How does this relate to lubrication and maintenance? In my view, the most important maintenance function doesn’t require anything from the tool box. It doesn’t require an instrument or an oil sample. It may not be on your PM schedule or lube route.

What it requires instead are skillful inspections that are rapid, comprehensive and frequent. Taking a pointer from speed chess, we need to pick up both inspection tempo and quality by deploying sensory-based (versus instrument-based) condition monitoring techniques. Let’s call them daily OMIs, or one-minute inspections.

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Doctors have perfected the skills of conducting physical exams. They know what questions to ask and how to examine the body for clues that signify health, injury or disease.

The same is true of pilots. They are taught how to perform critical preflight checks or inspections that reveal mechanical condition and safety.

By walking around the plane with checklist in hand, pilots survey the aircraft for signs of tire damage, maintenance errors, material defects, and even sabotage.

Mechanics, lubrication technicians and even equipment operators must be skilled at giving physicals as well. Like the doctor or pilot, they need to be alert to subtle changes or symptoms that might be an early sign of machine malfunction or accelerated wear.

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High consumption of engine oil is almost always a symptom or consequence of another condition of even greater importance. This article will address this issue from the standpoint of oil loss through combustion pathways (versus leakage).

While the focus will be more on diesel engines used in industrial and commercial service, much of what will be discussed applies equally well to personal automobiles and natural gas engines.

By itself, oil consumption is a well-known source of harmful emissions to the atmosphere (see the sidebar on page 4). Unburned or partially burned oil is released through the exhaust path in the form of hydrocarbons and particulate contamination (soot).

Additionally, motor oil anti-wear additives are known to poison or at least impair the performance of catalytic converters. The more oil consumed through the combustion chamber, the greater this poisoning risk/effect. This escalates the environmental impact further.

The causes of high oil consumption are many and complex. Because this consumption is symptomatic of other conditions, there is a need to be aware of changes in the oil consumption rate. These changes should be viewed in the context of other data and factors, including oil analysis, visual exhaust, engine service life (from last rebuild), boost pressures, running temperature, load/RACK, blow-by and operating conditions. Oil analysis will be discussed in terms of the correlation and meaning of common trends and how they might be useful for troubleshooting purposes.

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