Oil Filter Facts

THE BASICS ABOUT MOTORCYCLE Oil Filters

Clean Healthy Engines: Oil filters are all about engine protection. The quality of the oil you put in and the quality of the oil filter you use will make a difference to the life of your engine.

Not all oil filters are made equal, however their job is to trap and hold foreign particles that become suspended in the oil. If left unfiltered these tiny particles can damage engine parts such as pistons and bearings that are set to very fine clearances of 1 thousandth of an inch, leading to premature engine wear.

Safety Features - By-Pass Valves: Oil filters should have a by-pass valve which triggers if the filter element creates a large drop in pressure. When this happens the oil is not being filtered as it goes around the filter element. This can happen because a low grade oil is being used or when starting up on a very cold day and the oil is still cold , but mostly this will be an indicator that the filter is saturated with waste and needs replacing.

Safety Features - Anti-Drain Back Valve: Most motorcycles have oil filters mounted horizontally. The anti-drain valve is normally a piece of nitrile or silicon rubber that blocks the filter inlet unless there is positive pressure. This prevents the oil in the filter draining back into the engine, bringing with it a load of nasty engine damaging particles.

When to change your oil & oil filter? It depends how much mileage you are doing. However in our experience low grade oil and poor quality oil filters are false economies and shorten the service intervals and the life of your engine.

I always use a synthetic oil in Harleys and regular dino oil in older classic bikes combined with a good quality oil filter, preferably from the manufacturer of the engine. Your owner's manual provides details of the required oil changes for your bike.

However, common sense says that an oil change is a low cost, quick maintenance task that can be done easily by anyone with even a little mechanical understanding. It's recommend you change the oil filter with every oil change which is likely to be at every service, large or small, or once every 6 months. Oil filters must be changed no later than at every major service interval (usually every 5,000 - 8,000 miles) or at least once a year.