Like oil, when it comes to choosing an oil filter, there are a lot of feelings and opinions about brands and methods surrounding them. And, like oil, there is a lot of those feelings and opinions not based in facts. So when someone who has a no-BS track record like Sherwood Cooke, Jr. of Royalty Auto Service puts out a video like this, we tend to listen a little closer to what he has to say.

Cooke is no stranger to slaying sacred dragons, as he started an internet storm when he performed some tests on his lifelong-favored tool brand, only to find it get outperformed by a budget competitor. He didn’t shy away from the truth, and instead used it as motivation to not be branded by names and feelings. In the video above, he’s applying that same mindset to looking at a ton of the same part number oil filters from different brands.

The Oil Filter Lineup In Question

For this particular video, Cooke chose a filter for a 2008-’17 Volkswagen 2.0L turbo engine. “A lot of times, we buy stuff based on a name,” says Cooke. “We’ve said this before — something might say ‘Snap-On’ on it, but it might be made by someone else. That holds true for a lot of products, and oil filters are one of them.”

Cooke starts with an OEM replacement oil filter as a control, and then proceeds to cut open a lot of filters to see what is inside each housing and compare. What he finds is quite interesting. While not putting the filters through any scientific testing for quantification and qualification, it’s readily apparent that there are not as many different filters as there are brands being looked at.

What Cooke notes is that there appear to be three different oil filter designs being branded separately in this sample lot. We’re not going to spoil the entire video for you, but what Cooke finds is that his selection of different oil filters can be grouped together into apparently coming out of three separate factories. Once he gets to the OEM filter, Cooke has already recognized a pattern between country of manufacture and part number sequence that leads him to hazard a guess as to what company is manufacturing the OEM, and it’s not the one he would have guessed before the test.

With the canister cut open, Cooke realizes that the OEM filter is not the same as the expensive off-the-shelf option, but rather a humble MicroGard filter that sells for about 33 percent less on the parts-store shelf. “It sure looks to me like these came off of the same assembly line,” says Cooke. “That could potentially save someone some money over the lifespan of a car. But, I’m not saying this is the same across every make and model of filter. I’m not going to cut open every filter on the market, but you can for your particular application.”

Really, what you should take away from this is that you shouldn’t ever just blindly buy products based on price or a name. But, do your own research and be an informed consumer, and buy based on the features and quality of the products.

Nine filters cut open, and all but one appear to have come from one of two different manufacturers. And that one standing alone was not the OEM-branded oil filter.