Too frequent dpf regens

Sexual Chocolate

Kind of at a loss as to what to make of the dpf in my car.

The last while it's being regening ever 250 km, today it started one at 230 km. Guessing it's not normal no ? The ass mass according to bimmer tool is 46g.

2008 N47 E90

CoBo55

Have you tried different diesel? Has the wrong oil been put in at a recent service? I've started using Millers diesel treatment in the superb and since the second tank of diesel I'm getting a regen about every 600km, it used to be every 3-400km.

mikeecho

I don't know if this is relevant, but it might be informative.

https://www.bimmerfest.com/threads/do-i-really-need-a-new-dpf.915943/

Sexual Chocolate

CoBo55 wrote: »

Have you tried different diesel? Has the wrong oil been put in at a recent service? I've started using Millers diesel treatment in the superb and since the second tank of diesel I'm getting a regen about every 600km, it used to be every 3-400km.

Being running solely on Circle K diesel the last 3-4 thousand kms. Last fuel I used other than that was from Top and I noticed the car would have a slight splutter around 100kmh. Never happened after I went back to Circle K. I wouldn't know what oil was being used before I got it, though it had a mostly full service history from Joe Duffy so I'm assuming the proper Ll04 stuff.

I had my back pressure tested and it's perfect and also had the pressure sensor replaced during the last service as it was throwing a code every so often. The EGR is coded out so I know it will probably regen a little more often but I still think 250km is quite excessive from looking online.

Sexual Chocolate

mikeecho wrote: »

I don't know if this is relevant, but it might be informative.

https://www.bimmerfest.com/threads/do-i-really-need-a-new-dpf.915943/

Cheers for the link.

No real specific answer on that thread, more arguing tbh. The BMW forums tend not to be that helpful I've found, more who has the bigger dick stuff on them.

My coolant gets up to temp no bother. When it regens it sits around 94/95 degrees. Exhaust temp floats around 480-530. Engine note and gearbox holds onto gears longer as well.

Another interesting myth I think I've broken is that a car or the e90 at least, doesn't have to have more than a quarter tank of diesel to perform a regen. Dunno what to be believing tbh.

Xpro

They generally regen around 250/300km averagely. If you said you had EGR coded out, your regens as matter of fact should be leas frequent, 350/500km as there is less soot going trough.

Also, the temperatures you mentioned, are they while regeneration is on or just normal driving?

TheBoyConor

You need to redline it for a good 15 minutes on the motorway to get a good enough flow and heat going through the exhaust to get everything cleared out.

Psychedelic Hedgehog

TheBoyConor wrote: »

You need to redline it for a good 15 minutes on the motorway to get a good enough flow and heat going through the exhaust to get everything cleared out.

Do not do this. 2k RPM for the same time period will be fine.

zg3409

Sexual Chocolate wrote: »

Kind of at a loss as to what to make of the dpf in my car.

The last while it's being regening ever 250 km, today it started one at 230 km. Guessing it's not normal no ? The ass mass according to bimmer tool is 46g.

2008 N47 E90

I wrote a lot if information on dpf on a golf here which might help.

https://www.golfmk7.com/forums/index.php?threads/dpf-diesel-particle-filter-wear-testing-using-odb-reader.331184/

You dont mention miles on the clock. The DPF will need replacing somewhere between 100,000 and 250,000km. Each regen leaves some ash behind, red stuff, which cannot burn off. Once it is stuffed with ash there is no room to collect soot (black stuff) to burn off.

Similar to a fireplace if you never remove the ash. With a new DPF 400km per regen may be normal, 250km may be normal if you DPF is 12 years old, 160,000km + and 1/2 full of ash that cannot be removed. However it is hardly worth replacing unless the car is throwing codes. It will throw codes at a certain level of ash it deems end of life. Ash level is hard to estimate, its basically guessed based on differential pressure at end of regeneration.

80g of ash on a mk7 golf throws codes so you seem to be well below that. 46g may be normal and you will probably need to just live with it until 80g possible limit. It will mean more frequent regen, as there is less room to collect soot. Regent time may be quicker as less so it stored to burn off. More regular oil changes recommended

TheBoyConor

Would redlining for an extended period be enough flow to disturb the ash and blow it out?
Is it possible to remove the DPF and use a pressure washer or steam hose to blast out accumulated ash?

zg3409

TheBoyConor wrote: »

Would redlining for an extended period be enough flow to disturb the ash and blow it out?
Is it possible to remove the DPF and use a pressure washer or steam hose to blast out accumulated ash?

No, there are companies that claim to clean DPFs but they remove soot by heating and harsh chemicals, you need to replace to remove ash. Soot removal is fine for say a city diesel lorry that never gets up to temperature and misses many regen until it is filled with soot, but full of ash needs replacing.

A DPF is basically like filter paper in a car air filter, to catch smallish particles, and burning off soot turns it to gas. You cant turn the ash to gas. Possibly removing it and applying back pressure might clear some like putting an air hose to a paper air filter in a car.

Xpro

Ash limit on BMW DPFs is max 75grams if my memory serves me right.

And yeah, the aul high revs, etc and not required for DPF regen.

Especially in BMW, out of all the cars I have seen, they have the most reliable systems.
Their cars will regen even in low speed conditions, low coolant temps, etc. Once you drive them at all, and the soot level is above 27g they commence the regen. Temps go up to 600c mark and off you go and do you things as normal.

But as someone above said, the age of the DPF will aswell influence the regen intervals

Sexual Chocolate

Xpro wrote: »

They generally regen around 250/300km averagely. If you said you had EGR coded out, your regens as matter of fact should be leas frequent, 350/500km as there is less soot going trough.

Also, the temperatures you mentioned, are they while regeneration is on or just normal driving?

I always was under the assumption it was the opposite.

While regening, normal driving would be around 90 then climb when idle to about 96/97 then back down when I set off again, tend be lower again with A/C on be a few degrees.

Sexual Chocolate

TheBoyConor wrote: »

You need to redline it for a good 15 minutes on the motorway to get a good enough flow and heat going through the exhaust to get everything cleared out.

As mentioned already I was always told not to do this and nor do I. I just take it let it sit at 100 or 120 and let it do it's thing.

Sexual Chocolate

zg3409 wrote: »

I wrote a lot if information on dpf on a golf here which might help.

https://www.golfmk7.com/forums/index.php?threads/dpf-diesel-particle-filter-wear-testing-using-odb-reader.331184/

You dont mention miles on the clock. The DPF will need replacing somewhere between 100,000 and 250,000km. Each regen leaves some ash behind, red stuff, which cannot burn off. Once it is stuffed with ash there is no room to collect soot (black stuff) to burn off.

Similar to a fireplace if you never remove the ash. With a new DPF 400km per regen may be normal, 250km may be normal if you DPF is 12 years old, 160,000km + and 1/2 full of ash that cannot be removed. However it is hardly worth replacing unless the car is throwing codes. It will throw codes at a certain level of ash it deems end of life. Ash level is hard to estimate, its basically guessed based on differential pressure at end of regeneration.

80g of ash on a mk7 golf throws codes so you seem to be well below that. 46g may be normal and you will probably need to just live with it until 80g possible limit. It will mean more frequent regen, as there is less room to collect soot. Regent time may be quicker as less so it stored to burn off. More regular oil changes recommended

Mileage on mine is 172k kms so quite low I suppose for 08.

I don't mind it doing regens as frequent as its doing them, though it can be annoying at times tbh but am more concerned if there's an underlying issue that causing it to happen so often.

Sexual Chocolate

Xpro wrote: »

Ash limit on BMW DPFs is max 75grams if my memory serves me right.

And yeah, the aul high revs, etc and not required for DPF regen.

Especially in BMW, out of all the cars I have seen, they have the most reliable systems.
Their cars will regen even in low speed conditions, low coolant temps, etc. Once you drive them at all, and the soot level is above 27g they commence the regen. Temps go up to 600c mark and off you go and do you things as normal.

But as someone above said, the age of the DPF will aswell influence the regen intervals

When mine done its regen yesterday the soot level according to Bimmer tool was 3.0g. Before I got the pressure sensor changed and EGR coded out it would begin at 18-25g. Again it's all calculated and not a true figure I believe.

Xpro

Sexual Chocolate wrote: »

When mine done its regen yesterday the soot level according to Bimmer tool was 3.0g. Before I got the pressure sensor changed and EGR coded out it would begin at 18-25g. Again it's all calculated and not a true figure I believe.

Yes they are ecu calculated values based on DPF pressure.
Bimmerlink is a great app if you’re doing data logging and monitoring on the go.

Also one very usefull value to check when data logging is to check injector post injection no2

If your EGR valve is disabled that should show 0 and only increase when the regen is on.

While if you had egr active, this would be constantly injecting fuel thus creating active regen. Which means the filter is always kept at high temp and its constantly burning off the soot

Sexual Chocolate

Just seen it there on app store for 35 quid. Might invest in that as I've just switched from Andriod and can't get Bimmer tool on apple.

Pkiernan

TheBoyConor wrote: »

You need to redline it for a good 15 minutes on the motorway to get a good enough flow and heat going through the exhaust to get everything cleared out.

My friends who's married to a Guards cousin told me this....

Sexual Chocolate

Anyone have any recommendations for where to have dpf removed and cleaned for down the line ?

Most recent regen took place after 750km yesterday but bearing in mind the majority of that mileage was motorway miles.

zg3409

Sexual Chocolate wrote: »

Anyone have any recommendations for where to have dpf removed and cleaned for down the line ?

Most recent regen took place after 750km yesterday but bearing in mind the majority of that mileage was motorway miles.

DPF cleaning only removes black stuff soot, not red stuff ash. When it is full with ash it needs to be replaced and old one recycled. The "companies" offering cleaning services give no guarantees, and only remove soot, which if you do the odd long run should be removed during a regeneration. A genuine replacement should be 600 euro + fitting. Sometimes you can get genuine ones from different names that are the same part but cheaper such as putting a skoda DPF on a VW or a ford DPF on some mazdas as they are the same engine. There can be a 200 euro different for same part from different genuine dealers.

750km per regen is extremely good, possibly suspiciously good, many cars will regen at a certain km since last regen even if DPF is not full, say at the 600km mark. You might get higher than that if car could not do a regen for some reason such as less than 1/4 tank of fuel, engine never getting up to temperature lots of short runs. It depends on the car, and how it decides when it should regen.

emo72

How do you know when a regen happens? I have a Passat b6 and I don't ever notice it happen. Done a few motorway trips recently and noticed nothing.

dsmythy

emo72 wrote: »

How do you know when a regen happens? I have a Passat b6 and I don't ever notice it happen. Done a few motorway trips recently and noticed nothing.

If it's happening passively on the motorway you'll barely notice. The natural heat generated just burns the crap away.

It's only when the car is forced to do the work from a lack of appropriate driving that your fuel consumption would increase, engine become noisier etc.

zg3409

emo72 wrote: »

How do you know when a regen happens? I have a Passat b6 and I don't ever notice it happen. Done a few motorway trips recently and noticed nothing.

If when you stop the car and get out and the radiator fan keeps running that's a sure sign a regen was happening just as you turn off engine. Its hard to notice otherwise, best way is to read exhaust gas temperature with an ODB dongle and an app on your phone. It will throw up error codes during service or maybe a dash light if it is not happy.
Many people with 08 or newer diesels get a shock at 200,000km when it needs replacing at a cost of 1,000 euro. Its something to watch out for when buying a diesel with over 100,000km on the clock.

CoBo55

emo72 wrote: »

How do you know when a regen happens? I have a Passat b6 and I don't ever notice it happen. Done a few motorway trips recently and noticed nothing.

On my superb the stop start won't work, idle speed sits at 1000rpm, it keeps telling me to change down earlier than usual, it likes the revs to be around 1500 no higher. I'm getting about 700km between regens but it really does depend on the type of driving I'm doing.

99nsr125

Sexual Chocolate wrote: »

Kind of at a loss as to what to make of the dpf in my car.

The last while it's being regening ever 250 km, today it started one at 230 km. Guessing it's not normal no ? The ass mass according to bimmer tool is 46g.

2008 N47 E90

191 Land Cruiser
90k
No regen yet
As in not a single one completed, indicated or initiated.

Audioslaven

I have a Honda and I get between 1000KM- 1200KM between regens. I was down at 800KM but I took out the DPF and backwash it with a wash down hose. I got alot of red and black crap out. I did the same on a 1.6HDI 08 Mazda 3 which was doing regens every 60KM, it went back out to 250KM between regens which I think is normal for the HDI engine.

Whocare

Audioslaven wrote: »

I have a Honda and I get between 1000KM- 1200KM between regens. I was down at 800KM but I took out the DPF and backwash it with a wash down hose. I got alot of red and black crap out. I did the same on a 1.6HDI 08 Mazda 3 which was doing regens every 60KM, it went back out to 250KM between regens which I think is normal for the HDI engine.

DIY or professionally cleaned

CoBo55

99nsr125 wrote: »

191 Land Cruiser
90k
No regen yet
As in not a single one completed, indicated or initiated.

You never know it's happening with the Toyota, the avensis is the same.

Audioslaven

Whocare wrote: »

DIY or professionally cleaned

DIY. It takes me about 40 minutes to remove. I use high volume of water rather than pressure. I always backwash and close off the DPF/Cat sensor holes. Leave it over night to drip dry , refit and let the car idle till all water is pushed out.

On the mazda, the filter was really bad so I set the ecu that it had a new DPF. Its been two years and the Mazda has no issues since with DPF duration and fuel economy increased back to 250KM / 60MPG

tcawley29

OSI wrote: »

Mod: Given you clearly don't know what you're talking could you please refrain from giving advice that is liable to cause damage to other posters property.

I've been waiting for you mods to step up here for a long time against this individual and finally here we are.

This is also a consistent poster of bad advice.

yamaha4life

Audioslaven wrote: »

DIY. It takes me about 40 minutes to remove. I use high volume of water rather than pressure. I always backwash and close off the DPF/Cat sensor holes. Leave it over night to drip dry , refit and let the car idle till all water is pushed out.

On the mazda, the filter was really bad so I set the ecu that it had a new DPF. Its been two years and the Mazda has no issues since with DPF duration and fuel economy increased back to 250KM / 60MPG

Just water? Hoze or powerwasher? No chemicals needed?

Very interested

Audioslaven

yamaha4life wrote: »

Just water? Hoze or powerwasher? No chemicals needed?

Very interested

Just water with a 3 inch hose on a pump. It does not have high pressure just pushes alot of water through. I have heard of a chemical that I might use the next time. I dont have the name of it at the moment but I have heard that leaving it in it over night can also give good results. So far I have used water and this has worked really well for me

Sexual Chocolate

zg3409 wrote: »

DPF cleaning only removes black stuff soot, not red stuff ash. When it is full with ash it needs to be replaced and old one recycled. The "companies" offering cleaning services give no guarantees, and only remove soot, which if you do the odd long run should be removed during a regeneration.

Anyone else able to share any experiences with dpf cleaning ? Lots of conflicting information about it.

A back pressure fault code returned the other day after having the sensor replaced 4k km ago so my mechanic is recommending to have it sent off to a company down in Killkenny to be cleaned if I didn't want to go down the delete road which I'm trying best to avoid.

I've attached an image of the description of the fault code below, not sure of the seriousness of it.

yamaha4life

Depends what car / engine. I had fault pressure too high amoung others relating to dpf in my volvo s40 2.0d with additive tank. The one or both hoses going from dpf to pressure differential sensor were blocked up with sooty carbon. I swapped them out and cleared the faults and the car was perfect there after apart from message on dash to top up additive tank. It was great to have car out of limp mode.

zg3409

Sexual Chocolate wrote: »

Anyone else able to share any experiences with dpf cleaning ? Lots of conflicting information about it.

A back pressure fault code returned the other day after having the sensor replaced 4k km ago so my mechanic is recommending to have it sent off to a company down in Killkenny to be cleaned if I didn't want to go down the delete road which I'm trying best to avoid.

I've attached an image of the description of the fault code below, not sure of the seriousness of it.

What car, what mileage, what age, what engine type/size?

Back pressure faults typically happen when one of the hoses from before or after the DPF breaks. They typically break as they harden due to age but also when the DPF is full the engine puts lots of pressure into the hose.

The hoses run to a differential pressure sensor, which guesses how blocked the DPF is, based on difference in pressure. 0 pressure means one of the hoses is broken

I assume your mechanic knows a bit about this, but cleaning is only really for cars doing short trips with low mileage. Over 150,000km means the DPF should be replaced or Deleted (which should fail NCT if they notice).

Replacing the hoses with a bad DPF will cause them to break again.

Another thing that can cause DPF blockage on low mileage cars is anything that causes the car to create abnormal smoke and soot such as a faulty injector or a badly running engine.
Even with a good DPF system the DPF will become re-blocked in no time.

Sexual Chocolate

2008 E90 320d, 173k kms.

I'll look into the hoses when I'm off work one of the days if I can.

Can't remember if I mentioned it already but when I got the car the glowplug module was showing a fault code and as far as I know BMWs won't regenerate if there's a module fault or more than 2 glow plugs showing faults. Wouldn't of helped things at the time I suppose, though I was quick to have it replaced.

Unless I was able to get a new dpf for about 500-700 quid I'd consider it but otherwise id be getting rid of it if it was going to cost more than that.