Jump to content

Synthetic oil life


AudiOn19s

Recommended Posts

Those other oils are extremely dangerous to your catalytic converter. ZDDP (phosphorous) beats the shit out of catalysts. If you aren't running a cat and its some race car, well then who cares. But if you are (some sort of daily driver) you're going to be poisoning it and it will eventually fail, and much quicker than usual.

 

Maybe you don't care about your cat or the environment, but on a new car a bad cat means all sorts of shit's going to run wrong until you either do get sort of cat delete calibration (beyond something that just makes the light go away) or get a new converter, which is expensive. Pretty much your entire engine calibration is tied into emissions and the way your catalytic converter performs. When your cat dies your O2 sensors start reading all sorts of weird shit and your ecu starts doing all sorts of dumb shit which usually hurts your mileage quite a bit.

 

So, i guess my point is before some of you decide you want mad ZDDP in your perfectly daily driver (scion xb), realize it might not be worth the extra protection for your particular situation, and there is a potentially expensive downside.

 

those of you with race cars, standalones, and free flowing exhausts, burn as much of that shit as you please!

 

/rant

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So the synthetics from Pennzoil, Castrol, Valvoline, etc. all have to conform to these new regulations, so to speak?

 

my understanding was that only oils that came stock in cars or were recommended by the manufacturer had to meet it.

 

p.s. is that FIJI as in PGD?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I started running whatever "synthetic" is cheapest. By running *any* synthetic, I'm doing much more than the average vehicle owner - and the average vehicle owner running conventional oil and changing regularly should get well over 200k miles. Anymore, I only care about guarding against 99% - you can spend a fortune on trying to guard against 99.999999999999999999% - and perhaps see no difference in performance or wear. Oil over $6/quart is ridiculous. Maybe I'm losing my edge, but I seriously don't think I'll ever see the ROI on expensive oil. Anyone else feel like this?
Link to comment
Share on other sites

my understanding was that only oils that came stock in cars or were recommended by the manufacturer had to meet it.

 

p.s. is that FIJI as in PGD?

 

Okay, just want to make sure I understand.

 

And yes it means PGD.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I started running whatever "synthetic" is cheapest. By running *any* synthetic, I'm doing much more than the average vehicle owner - and the average vehicle owner running conventional oil and changing regularly should get well over 200k miles. Anymore, I only care about guarding against 99% - you can spend a fortune on trying to guard against 99.999999999999999999% - and perhaps see no difference in performance or wear. Oil over $6/quart is ridiculous. Maybe I'm losing my edge, but I seriously don't think I'll ever see the ROI on expensive oil. Anyone else feel like this?

 

I think for a DD or a car that doesn't see regular track use you're completely correct. I still use Mobil 1 in the M3, I just shortened my change intervals a bit.

 

-edit: Although in Andy's case where his motor costs more than the car itself....I'd probably want to use as good of oil as possible.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I started running whatever "synthetic" is cheapest. By running *any* synthetic, I'm doing much more than the average vehicle owner - and the average vehicle owner running conventional oil and changing regularly should get well over 200k miles. Anymore, I only care about guarding against 99% - you can spend a fortune on trying to guard against 99.999999999999999999% - and perhaps see no difference in performance or wear. Oil over $6/quart is ridiculous. Maybe I'm losing my edge, but I seriously don't think I'll ever see the ROI on expensive oil. Anyone else feel like this?

 

I'm with you. I don't do the track much at all any more since my last L67 where I would run Mobile 1 and change it often. Starting back in 01 when I got my Trailblazer I went to 7,500+ intervals. She's still running strong in Florida with the new owner/son and it has over 120k on it. Zero engine issues they say.

 

My wife has about 17k on the van now and it will go synthetic next change only because we do 5-7k intervals on it.

 

My MS3 will stay dino oil only because I will change it at the 3k mark because it's a turbo and is 99% city driven.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My MS3 will stay dino oil only because I will change it at the 3k mark because it's a turbo and is 99% city driven.

 

Can you explain this a bit? My GTI came with synthetic stock, did the MS3 not? What is the reasoning behind keeping dino because its a turbo and city driven?

 

I use M1 0-40 every 5k.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I swear this was discussed not too long ago but I think the search function is broken. How can there be no threads with the word "oil" in them at all?

 

Oil in question is Mobile 1. Car in question has been in storage for 12 months. Fresh oil prior to storage. Not run at all during the storage period. Pulled out of storage and now has a couple hundred miles on it.

 

Change the oil? This gives me an excuse to change brands too while I'm at it.

 

OR

 

Leave it, it's fine since it was fresh prior to storage?

 

 

when they tell you to change the oil every so many miles OR so many months, the time part which is 3 months for most filters is because they are made out of a paper media and after paper gets wet it only takes so long before it starts to fall apart. if the filter you used when you stored it was a paper media i would change it when you get the time.

 

Amsoil, K&N, and mobil one all use synthetic media. amsoil filters are guaranteed for 25,000 miles or 1 year

 

have you been to bobistheoilguy.com

 

Oil filter study - http://people.msoe.edu/~yoderw/oilfilterstudy/oilfilterstudy.html#sdf15 (old but some good info)

 

409,000 miles without an oil change -

http://www.performanceoiltechnology.com/haywood_grey_409k.htm

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Can you explain this a bit? My GTI came with synthetic stock, did the MS3 not? What is the reasoning behind keeping dino because its a turbo and city driven? I use M1 0-40 every 5k.

 

They come stock with Dino oil. Mazda doesn't even suggest Synthetic. Odd but true. 5w/30 is all.

 

The reason I am staying dino is because I'm going to be changing it every 3k since that's about 6mos worth of driving for me. I don't flog the car regularly and like Chris noted, the small percentage if any difference by using synthetic just isn't worth the costs IMO. I just won't the extended change interval stability that synthetic will bring as conventional is going to be fine for my use.

 

Some may debate and disagree, but I've yet to see any issues and I've had zero issues with my cars, modded or not.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

With synthetic in our enviroment here in ohio, changing at 3k mi. on a daily driver.

With mobil 1 i'll go 6k miles and changed the filter every 3k. The mustang had no motor issues with this at 125k mi. when i tore the motor down there was zero sludge buildup, and the wear was almost unnoticable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...