Why Disposable Oil Filters Are Hurting Your Vehicle’s Performance
The oil filter serves an important role. It’s the only thing in your car or truck that keeps the oil clean. Disposable oil filters are the most common type of oil filters used in cars. Yet, disposable oil filters can hurt your vehicle’s performance.
Disposable Oil Filters Let More Dirty Oil Into Your Engine Than You Think
Sounds pretty counterproductive, doesn’t it? Disposable oil filters do clean the oil, but not always.
- Paper filter media tends to clog up quickly. When that happens, it stops filtering dirty oil. Instead, the dirty oil is passed back into the engine via the bypass valve. Your engine will run on dirty oil until you change the oil filter.
- In many disposable oil filters, the bypass valve is weak. This means even if the filter isn’t clogged, the bypass valve may open up and let dirty oil through to the engine. Sure defeats the purpose of having an oil filter in your car, doesn’t it?
- Many disposable oil filters can only handle a low flow rate. So if your vehicle is running at higher RPMs, dirty oil may bypass the paper filter media and flow right to the engine.
Dirty oil is an engine’s worst enemy. It doesn’t only damage your engine. It also affects its performance. It lowers your engine’s power output and reduces its mileage.
Paper Filter Media Can Be Dangerous For Your Engine
Many disposable oil filter manufacturers produce their filters as cheaply as possible. Some of them use low quality materials. Some of them use questionable production processes.
- Often times, paper filter media can’t withstand the constant pressure. This can result in small chunks of the filter media tearing off and clogging up the oil passageways. This can starve portions of your engine of oil, which accelerates wear. As the engine wears faster than it would with clean oil, it also loses performance.
- Some disposable oil filters are produced so cheaply and hastily. It’s common for those filters to come with strands of cellulose and glue hanging off the filter media. These pieces can break off and contaminate the oil. When the oil is too contaminated, your engine’s performance suffers.
Disposable Oil Filters Don’t Come With Magnets
Did you know that tiny metal particles can end up in motor oil? This is a normal byproduct of metal-on-metal contact within the engine. But, disposable oil filters can’t catch most metal particles. As a result, the oil gets contaminated.
Contaminated oil can’t lubricate the engine well. This reduces the engine’s power and fuel economy.
The only way to filter these tiny metal particles out of the oil is with a magnet. Most disposable oil filters don’t come with magnets. So when your oil starts carrying metal particles, you’ll have no way of knowing until you notice the signs of engine wear.
Lifetime Oil Filters Are A Modern Solution
For a part that serves quite a big role in your engine, you would expect it to perform reliably. The good news is there’s a much higher performing option than disposable oil filters: lifetime oil filters!
A lifetime oil filter is a reusable oil filter that lasts the lifetime of your vehicle. It’s made of high quality steel.
PurePower! lifetime oil filters are as high quality as they come. A PurePower! lifetime oil filter doesn’t only clean your oil really well. It also improves your engine’s performance. It can handle a higher flow rate, so the bypass valve is used much less.