Bypass filters:

I don't know much about diesels, but Fleetguard has a good line.

On my gas vehicles, I use a Baldwin B164 on a OB1305 base. Quite reasonably priced and filters down to 2 microns. . I replace it when it is almost clogged. That is, no longer hot to the touch, just warm. It has a flat flange for easy mounting. It accepts 1/8 NPT hoses. Any good fleet truck supply will have the filter and be able to order the base. I use Fleet Supply or Fleetpride.

There are other bypass filters out there, but do your research, as many do not filter down to 2 microns.

If your warm idle oil pressure drops alarmingly with the .060 orifice, you can go down to .040 or .030 by soldering a fitting on the pressure hose shut and drilling it to size. My preference is to have the restriction on the fitting at the pressure end of the hose. That way, if a hose fails, there will be a smaller leak and you will have more time to detect it.

Thanks, Bill H. That was valuable info that I did not now.

I was unaware of the Fleetguard full flow/bypass dual purpose filters! My web searches for bypass filters did not hit them, kinda like looking for them to buy - same result.

I may even have the dual, but I cannot see my filter numbers.

I will call Cummins Monday and get part numbers straight. Baldwin does have the dual for my engine. But the Baldwin and Cummins p/n does not match my manual, which is not original, and is for the ISM, not the M11, but similar.

Since I am shooting for in/out at the shop in one day, I want to know the correct filter is in hand.

I believe all M11 engines use the LF3000 oil filter. The latest upgrade from Cummins Filtration (formerly Fleetguard) is the LF9009 which filters down to 5 microns with its built-in bypass system. This is the quickest way to get better filtration - simply upgrade to this level filter. Unless the mounting for the filter in your coach was modified, this should be the correct filter.

An external bypass filter is available from a number of sources as already mentioned here in the forum. Claims for these are made down to 1 micron filtration. That would be in addition to the upgrade to the LF9009.

Google 'oil bypass filter' and you can go nuts reading about the brands, research, etc.

Mike

Before installing any filter <5 micron, I'd check with the oil supplier. The old rule-of-thumb was that 5 micron was the sweet spot - fine enough to filter contaminants, coarse enough not to filter out additives.

Rusty, do you have any suggested reading on that?

Thanks, all. I confirmed with Spartan, before seeing your reply, the info about the 9009 and will go with that.

I did have been going nuts-o looking at bypass filters, and have concluded that they are simply too expensive to buy at my mileage rate.

Do you happen to know where any tap points on the M11 are located should one want to install an additional remote bypass filter?

Not just mileage rate to consider. Do you have an oil-cooled turbo? Bearings in that thing really prefer the cleanest oil possible. Some engines even have an oil-cooled alternator. Same goes for the bearings there.

Mike

quote:

Originally posted by bill h:
Rusty, do you have any suggested reading on that?

No, I don't; it comes from my days as a field lube engineer for Shell. Shell oil filters were rebranded Wix products, and we had a conference with some of our product design engineers, products applications engineers, and a rep from Wix.

One of the issues that came up was STP's offering a filter that claimed 1-2 micron. The design engineers pointed out that the metallic ash fines ("detergent-dispersants": barium and calcium salts, added to chemically neutralize acid) were also in that size range, ~2 micron. It was concluded that the STP filter shouldn't be recommended as it could filter out additives.

The "toilet paper" filter was also in vogue at the time, and general agreement was that it had two serious drawbacks. One was the chemicals (especially chlorine bleach) used in manufacture and the other was that toilet paper's filtration qualities couldn't be determined.

At the time, Shell was also using ashless (liquid) detergent-dispersants in some of its motor oils, based on the excellent results from the ashless Aeroshell W.

Shell still states Rotella T is a low-ash (calcium) oil (used to be about 1% by volume; Rotella was .5%)

However, the CJ-4 oils are expected to be available in the fall, and they will have still lower ash than the top current API class (CI4+). I infer from Shell that particulate size (or possibly the amounts) will be reduced, partially because USLD fuel has less sulphur to create sulfuric acid.

In the meanwhile, I stick with the Wix filters.

quote:

Do you happen to know where any tap points on the M11 are located should one want to install an additional remote bypass filter

Call the Cummins hotline (1-800-?) and they'll tell you right off. They have always been very knowledgeable and (seemingly) happy to field my questions.