Armada oil filter? I thought it went to the lawnmower!

[kc932]

Before buying my Armada I researched like crazy. I stayed away from 04's due to the brakes and just first year bugs. I knew what I was getting into gas mileage wise but I love the power this vehicle has. Is it just me or does the size of the oil filter for these vehicle just seem to be begging for engine issues? I haven't heard or read any complaints but seriously the oil filter for a motor this size is laughable. Anybody else have concerns or had any issues?

[Timmbo]

Never had or heard of any problems at all on any vehicle with the mighty 5.6 in it.

[MinisterofDOOM]

Exterior filter dimensions don't mean much. What's important is how the filter flows and how good the filter media is. And cylinder displacement doesn't really have much bearing on filter size, anyway. Ford uses (or used, anyway) the same filter on everything from their 2.3 4-cylinder to their big V8s.

[kc932]

I'm sorry but I would have to respectfully disagree that the size of the oil filter doesn't really matter. A 5.6 liter motor with 8 cylinders is going to need more oil than a four cylinder with 1.4 liters. If you are trying to keep a sidewalk wet a smaller diameter garden hose would keep it wet but a larger diameter hose would be more efficient (sorry that was the only example I could think of this early in the morning). I just feel that the oil filter is a little small for that size motor. Edit- After my post I did a little research and half of this article's and forum's I found said size does matter and the other half said size does not matter. Ahh who knows, Nissan made it that size for a reason and if there have not been any issues who am I to disagree (lol).
Modified by kc932 at 9:49 AM 6/14/2009

[MinisterofDOOM]

Once you understand how oil filters work, you'll see why size isn't really an issue.

If you were to slice an oil filter open into circular segments you'd find it looks like a donut inside. There's an outer ring and an inner cylinder, separated by the filter element. The oil flows into the outer ring, through the filter element into the center, and back out to the engine through the center. The filter is definitely not the restrictive point. You could put a HUGE filter on and it wouldn't make a difference, since the oil still has to flow back into the engine through that fitting the filter screws onto. That's the restriction. As long as the filter allows enough flow to keep up with that, you're fine. It'd take a tiny filter for size alone to restrict that much. That's why the filter medium and it's flow efficiency is the important thing. If the filter medium restricts flow, THEN you could be in trouble. But most oil filters have valves that will bypass the filter medium if filtration becomes too restrictive, so even that's not a huge issue. Obviously circulating unfiltered oil isn't ideal, but it's better than starvation.

Here's a good diagram showing oil/filter flow in case my description wasn't very good.