Glen-L.com

Kens - Have to disagree with "somebody selling a bill of goods" - When you have a main engine that has a system oil capacity of 8000+ gallons we don't change oil like you do in a small engine. The oil is continuously centrifuged and filtered and often lasts the life of the ship precluding a major failure of a crankcase component. Additonal make up oil "sweetens" the additives as they are depleted through usage. MilSpec oils are a different subject. All the major oil companies have proprietary additive packages which is why a baseline should be run on the particular oil being used. In reality it isn't cost effective to engage in analysis programs when you are talking about small inboards/outboards using 5-15 qts of oil. As for testing of heavy marine fuels one could not operate without it considering the degradation of marine fuels over the years.

Using petroleum oil for the life of the ship would be a challenge at best. I can see the need to monitor the oil.
We use a purely synthetic milspec oil, and that is why I believe a baseline is already there due to it being milspec in the first place.
Few years ago the oil got approved to go the life of the engine. But, we dont run oil filters though, only run screens.

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