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A full-flow filter is designed to pass the full flow of engine oil through the filter element. When the element becomes clogged with trapped particles, or if the filter inlet or outlet ports somehow become plugged, an internal bypass valve allows the oil to flow directly to the engine without passing through the filter to prevent a loss of engine lubrication. Most full-flow filters have a spin-on metal shell containing a pleated filter element made from specially treated cartridge paper or synthetic material. The openings between the fibers in the paper element are small enough to trap particles around 20 to 40 microns in diameter. (A micron is 0.001 millimeters or about 0.00004 inches). Full-flow filters can't trap smaller particles because that would require much smaller openings, which would starve the flow of oil to the engine.

 

A bypass filter design is based on different principles. It uses the principles of absorption and adsorption to pass only a small part of the flow of engine oil through the filter element. It does this by diverting, a portion of the oil flow through the filter. Because a bypass filter doesn't have to handle the full flow of engine oil, it can use an element with much smaller openings without losing engine lubrication. Most bypass filters, because of the very nature of bypass filtration, can trap particles down to about 1 micron and much smaller.

Particles are trapped in the filter by clinging to the long cellulose fibres of the paper. That is the adsorption principal. Any particle that gets through the filter, because of its small size, can be picked up while traversing the filter again. This is why this type of filter is able to catch particles smaller than the the spaces between its fibres. Unlike the idea of a strainer, the filter is actually grabbing onto particles.

Water, which is formed by condensation in all engines, is removed by soaking into the fibres of the filter. Paper fibre is very absorbant towards water (hydrophylic). This is the absorption principal. A wound paper roll can absorb a great deal of water due to the cappilliary action of the fibres. They soak it up like a sponge but cannot absorb oil because of its large molecular size. Paper can absorb over twice its weight in water. This means that half a kg of paper can absorb over a litre of water. You will be surprised to see just how much water is taken out of the oil in the average engine. The paper roll becomes the perfect separator of oil from water; certainly better than a centrifuge. I have done a great deal of testing with centrifuging water from oil and, for the engine filter application, the paper roll method wins hands down. 

 

 

 

Truck Exceeds 1,000,000 miles (1.6 million Km) Using Bypass Filters: Click here for another example of the benefits of having a bypass oil filter on your engine. 

Jackmaster filters were fitted to two test cars, a 6 cylinder engined Ford, running on LPG, and a Toyota 4 cylinder running on petrol. In both cars, the oil was left unchanged. The oil was not dirty but very dark, as you would expect in an engine that was properly maintained. After about 100 kilometres the oil in both cars was noticeably cleaner. After 1500 kilometres the oil in the 6 cylinder Ford, on LPG, was almost as clean in colour as new oil. The oil in the Toyota, running on petrol, was slightly more tinged with carbon than the Ford. Neither car was low mileage and the Ford was a reasonably well used engine, having done in excess of 250,000 kms. This can only mean that the filter is gradually removing sub micron particles of carbon down to fractions of a micron, as it is these particles which normally remain in the oil to create the black discolouration.

The reason for the filter's effectiveness is that as the oil recirculates, the filter picks up the contaminants in stages. Larger particles and all water are trapped in the first pass. Some sub-micron particles are trapped at this stage and those that pass through are subsequently trapped when passing through the filter again. This indicates why the oil gradually cleans up. In applications where there is a very heavy carbon loading on the engine, as can be found in diesels, the production of new carbon can keep pace, to some extent, with the filter's capacity to remove it. The resulting oil will not harm the engine, as it only takes one pass to remove dangerous particles and water. In a future test we plan to run a test on an engine where the oil is absolutely filthy and far beyond its change period. There is no reason to suspect that the result will be any different to the results obtained in these two cases, other than taking longer to clean the oil.

 

Test results January 2010. (Tappet noise eliminated) 

 

Use for filtering Waste Vegetable Oil. 

 

Fairlane using less oil. 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 Here are some photos of an installation on a Ford courier "PE" Turbo Diesel sent in by a customer.

 http://jackmaster.com.au/oilfilters/Ford/Ford_Courier2000.html

 Boundary Film Lubrication and Bypass Filtration

 

Laboratory testing has indicated that, between lubricated surfaces, the film of oil varies under load, especially on the power stroke in internal combustion engines. This film of oil constitutes the boundary layer and is preventing mutual contact between those surfaces and varies between 8 microns down to 2.5 microns under heavy load. This indicates that normal full flow filtration on a motor vehicle is unable to protect lubricated surfaces from damage by abrasive particles larger than 2.5 microns, since full flow filters are unable to filter to such a fine size. Full flow filters cannot remove water either. These tests were done using 10W 50 oil.

It is essential to remove all acid forming water from the oil as well as particles to a size of at least two microns. Both these objectives are accomplished by bypass filtration. Jackmaster Bypass Filters will achieve this.