Oil, a "novel" use for toilet paper - part 1

Now most people think of oil filters are necessary, and they are, as they filter big stuff so it doesn't flow through the engine.  However, there is a lot of little itsy bitsy things that still float around.  And, over time, these small things add up until it's time to change oil per manufacturers recommendation.

Have been thinking about doing something like this for quite a few years, probably around ten, well before bought the RV.  What cemented my current thinking in place was talking to the brother of the person I bought the RV from.  His brother is a long haul trucker and he uses one of these filters in his big rig, and has over one million miles on the engine.  Don't have any knowledge of how many times, if any, he changes the oil, though am still impressed by that number.

There are three main steps for installing the filter.

1. Identify source of oil
2. Identify return of oil
3. Mount all the hardware

It seems like all of these steps are common to the different varieties of bypass filters out there.

For my installation I chose Frantz Oil Refiner.  It seems like a reasonably priced filter, with cost effective and widely available filter media, and seemed to be fairly simple and easy to install.  Upon reading around, along with their FAQ, also chose to install two filters in parallel so that it would filter oil twice as fast..  This added some complexity, and more fittings, to the install process.

What is the oil-cleaning capacity of a Frantz Oil Filter?

Each single unit will clean up to 8 quarts of lubricating oil and can be up to 10 quarts with more frequent element changes. Two single Frantz Oil Filtersmay be installed in a "parallel" sequence to provide sufficient cleaning capability for those engines with a crankcase capacity exceeding 8 quarts and up to 20 quarts.

Left is pressure sensor, right goes to turbo

There are quite a few well written articles about benefits of these filters, and quite a bit of negative nellie comments also.  Everyone I have personally talked to had nothing but positive things to say about these filters (two people, but still)...  These can also be used on any vehicle with an internal combustion engine.  I plan to put one of these on my Elio.

One article I just found is this, which gives a decent explanation.

Return oil goes here

A forum post talks about this brand of filter, but a prior version, along with some tweaks that the poster did.

Will cover full install in my next post, but felt the need to provide some pictures of source and return points of my oil.  Source is fairly easy, in theory, to get to, but implementation was quite a bit different.

Return is really easy to get to, and is very accessible, though I worry a little bit about the hose hanging there and possibly loosening the fitting.

On a side note, one of the older guys at the local NAPA Auto Partss store was really interested in this install.  Had to go there to get fittings and extra hose and during normal conversation told him what I was doing.  Piqued his interest and will go back there to update him as I need to work on my follow-up.

More details to come in next post...