Mortor oil or Synthetic?

[racer_amx]

Ive always run synthetic in mine mostly because i dont change the oil every three thousand miles

[mr-starion]

Broken in after 20 min? Is that serious or sarcasm?

[vbrad511]

OK, short story long... Several years ago, on a COLD december morning I came out to my truck and fired her up. She'd always had a little lifter tick when cold, but this time it was a bit more than that. Audibly quite a bit more. I panicked, as I was out of work, had nothing in reserve to buy or rebuild a motor (nor had the place to do it). Even though it wasn't time I changed the oil, regular Castrol. Made no difference. I started reading about synthetics and finally made a trip to Walmart and bought my first batch of Mobil1. Changed the oil again (laying on the drive in +04 degrees). My rattle/tap/knock/noise was all but gone. That's been about 120,000 miles ago.

Say what you want about synthetics being a waste of money, or not needed in older vehicles, but I'll swear by it now. Better lubricating qualities and longer life have got me hooked. (I still change it about every 3000)

[carguygibby]

 

they sure do, but it's a waste of money because they run fine on dinosaur oil...

 

July 1996, Consumer Reports published the results of a two-year motor oil test involving a fleet of 75 New York taxi cabs and found no noticeable advantage of synthetic oil over regular mineral oil. In their article, they noted that "Big-city cabs don't see many cold start-ups or long periods of high-speed driving in extreme heat. But our test results relate to the most common type of severe service - stop-and-go city driving."

 

I have a G37S, it needs synthetic because it NEEDS the ester compounds in the oil, our cars never needed those esters so it's a waste...

July 1996?

I'll say this one more time and be done.

No chief, it is not a waste of money.

Our cars run fine on synthetic oil, offers superior protection especially in a turbocharged motor and lasts 2-3 times longer.

Plus I don't have to stick my fat old butt under my cars every 3000 miles (even that's a myth now) to change the oil.

That's worth the extra cost alone!

I haven't used conventional oil in any of my cars in 15 years but that is my preference.

Conventional oil great for breaking in a new motor then up to you if you stick with that or switch to synthetic. Simple as that.

God I hate when someone starts another stupid oil thread.

Colin

[bha280]

So, if I mix the two, its like the best of both and I should be good. Right?

 

 

 

 

 

 

I kid, I kid

[lionbull]

I lurk in other car forums and rarely do oil threads remain civilized.

Also I did not know a motor was broken in, in the first 20 minutes of running, conquest or otherwise. Did you mean the cam?

Edited May 15, 2012 by lionbull

[mr-starion]

Everyones got their own personal preference on oil

[trini2dbone]

i run quaker state 20/50

[mistapickles]

I use synthetic....and I don't drive a taxi cab, nor do I live in New York; the study is not relevant to me.

 

 

 

Turborusty

If you've ever been to New York City you'd understand those guys go harder than you every day of the week just going from point "A" to "B"...

 

Anyway, the stuff that makes synthetic better is specific to modern engines. It's detrimental to to new engines to put dinosaur oil in it, but you get no benefit putting synthetic in to old engines...Infinity will void your warranty on your motor if you use dinosaur oil in their motors because there are qualities to synthetic that engineers made specific designs for, like how it's consistency is more watery. Our motors however are in everything from forklifts, to trucks, to mini-vans, to sedans....slapping a turbo on it doesn't necessarily make it a high performance engine that requires the latest modern lubrication. It's a truck motor.....get a bigger oil cooler and you'd get better results for your "extreme" turbo conditions than spending $3 extra a quart for something that is thinner in consistency.

[vbrad511]

Thinner in consistency, yet superior lubricating qualities. One more success story I'd almost forgotten about...my bike. I've got an 83 CB1100F with about 20k on the clock. I'd noticed in the years before I parked it I'd have an occasional grind when shifting gears...like syncros weren't meshing corectly. I moved it to Mobil1 last year as i got it back on the road, no more grind. MP, you got your opinion, just like everybody else does. I will also say this...I'm a painter by trade. Every now and then I'll have a question about a product and call one of the local paint stores. 4 out of 5 times the ONLY thing the employee can do is read the label of the can or the MSDS on the product. Most of them have no practical experience with their stuff, other than regurgitating what they read. While I'm sure certain studies have proven this, that, and the other thing about everything, the bottom line comes down to "does it work for YOU". I'm dead-set-convinced that synthetic oil has given me 120,000 more miles out of the 4.0 in my truck than conventional oil was going to.

[Dodge2004srt4]

There are so many reasons to run synthetic motor oil in any engine that I would spend an hour typing all the info in a single post. Its not nearly as simple as most of you make it seem. There is nothing even close in comparing conventional motor oil and synthetic motor oils. Briefly convention motor oil evaporates at half the temperature of synthetic, reason why cars can be a little low on oil without leaking or burning it. Its not thinner at the same weight as conventional, it is comprised of smaller molecules of oil. Myth: once you switch to synthetic you cannot go back to regular. FALSE, you simply wont get the protection from synthetic if you switch back. Fact: using a different brand of oil or constantly switching brands is very bad for your engine. Oil made or drilled in Pa has different components of sulfates and is not compatible with oils derived from Tx wells. Mixing them or switching back and forth can cause serious problems with the oils creating sludge and other bad things. So without going further, I have had probably 30 hours of training on motor oils in the last 10 years and I still dont know everything about them that I can remember. Its not a simple subject but there is no comparison from conventional to synthetic. Use regular for breaking a new or newly rebuilt engine in and go from there, its your car, your engine, and only you can be upset when something happens due to lubrication or the lack of. There are too many people who hear from their brother's mother's cousin's boyfriend's boss's customer's doctor's dad's wife that take them as fact. There are also to many opinions that arent supported by fact and cause alot of Myths, misconceptions, and non factual statements about synthetic. 10w-30 is the thinnest oil I would put in this engine, and I would use atleast 10w-40 or thicker for synthetic oil. Mobil 1 is a good common synthetic oil and there are quite a few more expensive and very good oils. The only conventional oil I would use is Brad Penn oil, good stuff for our engines by far ideal for high performance engine and alike. If you want good reading on synthetic oils check out credible links, most oil manufacturers have more scientific data behind their products because they know everyone needs oil and that misinformation will cause lawsuits. Alot of oil manufacturers like Valvoline will back up your engine for up to 300,000 miles by using synthetic oils just for changing them regularly using their products. No other payment or cost involved with a free warranty other than doing what you should be doing, timely regular oil changes using the same brand oil every time with the filter every time.

 

Thanks,

Chris.

[StreetVelocity]

i run 90w gear oil and 1.348 qts of water with great success in all my engines

[19cturbo]

why is everyone crying about price? geeze dont you people know to buy your oil at walmart? 5 quart jug of mobile one is 27 bucks. then add a good filter for anoter 6 bucks, your got roughly 37.00 in an oil change. Then if you just so happen to run over a little on your next oil change, guess what? YOUR FINE. i wouldnt run conventional oil for 4000 miles in my car, thats the life of your engine. Better lube= less friction= less wear.

[mistapickles]

Thinner in consistency, yet superior lubricating qualities. One more success story I'd almost forgotten about...my bike. I've got an 83 CB1100F with about 20k on the clock. I'd noticed in the years before I parked it I'd have an occasional grind when shifting gears...like syncros weren't meshing corectly. I moved it to Mobil1 last year as i got it back on the road, no more grind. MP, you got your opinion, just like everybody else does. I will also say this...I'm a painter by trade. Every now and then I'll have a question about a product and call one of the local paint stores. 4 out of 5 times the ONLY thing the employee can do is read the label of the can or the MSDS on the product. Most of them have no practical experience with their stuff, other than regurgitating what they read. While I'm sure certain studies have proven this, that, and the other thing about everything, the bottom line comes down to "does it work for YOU". I'm dead-set-convinced that synthetic oil has given me 120,000 more miles out of the 4.0 in my truck than conventional oil was going to.

If you're talking about gear oil, you were probably putting gear oil with the friction modifyer in it, that'll make your syncros not mesh. Damn near every gear oil on the market has it in it, it's hard to find it without it as a matter of fact unless you go with Mobil 1 which doesn't have it. That's probably why your issue was fixed, but you could have got the same results with a $6 bottle of Lucas without the modifyer.

There are so many reasons to run synthetic motor oil in any engine that I would spend an hour typing all the info in a single post. Its not nearly as simple as most of you make it seem. There is nothing even close in comparing conventional motor oil and synthetic motor oils. Briefly convention motor oil evaporates at half the temperature of synthetic, reason why cars can be a little low on oil without leaking or burning it. Its not thinner at the same weight as conventional, it is comprised of smaller molecules of oil. Myth: once you switch to synthetic you cannot go back to regular. FALSE, you simply wont get the protection from synthetic if you switch back. Fact: using a different brand of oil or constantly switching brands is very bad for your engine. Oil made or drilled in Pa has different components of sulfates and is not compatible with oils derived from Tx wells. Mixing them or switching back and forth can cause serious problems with the oils creating sludge and other bad things. So without going further, I have had probably 30 hours of training on motor oils in the last 10 years and I still dont know everything about them that I can remember. Its not a simple subject but there is no comparison from conventional to synthetic. Use regular for breaking a new or newly rebuilt engine in and go from there, its your car, your engine, and only you can be upset when something happens due to lubrication or the lack of. There are too many people who hear from their brother's mother's cousin's boyfriend's boss's customer's doctor's dad's wife that take them as fact. There are also to many opinions that arent supported by fact and cause alot of Myths, misconceptions, and non factual statements about synthetic. 10w-30 is the thinnest oil I would put in this engine, and I would use atleast 10w-40 or thicker for synthetic oil. Mobil 1 is a good common synthetic oil and there are quite a few more expensive and very good oils. The only conventional oil I would use is Brad Penn oil, good stuff for our engines by far ideal for high performance engine and alike. If you want good reading on synthetic oils check out credible links, most oil manufacturers have more scientific data behind their products because they know everyone needs oil and that misinformation will cause lawsuits. Alot of oil manufacturers like Valvoline will back up your engine for up to 300,000 miles by using synthetic oils just for changing them regularly using their products. No other payment or cost involved with a free warranty other than doing what you should be doing, timely regular oil changes using the same brand oil every time with the filter every time.

 

Thanks,

Chris.

Well all that's wonderful, but the Mobil 1 website says their oil doesn't have that much ZDDP in it and if the oil doesn't have ZDDP in it, it's causing premature wear on your cam, rockers and bearings. Currently dinosaur oils have diminishing amounts of ZDDP, Diesel truck oils have enough in it to preserve our engines. ZDDP is getting used less and less because modern catalytic converter systems get clogged by ZDDP, our cats don't get clogged by ZDDP. Because of the metals used in our blocks they need the zinc in ZDDP, you are destroying your engines prematurely. The new engines are made of different metals and they don't need ZDDP, they need ester compounds which is why you can't put dino oil in them. Yes Mobil1 has superior lubricating traits, but only for new cars.... ZDDP is an aging additive, just as our cars are aging technology. You can't even get a ZDDP additive that is compatible with synthetic, that's how old the technology is. Somewhere in your 30 hours they should have told you about how older engines need zinc additives and newer engines don't... It's not just a waste of money, it's wearing out your engine.

[scott87star]

To me it shows that you can do a lot of different things and they all work, at least to some degree. I'll point out what I always point out on these threads, if you're not doing occasional oil analysis then no matter what you're doing your just guessing. Oil analysis can tell you when you need to change (not nearly as often as you think) and if something is starting to go wrong what it might be (elemental analysis) and its cheaper than an oil change. What do I use? Amsoil signature series 0-30W synthetic year round, changed once a year when hurricane season starts (June 1st), oil filters changed TWICE a year (result of oil analysis, lots of sand in the air). 50,000 miles in the past five years, perfect compression (150, 150, 148, 150). Compression was much worse when I bought the car, I've tested it three times during that period and its gotten better each time.

[vbrad511]

If you're talking about gear oil, you were probably putting gear oil with the friction modifyer in it, that'll make your syncros not mesh. Damn near every gear oil on the market has it in it, it's hard to find it without it as a matter of fact unless you go with Mobil 1 which doesn't have it. That's probably why your issue was fixed, but you could have got the same results with a $6 bottle of Lucas without the modifyer.

Well all that's wonderful, but the Mobil 1 website says their oil doesn't have that much ZDDP in it and if the oil doesn't have ZDDP in it, it's causing premature wear on your cam, rockers and bearings. Currently dinosaur oils have diminishing amounts of ZDDP, Diesel truck oils have enough in it to preserve our engines. ZDDP is getting used less and less because modern catalytic converter systems get clogged by ZDDP, our cats don't get clogged by ZDDP. Because of the metals used in our blocks they need the zinc in ZDDP, you are destroying your engines prematurely. The new engines are made of different metals and they don't need ZDDP, they need ester compounds which is why you can't put dino oil in them. Yes Mobil1 has superior lubricating traits, but only for new cars.... ZDDP is an aging additive, just as our cars are aging technology. You can't even get a ZDDP additive that is compatible with synthetic, that's how old the technology is. Somewhere in your 30 hours they should have told you about how older engines need zinc additives and newer engines don't... It's not just a waste of money, it's wearing out your engine.

 

No, Mobil1, 15/50, motor oil. The engine and trans on my bike both bathe in the same oil. While dismissing the advantages of synthetics may work for you, I've realized the difference. Read what you want, believe what you want. I'll keep using what works for me (as well as countless others).