In the interest of full disclosure, Schaffer Oil is a very important sponsor to 4 Wheels and a Motor.com. They do not pay us any money, they provide their products for our use and we continue the relationship because their products work exceptionally well.
With that out of the way, I wanted to talk about the Schaeffer Oil Lab. Schaeffer offers the oil testing service to anyone who purchases their products. You have to buy the oil testing pack which includes shipping labels for the containers, a purchase between $22 and $28.
What Does the Schaeffer Oil Service Do?
Exactly what it says it does. It tests your oil and other fluids for anomalies. It can tell if you have antifreeze in your oil, the levels of additives, wear metals and more. These are given numeric values and color-coded for any category that has an issue.
The testing will also track and provide trend analysis letting you know of potential problems before they become catastrophic, or conversely let you know you can extend the time between oil changes.
Example Report
As you can see we got a clean bill of health for our first oil check. Always a good thing, but what do all of those items mean?
Wear metals show what parts of the engine may be breaking down. There are always some particulates present in any engine oil. What you want to watch are excessive amounts and a trend showing consistent high wear in any single area.
Multisource is a breakdown of the other metals that are present in the oil. Magnesium, calcium, and barium are detergent/dispersant additives. Phosphorous is used in extreme pressure additives and phosphorous along with zinc is used in anti-wear additives.
The preceding shows the allowable limits and viscosity. This chart is Schaeffer specific but most if not all manufacturers will have a similar breakdown for their acceptable ranges.
Should you get your oil checked?
The short answer is yes. The long answer is definitely yes. For less than $30 you get 6 test kits which given today’s average oil change interval covers you for possibly 3 years worth of testing. There are other services if you aren’t a Schaeffer Oil customer that offer the same type of test results. The benefit here is that if you already use Schaeffer products you can save money using their provided service instead of paying roughly $28 per test.
Do you test your oil? Let us know in the comments below.
