Oil Filter; Is Bigger Necessarily Better?

[7394]

I have been doing my oil changes in fall, after last mow. Then my mowers can sleep w/ a belly full of fresh oil.

I don't think I'll change that habit either. Everyone has their preferences.

 

[cruzenmike]

No, I've never changed oil in the Fall and have no intention of starting now. The operational change I made was to religiously clean the air filter wrapper at 10 hour intervals as recommended by Cub Cadet, not the 50 hour interval recommended by Onan.

I am confused here. In an earlier post you said "I've always changed oil in the Spring. One of my engines is an Onan 14 hp that has blown crankcase gaskets, twice. The last time I had it apart was at the 600 hour mark. There are pictures of this engine in the Cub Cadet forum somewhere. You can see for yourself the effects of changing oil in the Spring." This statement would lead me believe that a) changing oil in the spring had in some way been related to your gasket failures, b) that this practice of doing it in the spring for many years resulted in more than one gasket failure and c) that because of said failures, you changed your routine; this was deduced from "It's now got almost 1100 hours on it, with no rebuild yet." I assumed that in this last statement, you are saying that you have not had a complete engine failure nor had you needed to replace the gasket again. If all of your troubles went away by simply "cleaning" the air filter, than it is likely that the oil changes, and when they are done has little to do with your gasket issues.

Again, I am just trying to make sense of this. I do not use my mower in adverse conditions. I would think that my engine and the rest of the mower has an easy life. I replace my air cleaner and pre-filter each and every season even if they looked clean. I run only ethanol free gasoline and replace the fuel filter at the start of each season. I put Genuine Briggs SAE30 oil in, and flush the system before putting the engine under any load. I do not operate the engine when ambient air conditions are under 50 degrees F and I never cut off more than 1/3 of the clippings. I find that after approximately 50 hours of use each year, the oil in the engine stays golden yellow all summer long and the engine doesn't consume a drop.

I guess at the end of the day, whatever I am doing it is working. I simply wanted to know if the bigger filter was "better." I guess in my case it probably does't matter!