The following was posted on another board but it turned into a debate between Motorcraft vs Fram oil filters. What I was really hoping for was some advice on solving this problem.

I have a 1993 Lincoln Town car with 134,000 miles on it. This is not a sludged up motor and it doesn’t use oil (yet). It has a quiet engine that just recently developed a single lifter tick. You can hear it inside the car with the windows up but not from the outside. I tried two oil changes with Rislone added but no improvement. When looking at the threads in the base of a new Motorcraft FL820S oil filter that I was about to install in my wife’s car I noticed a very fine strand of metal left from the tapping of the center threaded hole (Poor quality control). All my cars take this same filter so I closely inspected the eight filters I had on the shelf and two had this hair like strand of excess metal still wound in the threads! You would probably NOT see this strand with a casual glance you must be looking for it. Then the fear set in! What if one of these strands found it’s way into the oil gallery and then into a lifter on my 1993? Using a stethoscope, I believe it’s on the driver’s side bank of cylinders. The 4.6 OHC has a hydraulic lash adjuster that is different from a push rod engines that I am familiar with. My question is: What would be the best way to confirm and isolate this noisy lash adjuster and would it be a difficult job to replace it? Any ideas would be helpful. Thanks…….

That sucks, just put one on my car...

Is the oil filtered as it returns to the pan or as its pumped out? What side of flow would pick up the strand? I would hope its upstream of the filter elemnt, thus it *shouldnt* pose much threat. But man, now ya got me worried!

The flow is: pan, pump, filter, engine, pan.



I have a stack of 820s that I just picked up on clearance from WM, so I'll check them out...

I'll check mine later.

Tell him www.auto-rx.com will clean his HLA MUCH MUCH better than risolene or MMO or whatever else he's going to pour into his crankcse.

I always run my finger along the threads to clean out any flashing left... it's pretty common. The K&N filters never have any large pieces but my finger gets minute particles on it - enough to give me a little silver ring on my fingertip where I rubbed it.

Of 4 820s & 4 1As, none had any loose metal particles in the threads or the box.

Every filter type I've bought over the years has had some metal shavings left on it at one time or another. Aftermarket and OEM manufacturers. Is it the cause? Maybe. Just check and clean up each filter before installing it.

Alex.

I've seen shavings on the threads of just aboot every brand of filter I've used.

The bad news is that that the oil leaves the filter through that middle hole, so anything sitting on the threads does NOT get filtered.

That's why I always make sure to brush the threads out.

Thanks for the heads up...

Whats the oil route nyway? From the inner core out or the outer holes to the inner one?

Just curious. Might make a diff about worrying about shavings.

Looks like it flows into the outter holes, down and through the filter element, and out the center hole to the engine.