Overnight oil pressure drop, Quick Fix!

[Sherman Bird]

Same thing happened to me yesterday on my 2015. Was just starting a 300 mile trip and notice my oil PSI was down to about 45 while driving around 70mph (typically in low 50s). By end of trip PSI was down to 40 doing 70 mph! Was using same Fram Ultra filter you were - XG10060. Was 3,200 miles into oil change. Stopped at local Autozone and got their STP xl filter (no clue if any good) and changed out this morning. Was at 42 psi when I pulled into garage, went up to 55 once I changed and pulled out of garage. Clearly defective.

Think I'm changing to WIX from now on.

Being a professional technician with many decades under my belt, I've gone to all kinds of industry "show and tell" regarding many products and have a lot of practical experience in the field. Inasmuch as I'm personally and professionally liable if I use a garbage filter on an engine, well, I get to fix or replace the engine on my dime. OUCH! So.... my motivation is to provide proper service with quality products which will accomplish first time accuracy for repairs and keep my customers happy. I bluntly tell my customers that they may be mad because their cost of high end parts are high and it took me more time than some high spark twitchy production shop to wham bam slam jam their car in and out in a day! But, They are NEVER mad that their vehicle is fixed correctly the first time! In the rare comeback, I DO stand behind my work and prioritize getting them taken care of.

I remember going to a training meeting about oil filters a number of years ago. These people had dozens of brands and models of oil filters torn open with data for each one. Fram was the lowest quality with the cheesiest internal pieces of all of them! A friend of mine is an old time mechanic turned Automotive media person with a nationally syndicated radio show. "Let's Talk Wheels". As a matter of fact, his show is sponsored by FCA. He told me about 2 years ago about a conversation he had with one of Fram's marketing chiefs and expressed this concern about their substandard product. Said chief assured him that they had "corrected" these quality issues. A few months ago, I was watching Steve Cox on You Tube do an oil filter comparison. Steve tore open a variety of oil filters and, the Fram was still very poorly made; the worst of the bunch.

I'm not slamming Fram, just putting out there what I know and from where. I used their filters in ignorance for years prior. Today, I generally go with OE or WIX.... and Denso on Asian vehicles.

 

[rotwiler]

I been using boss filters in my 13 Ram 5.7 for years, I have really high oil pressure compared to others I seen, at cold start sits at 62, drops to 60 after few minutes, driving hits almost 70. I am usually very prompt on oil changes around 7k, but last oil change I did was around 12k miles, was going to change and had to go on unexpected long trip with the truck and travel trailer, oil still smelled fine, wasn't dark dark black, I use biotech with pup so is usually a little darker just due to the biotech. I didn't have any pressure issues, maybe some gunk came loose and filled filter. If 8k is limit, that's not good, will keep eye out on that.

 

[UnleashedBeast]

Recently my 2019 1500 Classic 5.7L had an upper valvetrain tapping on startup that would not go away. I've heard this before if I do not drive my truck for a lengthy period of time, but it goes away seconds after you start the engine. This time, the tapping continued. I shut off the truck and changed the oil filter. Even though this filter is high quality with nano fiber media, it was faulty within 3,000 miles after the oil change. The filter is rated up to 15000 miles. Soon as I changed the filter, it was back to normal with no valvetrain tapping.

To this day I have NO idea why the engineers at Ram would allow the 5.7L to have such a small filter. My previous Rams I could install the longer version of the filter to make up for it. However, now I have a 4x4, and using a longer filter in the OEM location is impossible. The best thing to do is install an oil filter relocator so you can use a larger oil filter.

 

[Sherman Bird]

The best thing to do is install an oil filter relocator so you can use a larger oil filter.

I must disagree. Without engineering data to prove your theory that the factory filter is too small, I believe it is a stretch to make a conclusion-biased statement like this. WAY too many variables are st stake here for this to be accurate!