OK! Don't laugh at me on this one. I just need to know who can tell anything about the Frantz "Miracle" Oil Cleaners??? I managed to pick one up today and it needs a little cleaning up, but it is in very very good condition. It even came with the original paperwork. The Guarantee, Door decal to write the mileage when changed, Installation instructions, Owners guide, literature request mailer, the original Frantz decal, and the original purchase receipt. The receipt shows that it was bought for a 1957 Plymouth at 97,778 miles. I will get some pics of everything after the weekend and post them as I will be away until late Sunday night. If anyone can throw some info at me about this, please do so.
I have one it does what the manufacturer claims. There is a thred here already. I think its titled toilet paper oil filter? Oldwolf
Still made today in I believe Idaho, I think they are now all stainless steel, are you sitting down, retail $165.00. I bought my last one at the Turlock Calif. in Jan. this year. Actually I got two, a used unit, which I thought I was buying for $10.00, but he said it was for the whole box. The box also included a NOS in the box unit, a dealers manual, 6# of brass fittings, a whole bunch of nifty door stickers and pounds of special self tapping fittings for the return line into the pan. My friend who was with me got a early Christmas present from me, he has been looking for one to use for several years. While they may work well for filtering oil, I use them to filter out water in my compressor lines. I have yet to change out the "filter elements", I do remove them when wet, let them air dry then reinstall on a rotational basis. You can Google "Frantz" for the latest info, by the way, they recomend buying 3, one for oil, one for the trans and one for your cooling system. Steve - Santa Rosa
The other thread is stale but we could revive it There's no reason to stop talking about the wonders of the TP filter. The other thread offers a lot of information, including old wives tale and the like. You have to read it all as there are great conflicting theories and great banter going on. It's here: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=151919&highlight=toilet+paper+filter (since it was the results of a search, i think the words toilet, paper & filter show up in red lol) Here is a 2006 thread on Stilko's: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=154 I have been a believer in TP filters since 1976 when my neighbor had a VW dune buggy. He had the Fram TP filter, much cheaper than the others. Later I was helping a friend move I ran across a Stilco TP filter and put it on my 1968 327 C10. I liked it because there were times I could not afford an oil change or $3-5 for a filter but, I COULD go into the garage and get a roll of TP I had stashed away (OMG! He's a toilet paper hoarder ). I learned a couple things from the instructions & from my dune buggy friend. So if you didn't get instructions with your garage sale find, do a search for all the info you can find online. I can tell you 3 things to remember. Only use cheap SINGLE PLY toilet paper. It's the fancy household 2 ply that falls apart, collapses, etc. because one of the ply's is made to be soft and fall apart. It plugs tight almost from the moment the oil hits it. 99 cent store, Dollar Tree, Everything's a Dollar and even Walgreen's has the cheap single ply TP for 25 to 50 cents a roll. You must unwind the roll until it sits gently, at least ½ way down but not more than 3/4 the way down to the bottom of the cylinder. The Cylinder is tapered slightly to compress the roll at the bottom end. If you jam the roll in tight from the top, the filter will have no flow from the start. Change the paper no more than 1000 miles. Some members in the other thread say 500 miles. They are correct. The MAX is 1000 miles. TP is still 50 cents a roll. If you can afford 50 cents every 500 miles then go with that!. lol (Sarcasm, as always, intended). About oil... I have 3 relatives in the industry. Each has told me that if oil wouldn't get contaminated, it would never wear out. Blow-by, scorching (turning the oil back into bits of carbon), and condensation (caused by running and cooling your engine) are the biggest enemies of oil - thus your engine bearings. One Uncle only changed the spin on store brand filter and added a quart every 1000 miles on his Datsun 280ZX and ran it for 200,000 miles. When you opened the valve cover, it was clean as a whistle. Like any filter, TP filters have a bi-pass spring that will open and allow free flow when the filter fills up and just plugs. So changing often is the key. The reason TP filters are popular though is not only because it's 50 cents a roll; it's also because TP is able to remove contaminants down to 1 or 2 microns compared to 6 or 7 microns of the auto parts brands. I haven't run the Stilko in a while since I sold my only SB Chevy, but you can gather info at their site no matter what brand of TP you run. I think Fram is $200ish so it still should be the cheapest. Stilko Filters
One step beyond a TP filter would be an Amsoil by-pass set-up or a small Dieselcraft centrifugal by-pass.They claim they can filter to less than 1 micron.
Pretty close...Amsoil rates thier bypass filter at 98.7% absolute effiency at 2 microns which insures the oil in my stovebolt 6 never darkens from soot contamination.
Finally getting around to replying. I was away for 4 days and didn't look at a computer the whole time. Only the iphone. Anyways. Thanks for the information. I am not sure if I am going to sell it, or if I'm going to keep it for use on a future project. The one thing I did forget to mention, it was originally purchased in 1963 for that 1957 Plymouth. I'll try to get some pic by the end of the week. School has me trying to keep up with all the reading and it's killing me.
My uncle was a dealer for the "Frantz"---He installed a unit on my new 1963 Ford wagon & I used it until 1970, trading in on a new 1970 Torino. I remember back then uncle said to use 2 ply toilet paper,---They must have upgraded their engineering process I guess.
ha ha, my grandmother, olive lenore mertle inez redwine frantz (yes, that is her real name) is 95 years old. one of her relatives started that company. ive always wanted to try one of those...
I also picked one up at Turlock this year, and another at a swap in Santa Rosa, both are in pretty good shape, and are completely different models
I've seen these (and serviced them) on customers' cars since the mid- '50s. There was a paper distributed by the Ashland oil Co., (Valvoline) that I received through the Independent Garage Owners' Ass'n when I had my shop... It stated that prolonged use of the Frantz filter altered the molecular structure of the oil, (seem to remember a number like 15,000 miles) so frequent oil changes were recommended. Perhaps a predictable reaction for a company whose chief interest was oil sales... Anyone remember that ad? It also appeared in "Motor Magazine", around 1965... Charmin'.
Finally got around to getting the pics done so I could post 'em up to share. 4 for now, more to come.
My dad sold these in the '60's. They are a help for any car with a full flow filter. I don't think I'd use one on a car that already has a bypass filter. The big problem with them is the return line for the oil. It's pretty easy to "tee" into the line to the gauge to get oil into the filter, but getting it back in the pan is a problem. When the old man sold them, they came with a fitting that screwed into the oil pan. You'd drill a small hole in the side of the pan (above the ambient oil level), and then bash it in with the proper sized center punch. The fitting I'm talking about had coarse, tapered threads and a hefty neoprene gasket. You'd screw it into the hole you made in the pan. If you made the right sized hole and didn't really reef on the fitting, they worked fine. I notice that fitting is missing of he one you have, which could be a problem. These things actually worked. When my dad sold them, they came with another sticker (the same size as the oil change sticker) made of blotter paper. It had 4 or 5 places where you were supposed to touch with oil from the dipstick every 100 miles. It was really impressive to see how the oil cleaned up over a few hundred miles. I had one on a '52 Ford, which I took off when I junked the car. I have no idea what happened to it. I wish I still had it.
Franz's son is now in the wholesale nursery business about 1/2 mile from my place. My son just scored me one of these things new still in the box that he has yet to deliver to me .......not sure what or which to put it on just yet.
Thought I would bump up this thread. Im still using my Frantz oil cleaner. I use the John Wayne toilet paper. and none of the bad things the naysayers have predicted have occurred.
Well it will catch particles, but beware of the claims. Depending on when it was purchased it may suggest that you change the filter element but don't need to change the oil as often or at all as long as you keep the filtering element changed. They eventually changed the claims once they got sued a few times. If you keep your oil and filter changed on a regular basis you're golden and I don't recall the number but there actually is a filter cartridge that will fit the housing and it is a good idea to use one of those.
I did a lot of research on these (on the net) and came to the conclusion they are the real deal. What they do is depth filtration. The oil goes through the paper roll from end to end and it filters out practically all contaminants. All dirt, sludge, even water and acid is absorbed. But, it takes 15 minutes to half an hour for all the oil in your engine to go through. The modern full flow filters all the oil but it is a coarse filter. It lets the small stuff through. The theory is, small particles of dirt can go through your bearings and not wreck them. Maybe so, but they will cause wear over time. The Frantz is like a pool filter. It sucks in a small stream of water, filters it, and pours it back in the pool. But eventually it will clean up a pool full of scummy water and make it sparkling clean. A Frantz works the same way. The best answer is to have both, a standard filter to filter all the oil as it goes through the system, and a Frantz for depth filtration and sparkling clean oil. This is easy today because you can buy an adapter that goes between your stock filter and the engine. It is a bypass for an oil cooler but works just as well for a filter. One guy who has a Dodge Diesel truck, uses a Frantz filter and never changes his oil. Every 1000 miles he changes filters, tops up the oil and every 5000 miles, sends a sample to be tested. The report is always the same, the oil is clean and in perfect condition, with perhaps a trace of dissolved iron. Eventually they told him he was wasting his money getting his oil tested. At the rate he was going, he would need an oil change at 50,000 miles just to replenish the additives. There are over the road diesel rigs that have gone 500,000 to 1,000,000 miles without changing oil, using a larger version of the same filter, that holds a roll of paper towels. And, it it true that the cheaper paper works better. You want Chuck Norris toilet paper - rough, tough, and doesn't take shit off anybody.
Every time you change the filter you must top up the oil. Because the paper absorbs a certain amount of oil. This means the additives are being replenished at every change. The oil never wears out but the additives do. You can change oil every 50,000 or 100,000 miles just to make sure the additives are ok.
I could also point out that at one time ALL oil filters were depth filtration, bypass filters like the Frantz. All car makers used them for 15 or 20 years. The full flow filters came in about the same time as hydraulic lifters. The engineers knew depth filtration is better, but one speck of dirt can plug up a hydraulic lifter. So they changed to a full flow filter to catch that speck of dirt, and let all the finer dirt go through. Studebaker used the bypass filter on all their engines until the early sixties. This means that for the first 10 years all their V8s had bypass filters. Today Studebaker fans will pay a premium for the later model engine with full flow filter. But a Studebaker expert who has rebuild dozens of them, says they are wasting their money. He has torn down and examined nearly 100 of them and there is NO difference in wear between the bypass and full flow filter.
After saying all that, a Frantz filter is a waste of money for the average motorist because the engine will last as long as he owns the car anyway. If you are planning on keeping your car forever and running up 200,000 300,000 miles or more, or have a diesel or other engine that requires frequent and expensive oil changes, the Frantz is a good investment.
exactly even Chevrolet did that. In 55the 265 didn't have a filter provision on the block. They where all solid lifter engines. they had a optional bypass canister filter. in 56 the 265 had hyd lifters and a full flow filter. You could get hyd lifters on a 235 and they where troublesome.I change my oil and both filters the original and the Frantz every 5000 miles and the oil always appears clean. The huge luberfinder auxallary filters used on diesels do the same thing as a Frantz toilet paper filter does.
I bought mine at a auction for a few dollars. I was skeptical however I installed it on a 250 chev engine in my wrecker. that engine had a lifter that rattled when the oil got a couple thousand miles on it. after using the Frantz it quit pecking. What you do is remove the filer and put it on the replacement vehicle.
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