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Former colleague of my father's was a professor in the U.S. for awhile, from Korea or Japan (can't remember), and bought a new Toyota Camry when he was here. He'd never owned a car before. He never changed the oil, or did any maintenance to the car, just figured it would keep running so long as you put gas in it.
The Camry made it to about 60,000 miles before the engine seized up.
I'm not sure if this says something about the sturdiness of Toyota engines, the general quality of dino oil, or the ignorance of consumers. Probably all three.
-Karl
Has the same flash point as Quaker State, but lower than Wolf's Head or Pennzoil.
Has a lower pour point than Quaker State or Wolf's Head, but not as low as Pennzoil.
Has a higher kinetic viscoscity than any of them, far higher than Quaker State.
All of the data sheets are available on the Pennzoil web page. Their oils are SL. Apparently they haven't updated the Wal-Mart data sheets to reflect the SL oil in the stores yet. To my untrained eye, it looks to me like the SuperTech specs are better than Quaker State but not as good as Pennzoil.
I read over 5000 posts here and researched a few other referenced oil related sites trying to decide which filter and oil to use in my 2000 Accord and 2002 CRV. Based on all of this I decided to use the SL rated Chevron Supreme dino at $.94/quart and a $3 Walmart Supertech filter (made by Champion) and go with a 3-4K mile oil change interval.
I had actually bought Mobil 1 synthetic oil and filters but decided that there was not enough evidence that extended drain intervals with the synthetic would be superior to 3K mile changes with an SL dino. I rarely get over 5000 rpm and the temperature rarely gets below 10 degrees so I just not sure I see any real advantage.
I do plan to do regular analysis of my oil and believe that is the only thing that will really tell you what is going on in your engine. Each car, driver, and situation is unique.
My decision has nothing to do with cost. I am simply not convinced that extended oil intervals are the best thing for my engine or that synthetic oil is superior to dino for my application.
I will be shocked if this system does not deliver in excess of 200K miles on my engines and I doubt that I can stand to drive the same car for any more than 10 years anyway. Just my $.02
Personally I think that most SL rated oil is pretty good. I'm using Wal-Mart dino for many of the same reasons listed by tntitan. I'm staying on a 4K interval for my Elantra and pushing close to 5K for a Cavalier and Topaz. Both engines are ancient and should be quite easy on oil.
I enjoyed dabbling in synthetic lubes to the exclusion of petroleum based products for a decade. Then, I tired of that and went through an informal analysis of my own documented vehicle ownership and use patterns. I came to the conclusion, like you, that my best interests could readily be met by a well made "mid range" filter and dinosaur juice-- both to be changed not long after 3K miles, but understanding that 4K was not a moral dilemma! I still use synthetic lube products, but not expansively as before.
tntitan: "I decided that there was not enough evidence that extended drain intervals with the synthetic would be superior to 3K mile changes with an SL dino."
I've gone so far as to continue using Mobil 1 in a vehicle that the previous owner had used Mobil 1, and I even switched over another of our vehicles from conventional oil to Mobil 1 in the past 15,000 miles or so.
I will be switching back and due to my unexplainable excitement at finding what I believe to be excellent oil for about $1 a quart (Chevron Supreme and Citgo SuperGard SL-rated 5W30 and 10W30), I have already stockpiled about 40 quarts of dino-based oil even though I about 6 months' worth of Mobil 1 on hand.
If you want extra protection in off-normal conditions like an overheating engine you should go with syn.
For me changine every 8K with syn vs 4K for conventional:
Costs 100 bucks every 100K
Gives a measure of extra protection
Saves me 25 hours of work
Pretty simple for me, but then again I'm no rocket scientist.
Ironically the same dino/syn blend oil in another vehicle doesn't have the same problem.
So clearly one answer to this dilemma is to use whatever works best for your particular vehicle.
I'm inclined to agree; however, 2 caveats:
How does one define a "full synthetic" oil or a "synthetic blend" oil? Some folks here feel that certain oils marketed as full synthetic (E.g. Castrol Syntec, and an increasing number of other major-brand synthetics) are NOT true synthetics. And some oils marketed as "conventional oil" may in fact be what most people consider a synthetic blend.
When you throw that caveat into the equation, things become much less simple. Just my opinion.
Caveat #2: What does "better" mean? I have a rough idea based on what I hear on this forum, but the things that make synth better than conventional can be hard to explain and even harder to quantify.
That makes it less clear whether synthetic is worth the extra money. I have no problem paying 2-4x more for synthetic; I've done that for a while now. But the benefits are neither clear nor measurable to me, and therefore I cannot justify the extra cost.
Yes, you could minimize the cost difference by extending the synthetic change interval. But you'd need to pay for oil analysis to be safe, and that would widen the cost gap again.
Personally, it seems a little risky to leave ANY oil in for 10,000 miles or more and assume it's okay simply because it's synthetic (or you THINK it's synthetic).
Lesson-- with a low tech engine, frequent changes, and no temperature extremes dino works just fine.
csandste: how could someone drive 800 miles a day on a newspaper delivery route? That seems like a lot of miles. I think a 4-day change interval is a little too frequent. Couldn't it have been safely stretched to weekly or something? How much could the oil break down in a week?
Most companies will you give the spiel that we have spent all this time and research for blending oils and configuring weights and you shouldn't do it. However, they also admit that each one of their oils is compatible with every other oil in their line.
I also got an admission last week from one knowledgeable Valvoline technician that they know of many users who do a 50-50 blend of conventional and synthetic oil on their own.
The consistent warning I have gotten is that oils of different weights should not be done. This is not because they are incompatible, but that the resulting mixture may not be what would normally be expected. For example mixing 50% 10W-40 with 10W-30 may not necessarily create a 10W-35 weight.
So clearly while companies don't recommend blending it is anticipated that it is being done.
I have blended in the past on my Subaru, a 50% mixture of 5W-50, and 5W-30 Quaker State synthetic because the 5W-50 was much higher on gas mileage. The blend put mileage close to my conventional 10W-30, and saved me money. I will also be going back to that on the winter oil change because cold weather starts are smoother and quicker than an off the shelf blend.
I'm also custom blending my Mazda right now. 2 quarts of Valvoline 5W-30 Maxlife 2 quarts with 5W-30 Synpower. After extensive study of any information I could glean I am convinced of the following. Maxlife has wonderful cold start barrier protection, not the least of which was Bob's barrier protection test. Maxlife has amazing anti-sludge properties. But Maxlife has seal conditioners that at full strength may be too strong for the seals I just had replaced. The seal conditioner is designed for hardened, not new seals. However, experience shows that Syn doesn't give any advantage to seals at all. Synpower adds durability which Maxlife doesn't have, allowing me to feel comfortable extending the drain interval to 5,000 miles in lieu of my formerly 3,000 miles.
I believe that I will get increased protection and longer intervals with about the same cost as my former off the shelf blend.
see y'all
Rando
http://www.caranddriver.com/xp/Caranddriver/columns/2000/November/200011_columns_bedard.xml
"There are no industry standard definitions of either "full synthetic" or "semi-synthetic" in regard to actual synthetic base oil percentages of a finished product. I'm not involved in formulations so I can't offer exact percentages though I can tell you all Royal Purple products begin with 100% group IV PAO synthetic base oils. However, in finished form they do possess a degree of mineral base oils used as diluents or carrier oils for uniform suspension of the additives as you will find with any fully formulated synthetic lubricant regardless of how the manufacturer may market the product. Due to poor additive solubility of synthetic base oils, additive separation would occur without the appropriate diluents.
Bottom line here; focus on performance not on marketing. These terms are used by major oil manufacturers in an attempt to differentiate themselves knowing the general public has no other means of gauging high end lubricants. As well, RP does not simply rely on synthetic base oil for performance. While synthetic base oils provide benefits in certain regards, additives play the greater role in determining overall performance. The horsepower, fuel economy, operating temperature, etc. benefits RP users repeatedly see over other synthetics are indicative of the Synerlec high film strength additive technology, not the base oil. "
very good response from RP.
The product I use was marketed as "Klotz Flex-Drive."
Some GL-5 are not intended for use in MTX. Mobil explicitly say that you should not use Mobil 1 75W90 in MTX.
I have read good things about Redline MT-90 which is a GL-4 MTX oil.
The manual in my 93 626 recommends GL-4/GL-5 but I read from some site that the GL5 part is wrong.
see y'all
Rando
Hardly anything bad will happen if you change oil to synthetic now. Neither if you postpone till the second change.
Personally, I switched to synthetic with my 2000 Buick at second change and 5000 miles.
knapp3 syn is a better natural lubricant than conventional oil and clings to metal better. But having said that, my guess is the antiwear package may be more important. In very cold weather the syn would protect better by virtue of low pumping pressure (obviously). My 2 cents.
If they are NOT SL certified, all bets are off. A dino oil with molybdenum could be much better at preventing wear than a synthetic like Mobil 1 with reduced levels of zinc phosphate.
Pepper53 I used to wait ... although I think I was overly cautious. I don't know if it makes a difference anymore. I would hold off using an oil with molybdenum in it for the firts 5,000 miles, though. That may affect break-in of the rings and cylinder walls.
--- Bror Jace
Thanks.