://www.lycoming.com/sites/default/files/SB480F Oil ServicingMetallic Solids Identification After Oil Servicing and Associated Corrective Action.pdf

[Pinecone]

So how about Continentals?

And most people seem to recommend 25 - 35 hours for turbo engines.

Oil and filters are cheap compared to an overhaul.

[A64Pilot]

A filter isn’t going to load up in a normal engine in 50 hours, but if I were to change every other oil change, I’d drain it, just like the idea of getting all the dirty oil out you can

Biggest reason to change with oil change is the inspection, if you don’t change it, you can’t inspect it.

Even back in the day the official recommendation for cars was new filter every other change.

[Vance Harral]

4 hours ago, Pinecone said:

Oil and filters are cheap compared to an overhaul.

I see this argument tossed out a lot, and I'm not really here to change minds.  But it's worth pointing out that people who change their oil twice as often have twice as many opportunities to get bit by bad parts and/or maintenance-induced failures: bad seals, bad torque, missed safety wire, stripped threads, etc.

Changing your oil more often isn't without its own set of risks, and if unlucky, you could wind up overhauling a lot sooner than you otherwise would have as a result.  Just saying "oil and filters are cheap compared to an overhaul" is a naive approach to cost and risk management.

[1980Mooney]

25 minutes ago, Vance Harral said:

I see this argument tossed out a lot, and I'm not really here to change minds.  But it's worth pointing out that people who change their oil twice as often have twice as many opportunities to get bit by bad parts and/or maintenance-induced failures: bad seals, bad torque, missed safety wire, stripped threads, etc.

Changing your oil more often isn't without its own set of risks, and if unlucky, you could wind up overhauling a lot sooner than you otherwise would have as a result.  Just saying "oil and filters are cheap compared to an overhaul" is a naive approach to cost and risk management.

True - and when G100UL and any other unleaded fuel arrives all GA should move to 100 hour oil change intervals. 

[DXB]

4 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

A filter isn’t going to load up in a normal engine in 50 hours, but if I were to change every other oil change, I’d drain it, just like the idea of getting all the dirty oil out you can

Biggest reason to change with oil change is the inspection, if you don’t change it, you can’t inspect it.

Reasonable, but the main appeal of running the filter longer for amateurs like me who do their own oil changes may be putting off the contortionism act at the back of the accessory case, not filter cost (though draining and reusing may make sense for victims of the current Soviet Russia-like filter rationing economy).

Regardless, changing and cutting the filter silences my recurring nightmares of my lifters and cam lobes turning to dust, so I keep doing it  every time I change the oil for my mental health 

[1980Mooney]

4 minutes ago, DXB said:

Reasonable, but the main appeal of running the filter longer for amateurs like me who do their own oil changes may be putting off the contortionism act at the back of the accessory case, not filter cost (though draining and reusing may make sense for victims of the current Soviet Russia-like filter rationing economy).

Regardless, changing and cutting the filter silences my recurring nightmares of my cam turning to dust, so I keep doing it  every time I change the oil for my mental health 

Once again the introduction of G100LL and other unleaded fuels should lead to the use of modern synthetic engine oils.  Synthetic lubricating oil is capable of carrying much higher-quality additives – friction modifiers, anti-wear additives, antioxidants, and more. Synthetics are able to withstand the high heat and high rpms of a turbocharger.  Once that dinosaur mineral oil is gone your mental health will improve!

[DXB]

9 minutes ago, 1980Mooney said:

Once again the introduction of G100LL and other unleaded fuels should lead to the use of modern synthetic engine oils.  Synthetic lubricating oil is capable of carrying much higher-quality additives – friction modifiers, anti-wear additives, antioxidants, and more. Synthetics are able to withstand the high heat and high rpms of a turbocharger.  Once that dinosaur mineral oil is gone your mental health will improve!

This is a great point.  From what I glean synthetic oil  is better for literally everything related to engine longevity except carrying the byproducts of tetraethyl lead combustion.  

[A64Pilot]

On 9/29/2022 at 2:52 PM, 1980Mooney said:

Once again the introduction of G100LL and other unleaded fuels should lead to the use of modern synthetic engine oils.  Synthetic lubricating oil is capable of carrying much higher-quality additives – friction modifiers, anti-wear additives, antioxidants, and more. Synthetics are able to withstand the high heat and high rpms of a turbocharger.  Once that dinosaur mineral oil is gone your mental health will improve!

One would expect that and maybe one day it will happen, but using your Rotax example it doesn’t seem to have done so.

Most all modern automotive synthetics have had many of the anti-wear additives removed as they shorten the life of pollution controls mostly O2 sensors and Cats.

So many of us performance car and motorcycle guys switched over to Diesel oil because they still have the anti wear additives, because no O2 sensors or Cats, but the two latest Diesel oils out have removed the anti wear additives because it seems Diesels now have Cats.

Several years ago motorcycle enthusiasts switched to Diesel oil because the new spec gas oils weren’t cutting the mustard with motorcycle flat tappet cams etc, personally I run Shell Rotella T6 5W-40 in everything I own except my airplane of course. I mean everything from the Lawnmower, Model-T, motorcycle, automobiles etc.

I would have expected the Rotax guys especially the Turbo’s to be running synthetic Diesel oil (the ones running unleaded only) but it seems they don’t, they run Aeroshell oil made for sport planes it seems.

Anyone know why? 

[A64Pilot]

Oh, and on our Air cooled Aircraft engines, lead is only part of it, the greater part is Ashless, we burn oil by design and a non ashless oil would quickly gum up our valves and foul plugs etc.

Is ther an Ashless Synthetic? I honestly have no idea.

The Mobil-1 AV oil must have been?

[Will.iam]

Isn’t there still carbon blowby since our air cooled engines have to have looser tolerances due to bigger thermal expansion than the water cooled automobile engine? And wasn’t the fully synthetic oil not as capable of holding said bliwby in suspension as regular dino oil was. Hence just because the lead will be gone doesn’t mean the rest of the carbon blowby will not still be there to sludge up the oil galleries if the synthetic can’t hold it in suspension as well as the dino oil. 

[Pinecone]

SYnthetic oils, AFAIK can handle the carbon, they just did not handle the lead well.

[A64Pilot]

Other than lead not being miscable with Group IV oils, Synthetic is pretty much superior in every way, except cost.

However the definition of the word synthetic has somewhat changed due to Castrol and their lawyers.

This explains oil groups pretty well both Dino and Syn, and even explains what is “real” syn and what’s being sold as syn, but many say isn’t really. I’m in the group that says group III isn’t real syn.

https://blog.amsoil.com/are-all-synthetic-oil-groups-the-same-group-iii-vs-iv-vs-v/

Group III oil which I believe most of our engines oils are can of course be made to hold lead in suspension with an additive package, but so can group IV “true” synthetics, no idea why Mobil 1 didn’t make their oil do so, never had any leaded gas experience would be my guess, and I assume after the SNAFU just wanted out of the aviation game entirely instead of fixing their oil, but that’s just a guess.

Having said all that the probably biggest advantage to syn oil is extended oil change intervals, and with an OCI of 50 hours it’s likely there just really isn’t much advantage to a group IV oil. We don’t change our oil because the oil is worn out or breaking down, we change it because it’s full of garbage, lead and combustion by products. If we had a high bypass filtration system we could greatly extend our oil change interval, but I don’t ever expect to see that, oil just isn’t expensive enough to justify it.

So it’s my belief that even when the lead goes away, we won’t see group IV oils, and wont see extended oil change intervals. We may however see reformulated oils labeled for unleaded fuel use only. And maybe even a group III oil labeled as Synthetic AKA Castrol.

I’m not even sure Mobil-1 is still a pure group IV PAO oil, group III is much cheaper and since Castrol can market it as a Synthetic, maybe Mobil-1 has switched to group III to compete with Castro price wise?

But this is my opinion