Put Magnet Inside oil filter?

That there center hole is where the oil comes OUT of the filter and INTO the engine. Don't put anything in there that you don't want falling into the engine. Heat reduces a magnet's hold, remember, and those ceramic magnets, IIRC, are the worst for demagnetizing when hot. Tempest aircraft filters have magnets in them. Expensive, though, and I seldom find much metal stuck there. A magnetic drain plug works better.

Dan

Many of the filters that I've seen cut open have a valve at that end of the filter... I can't say for sure, but the magnet could interfere with that valve.

I'd Google for images of cut open filters and check out the type that you have to see how it's assembled.

Other than that, it should be OK.

Won't hurt anything, unless you left the heat shrink in place (the way I'm envisioning this is, that you used the heat shrink simply to guide the magnet down the tube without sticking halfway) however you won't get it out unless you cut it open. You would get the same benefit simply by using a larger/stronger magnet and sticking it to the outside of the oil filter and/or bottom of the oil pan.

nate

The steel can or oil pan will short-circuit much of the flux path, making the magnet less than effective. That's why the magnetic drain plug has the magnet on the inside end.

Dan

There's a magnetic ring for that, now.

The oil path is shown through the filter, here, along with a magnetic ring:

The magnet is good.

No need to. You already have a magnet in your drain plug which does precisely the same thing. That's why you should always wipe the drain plug when you change your oil.

--scott

Something you're all missing... Anything caught by the magnet would automatically be taken out of the engine at each oil change.

In this day of plastic and alumnium parts, it's not a big deal, but if you have an iron block I'd say it would be worth doing.

He does? I have seen very few vehicles that had a magnetic drain plug from the factory, Porsche being a notable exception (the odd thing is that a Porsche engine has significantly less ferrous metal by mass than a typical engine.)

nate

Here's a picture of a cut-open filter from a 351C that had a magnet from an old harddisk stuck on the outside. The magnet has a radius that appear to fit the oil filter perfectly.

Dunno. A lot of German vehicles do have it, I know, but I have had Mitsubishis with it too. If you don't have one, it's worth getting one.

--scott

Eh... MAYBE... Does the engine pump every drop of oil close enough to the drain plug for any suspended shavings to be grabbed by the magnet? I doubt it...

Which doesn't take into consideration the fact that I haven't seen too many magnetic drain plugs in oil pans. That's not to say they don't exist, only that it seems that only a few makers install them.

And even if a drain plug is magnetic, I'd say that sticking a magnet somewhere in the pumped stream (and the oil filter seems to me like a really good candidate location) is much more likely to grab anything that may be floating in the oil than hoping that all the suspended shavings "just happen to" run over the drain plug close enough to be grabbed by the magnet...

That's why you should always wipe the drain

Don't know why but all of the responses concern an engine oil filter and drain plug.

The OP was asking about a transmission pan!

You must have missed the part in the original post where he asked about the viability of stuffing a magnet into the engine oil filter, after being inspired by noting that there was a magnet in the transmission pan (Only there wasn't one in the new one he bought)

Re-read the original message. You are correct. Sorry.

But anything caught by the magnet would have been caught by the FILTER MEDIA anyway!! The magnet is redundant.

The block material has nothing to do with it in most cases.

Crankshafts have always been forged steel or nodular iron, regardless of whether the block is aluminum or iron. Same for camshafts. Piston rings are iron (often chromium clad), and cylinder liners are iron even in most aluminum engines.

But the point is STILL being missed. Transmissions have gears, and gears tend to shed a fair amount of material as they wear. NOTHING inside an engine will be shedding a comparable amount of metal (unless its failing), so magnets in engine oiling systems don't do nearly as much good as they do in transmissions.

If you really want a magnet, stick it to the outside of the filter, or get a magnetic drain plug. I'd NEVER put one down inside the filter, especially NOT the center outlet opening. Hot oil could de-polarize the magnet and it would get blown right into the engine's oiling system where it would immediately block oil flow and starve the engine for oil.