Prefilling An Oil Filter with Prefiltered Oil

[Gonzo 1066]

The point I was trying to make is that pre filling is not for everyone, should be done with EXTREME caution because a mistake in this procedure could cost you a new engine. If done with care and it makes you feel good then by all means follow your need. I agree that the turbo should have lube as quick as it can, but the fact that the filter will drain to at least 1/2 full with every extended stop should be considered.

 

[Woodenhead]

A bit off topic but I remember a member years ago that put a reservoir on his truck that would slowly fill and pressurize when the truck was running, then he'd shut the valve. Before starting again he'd open the valve to prelube and have pressure before hitting the key.

People can take this stuff a bit far and worry too much. I've always dumped clean oil in the center hole and screwed it on. Not necessary but it makes me feel good . Unless your changing your oil in a sandbox during a tornado it's pretty hard to screw this up. Or don't fill it, who cares, it'll fill itself in the blink of an eye anyway.

 

[dieseldoctor]

ive worked on a lot of diesel engines over the past few decades... all the old school mechanics i learned from back before the dawn of time told me its good practice to prefill the spin on filter if at all possible (back then most of them had a cartridge type filter, messy to service) but take care to not contaminate the new filter with dirt. a couple of them made a prefill tool out of what looked like an adapter to prefill only from the upstream side. all the cat guys recomended prefill if conditions werent to dirty, like service out on job site. ive not heard about the warranty claim on cummins engines being denied over a piece of aluminized plastic found in the motor plugging what i assume from reading posts was the spit hole in the big end of the rod. at any rate i have never had any lube related issue due to prefilling oil filters in 40 years of service /repair cat/cummins/detroit/ various automotive diesels from that silly *** 5.7 v8 gm cobbled togather to isuzu/mitsubishi/perkins and on and on...

 

[Bill Lins]

ive not heard about the warranty claim on cummins engines being denied over a piece of aluminized plastic found in the motor plugging what i assume from reading posts was the spit hole in the big end of the rod.

I believe they're referring to the nozzles that spray oil at the underside of the piston crowns.

 

[Regcabguy]

All my life I have been prefilling oil filters without incident. After alot of reading about this, I have changed my ways and let the engine fill the filter now. Really is no big deal and figure that i beat the odds of contamination getting in there prefilling! Tim

Same here. Last time I let the engine do the work and the oil pressure gauge read normal in a few seconds.

 

[Matt42]

Matt42, pretty dam sure that Gonzo was being sarcastic in his last post.

It's fun reading conversations from a few years ago, and seeing the friendly disagreements still being picked up and carried along. Kind of like driftwood. Having begun with that inept intro (but driftwood is the color of my truck's hood!), I see that I neglected to mention--nearly three years ago--that I am in no way militant about completely filling the oil filter to the brim. If I get it 1/3 full, it's good. If I get it 1/4 full, it's good. If I get it 1/2 full, it's good. Even 1/4 full is going to start it out with enough oil to lubricate the turbo bearings long enough to pump oil from the crankcase into the filter to get things going again.

So is it going to matter, starting with a dry filter or a full or partly full oil filter? Some say yes. Others say no, because they will no longer have the truck, or they'll have gone on to their reward. I bought my truck new, in 1996. I have always prefilled the filter, at least most of the way. If I had wanted to experiment, I would have bought two trucks.

The word of professional diesel fleet mechanics and maintenance staff means a great deal to me. If they have experience from new engine through many hours, many oil samplings, many oil changes to tear down and rebuild, and they can say that not prefilling makes no difference, I'm not going to argue. Experience counts. It takes me maybe six minutes to pour through the outer ring of holes so the prefilled oil gets prefiltered. It's my time to waste, and as the things I do to waste time, it's not the worst.

Best wishes, everyone! Let's all stay healthy and vertical.