Re: Oil filter adaptor FYI.
smaug said:
ok, so someone machine a remote filter that has a "straight" connection in and out. Get to it, chop chop.
Its been done by another owner eons ago from what I understand but Ive never seen it to get a look at what was done. Im going to modify mine to more my liking though. Ive got enough projects already without something else to build from scratch
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there are 4.3s running with WELL over 200k miles on them, and they all use the same remote oil filter.
I agree there are 4.3s out there that have went well over 200k miles. Ive got one sitting in the corner of my garage now that ran fine and had ~180k on it when I yanked it out of the 4wd blazer it was in which was driven daily by a non car guy (read: prolly never saw WOT). However, how many sytys do you hear about making the 2 or 300k mark on the original engine? I only know of 1 or 2 right off and only one of those is touted as being on the original engine IIRC. Big difference in stress levels on the engine when you compare a N/A 4.3 and one that sees 15psi of boost on a regular basis and as we all know other than the pistons and main caps whats the difference between a N/A 4.3 and a stock syty engine? Nothing so the oiling system was designed for a N/A engine but was carried over to an engine that now puts out double the hp/tq of what it was originally designed for. Im thinking any improvements you can do to the oiling system arent gonna hurt anything one bit and may just save your wallet.
Jer said:
Good points but I don't think you can compare an iron and metal train going down the tracks to a given amount of fluid when it comes to turning corners. Newton's first law states that a body in motion will remain in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. This doesn't have as big an effect in our situation on motor oil as by nature it was designed for lubrication and therefore the resistance (and friction) created are minimal and therefore not an issue. The 90 degree bends are manufactured and used extensively w/o recourse and I doubt that there is any noticeable back pressure created if any.
While I used the train explanation to get the point accross you are correct in that comparing oil to a locomotive is about as much of an opposite as you can get but the theory is still the same (besides, I like trains). When talking about oiling systems you have to scale your thinking down in size/weight and I really couldnt come up with anything else right off the top of my head to do the comparison. Anyways, turning a 90 degree corner for oil is just as hard as for a locomotive but on a much much smaller scale. As Newton stated oil that weighs a few ounces (or anything else) doesnt want to change direction any more than something that weighs several tons does until its acted upon by something else. In this case its the wall of of the filter adaptor that it must slam into, slow down, turn the corner, then be accellerated again by the pump. This all happens very quickly so youll never see it on the gauge but it will cause the oil to be sheared on a miro level which adds heat and disrupts the flow (shearing of the trans fluid in the TC is what causes most of the heat, and a lot of it, in that system).
Unfortunately I cant get a pic of the configuration of how the oil must negotiate the turn into the opening down in the bottom of the adaptor (its horrible, trust me) but the main point Im trying to get across is that the unit with the tiny opening leaves very little room for the oil to make the turn into the port which means there is an incredible amount of flow interuption in there. Using the adaptor with the larger block opening will help the flow at that point quite a bit and if you feel industrious some work with a die grinder will help even more.
I will also agree that 90 deg bends are used in systems every day with no ill affects but you have to consider the
size of the opening relative to flow. A 90 deg bend isnt as much of an issue if its size is designed to minimize the affects of the 90. Talk to any of the fitting manufacturers and ask them if having say six 90 deg bends in a fluid circuit will perform the same as a straight piece of tubing if every thing is kept the same (pressure, temp, volume, inside diameter). Anyone in the fluid transfer industry will tell you less sharp bends equals a more efficient system and to get the same flow/volume you will need to increase the pump output, line size, or a combination of the two if space constraints wont allow for just one. Dont take my word for it call Russell, Aeroquip or Earls and ask em.
You mentioned that you cannot have pressure without restriction which is correct however you are forgetting what the pressure is provided by in an oiling system. In an
perfect oiling system all the pressure should be provided by the bearing clearances at the oils destination and any inefficiency between the pump and the bearings is just extra "work" the pump must over come to get the oil to its designated point. If you put a bunch of flow inhibitors (sharp 90s) in the circuit then by the time the oil gets to the bearings its hotter than was start with not to mention at a lower velocity which reduces the oils ability to do its intended job. You MUST look at oiling systems in several dimensions not just as flow or pressure since the oil does several things. If the point was just to get some oil to the bearings then 10psi of oil pressure circulated by a tiny 12v electric pump would be sufficient in any engine but thats not the case. The oil not only must circulate at the right speed to pull heat out of the bearing surfaces and their corosponding journals the oil film must be able to hold its integraty from the several thousand pound dynamic loads that it is subjected to on the rod/main journals. There is also the mechanical limits of an outomotive oiling system to consider too such as the bypass in the pump. The more back pressure you have the more the pressure bypass opens which dumps the oil right back into the pan without going anywhere other than through the pump which adds heat due to the pumps design (gear rotor) that shears the oil. Theres also the addes load on the distributor gear that drives the pump off of the cam, the timing chain that drives the cam, and lastly extra parasitic drag from the extra hp it takes to turn all of that monkey business.
One last thing...and this is kind of apples and oranges but the theory is the same... Why do we go through so much trouble to port polish heads? How bout getting rid of factory exhaust/manifolds and replacing them with mandrel bent exhaust/headers? Will a factory crimp style bent exhaust flow the same as a mandrel bent exhaust of the same diameter? Nope, but why? The diameter is the same.. Its mostly due to the sharp/uneven way factory bent exhaust is made interupting the flow causing the engine to work harder to expel the exhaust which is directly comparable to the way the oil paths are configured internal to the engine since the oil pump must work harder to expel the oil to its intended destination (not your gauge you look at but the engine bearings). This is assuming that you are putting on headers/exhaust and porting heads for performance not just for the oooh ahhhs among your friends when they look at it
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Something else to consider, w/o resistance there's no pressure. We all know how bad it is to lose oil pressure.
You are 100% correct but you are forgetting what the oil is for. As I stated above the oil is not designed to actuate a guage for us to look at and pressure is relative to the amount of restriction which in a
perfect oiling system that would only be the bearing clearances
not the path ways to get the oil there. Unfortunately a pefect oiling system will never see an automotive application so its one big compromise since due to space limitations, cost, and engineering guidelines you will have some inefficiencies built into the system even before you get the oil to the bearings. That being said anything you can do to reduce those extra inefficiencies wont hurt.
jwaller said:
I dont think it's as much of an issue as you do though.
I never said the sky was falling either. Its something I noticed that can easily be addressed should someone remove their filter adaptor and notice they have the restrictive one. Swap in the bigger of the two and your done, the oil pump is a little happier, you have a little more piece of mind, and your oil temps will thank you by half a degree or so.
I have driven/worked on 4wd 4.3's s-trucks with over 300k on the original oil lines which have the same 90 deg bends.
I have too but how many of those werent N/A 4.3s but original engined sytys again?
