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Oil changes every 100 hours vs waiting for the lab, which way saves your motor
I ran a 60 horse diesel on my last boat out of Morgan City for two seasons and I changed the oil every 100 hours like clockwork because that is what the old guys on the dock always said. Then my buddy who runs a crew boat out of Fourchon showed me his oil sample reports and he only dumps his at 250 hours, sometimes 300, and his motor has 11,000 hours on it with no rebuild. I started sampling my own oil through a lab in Lafayette and it came back clean at 140 hours, so I pushed it to 180 and still no metal in the report. Now I send a sample every other change and let the numbers tell me when to dump it, which saves me about 40 bucks a change on filters and oil alone. But here is where I get stuck, if the lab says the oil is fine but my gut says the motor sounds different, which one do I trust? Half the guys I work with say never stretch a change on a working boat, the other half say the lab is smarter than your ears. What are you all doing on your own motors, hours on the clock or waiting on the report?
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kim_sanchez1926d ago
Isn't that the worst feeling, trusting your gut or the paper when both cost money?
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