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6.0 Injector Failure Analysis

Here are the professional reports and pictures for some recently failed 6.0 injectors. The owner of the vehicle went back to the restaurant where he collects his oil to find that they use a Sodium Hydroxide to clean their fryers, and then dump it on the fryer oil bin, which is well against EPA and OSHA regulations. Sodium Hydroxide, aka LYE is an extreme caustic whose properties are only enhanced by temperature.  It would appear that the failure of the injector was in no way related to the use of oil itself. In fact, when talking with Swamps Diesel Performance, they indicate this is a failure they commonly see in poorly processed home Bio-Diesel where the Lye is not fully removed from the batch.

From Jonathan at Swamps...

Jason, I am firmly of the opinion that once again the problem was what was in the oil,  not the oil itself. While the 6.0 injectors have nothing in common with the 7.3 in terms of parts interchangeability, the alloys are basically the same (not that I'm a metallurgist), but hardened tool steel is hardened tool steel, and all the areas of steel that were in contact with fuel were pitted/corroded. The problem is NOT moisture in the fuel, nor is it poor filtering. If you used this oil to fry some eggs in or make some french fries, you'd see the same results--your skillet would look like freshly sand-blasted bare metal.

And in conversation directly between Jonathan and Clay, BEFORE Clay knew what the restaurant used for cleaning the fryers...

Clay, I would really like it if you could get the oil from the grease dumpster sampled. Note that most places that do oil or fuel analysis are only checking the things than normally occur with regular refinery products used in normal engine operating conditions, so they are not really equipped to do the type of tests you need done. Start by finding out exactly how the restaurant cleans its fryers (and anything else that uses oil), what products it uses, and how it disposes of the used cleaning agents.  Then find out as much as you can about the cleaners so you can tell the oil analysis company to test specifically for "X" or "Y". If the container labels don't give enough information, get the manufacturer name and product name/number and search for the MSDS (Material Safety Data  Sheet) which will list everything except proprietary/trade-secret compounds.  I'd expect to see names like sodium hydroxide (lye), tri-sodium phosphate, and maybe chlorine or ammonia compounds.

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