An innovative Saturates, Aromatics, Resins, Asphaltenes (SARA) separation analytical instrument will be described. The methodology is a combined precipitation and chromatographic analysis that separates petroleum, heavy oil, bitumen, asphalt, or other product into eight subcomponent fractions. Four analytical columns are used in the separation, and unlike other SARA procedures, the columns do not have to be repacked or replaced between analyses which allows for unattended automated use. Asphaltenes precipitate on the first column and are subsequently eluted using three successive higher solvent-strength solvents. Maltenes elute through the first column and subsequently through combinations of three additional columns of subsequently greater adsorption strengths. Injection and elution is performed with a quaternary pump HPLC system using a variety of valve-directed forward and reverse-direction mobile phase flow programs. Peak elution for the multidimensional precipitation/redissolution and normal-phase chromatographic separation is monitored by optical absorbance at 500 nm and an evaporative light scattering (ELS) detector. The instrument-based technique provides results having distinct advantages to conventional SARA, and can be used for applications such as tracking chemical changes during petroleum refining, measurement of oxidative aging and performance of pavements, evaluating the chemical characteristics of roofing coatings, recycling (asphalt is conventionally known as the world’s most recycled material), rejuvenation of brittle asphaltic materials, and evaluation of increasingly-diverse sources as candidate feeds to manufacture more desirable and sustainable engineered products.