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Recently, in the forums, there has been a sort of discordant voice among the populace. We have some new posters (which is weird in a dying forum), and some of the old crew, after years of fighting, have synced up their headbutting sessions like sorority sisters with their periods. What better way to distill and crystallize those opinions than with an Oil Discussion Megathread (tm)? Every other forum seems to have one, and it is a no-brainer when you're looking for a place to dump bad opinions and angry vitriolic posting. As I'm a poo poo poster, this will kind of be a short, lovely OP, but I'll try my drunken best. The good news is that we in AI tend to care less about the OP and more about each other, for better or worse, so short first posts tend to fly pretty well here. The real meat is in the discussion. It used to be that motor oils were made purely of mined/extracted petroleum products. As time has marched on, "synthetic" oils have flooded the market. Once taken as voodoo magic elixirs that both "swell seals to stop leaks" and "destroy your old engine" at the same time, the vast majority of synthetic oils actually ended up being what some call "synthetic blends." I don't know what that means, so I'll skip it. What you do need to know, however, is that changing your oil "every 3,000 miles" is a scam. Really it depends on what your manual says, combined with what your driving style is and your climate. Ride it hard in stop and go traffic? Probably going to be a shorter change interval. Drive like a grandma in a 2012 Porche Panamera down a two-lane highway? Probably going to be longer. Just RTFM. I don't know much about modern cars, as the most modern vehicle I have ever owned is a 2004 Dodge Ram 1500. That is pretty equivalent technology-wise to the second most modern car I have ever owned, a 1998 Ford Explorer with the PPPTHBBBBT 4.0 SOHC engine. But since selling or trading out everything even semi-modern in the garage, the only cars I have left all have 1: Solid adjustable lifters, and 2: technology from at least 60 years ago. This means that I worship the One True God, Rotella T:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_Rotella_T Allegedly it has a higher zinc content, which is good for solid lifters. It also is rated (or, more accurately, advertised) for higher heat loads without breaking down, which is perfect for my ACVWs and pre-war construction motorcycles. I'm going to say it now: it's the only good product Shell makes in TYOOL 2015. Please use this thread to discuss why Rotella T is equal to Nicholas Cage in terms of godliness and second only to the flat 4 boxer engine, and the NA Miata, in terms of holiness. Also use it for posting anytime you change your engine/gearbox/primary/transmission/headlight oil, if you want. Send all Rotella T UPCs and/or codes to SSS as his reward for his brilliant Tumblr ramblings.  MOTORCYCLE OILS KozmoNaut posted:Special motorcycle oil is scam, it's the same oil as from the manufacturer's car oil line, with a different label on the jug and a 50-100% markup. There is no difference in shear strength, longevity, detergents, ability to suspend contamination particles or any other important parameter. But motorcycle guys are generally a very worrisome bunch that like to believe they're pampering their precious moto-babies, so they'll buy anything that says "special stuff for MOTORCYCLES!", even if it's just same old poo poo as everything else, with a big markup. Queen_Combat fucked around with this message at 10:20 on Nov 5, 2015 |
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Oct 26, 2015 08:47
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I like that I can cash in the serial numbers from jugs of Rotella to get Shell branded t-shirts and toy trucks. With how fast my Subaru burns oil it'll cover my entire Christmas gift list. (Please send me your Rotella codes.)
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Oct 26, 2015 09:10
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Shell oils are pretty good. I've never used mobil 1 or any race oils in my boring cars. Old 4 bangers, any 20w-50 dino like cheap caltex E: castrol I meant Rotaries, shell (dino only) old cars you like and want to keep a while, shell semi synth modern cars with vvt and known to be sludge magnets, shell fully synth I've never tried rotella, seems like it would be good in the above for anything except the more modern vvt cars Fo3 fucked around with this message at 11:44 on Oct 26, 2015 |
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Oct 26, 2015 11:37
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Caltex Delo 400 in all of my diesels, cant fault it in everything from my 1953 massey ferguson to dads 2015 CRD hilux. Better halfs tiida gets whatever 5w-30 full synth is on sale, only because buying the little bottles of sewing machine oil are expensive. The MR18DE in her Tiida sounds like a singer going full tilt... Theres only one true god of gearbox oils too- Castrol VMX-80. Its the ONLY oil on the market down here that will actually allow an old landcruiser gearbox to change into 2nd without sounding like a tip truck dumping a load of boulders.
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Oct 26, 2015 11:55
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I personally don't care for plain Rotella. It always left my duramax with the "typewriter tick" for a few thousand miles after the oil change. Rotella T6 did not,and neither did Mobil delvac 1. Right now I have delvac 1 in my tractor, mowers and pressure washer because I bought two cases of it to try out. It's even in my Prius C with no ill effect. However, it's expensive and I will be going back to Rotella T6 when it's gone.
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Oct 26, 2015 12:42
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My buddy is an engineer at some oil testing place here in RVA, and he tells me to use Pennzoil exclusively. He also once showed me a POV video of him boning his Asian girlfriend, so I tend to listen to what he has to say.
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Oct 26, 2015 13:19
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Geirskogul posted:I'm going to say it now: it's the only good product Shell makes in TYOOL 2015. I've never used Rotella but I think this statement is false - SOPUS has plenty of good oils out there. I've been running Pennzoil Platinum almost exclusively for years now and nearly every used oil analysis I've ever run on it has come back fine, even for ~7000 mile intervals on my Mazdaspeed3. The only question mark is the first analysis I did on the WJ, and it was I suspect the first-ever synthetic oil run in the engine. Haven't done a follow-up analysis yet on it. Of course I've also gotten far less picky about the brand on the bottle, because the reality is modern oils are all pretty loving good. I've got two five-quart bottles of Mobil1 and two more five-quart bottles of Quaker State synthetic sitting in the garage, in 0w20 for the Honda and 5w30 for the V8s. I've also still got three quarts left when I cleared out every Autozone in a five-mile radius of Pennzoil Ultra 0w40 when they dumped it on clearance for $1/qt (and nearly a case of Valvoline Dexron VI for the same price). I ran whatever plain dino oil was cheapest (Pennzoil Yellow / High Mileage, Mobil 5000) in the Ranger when I had it and never gave a gently caress about running more than 3000 miles on a change.
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Oct 26, 2015 17:35
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Geirskogul posted:Allegedly it has a higher zinc content, which is good for solid lifters. It also is rated (or, more accurately, advertised) for higher heat loads without breaking down, which is perfect for my ACVWs and pre-war construction motorcycles. Supposedly they've lowered the zinc content recently, but that's not the reason you should use Rotella T. You should use it because it's consistency in -30C weather is that of a finely aged vintage red wine. Seriously this poo poo holds up to anything, nearly everything else turns into molasses but loving Rotella T pours fresh out the bottle in near arctic conditions. Shell really loving figured out that one.
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Oct 26, 2015 17:46
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The biggest complaint I've seen about Rotella T(6) is a low film strength compared to other high performance oils. Does this matter in practice? There is no credible evidence that this matters, like almost every other metric that is used to compare oils. I throw Rotella T6 in my race Miata and Mobil 1 in anything that needs synthetic and whatever is cheap in the stuff that doesn't need synthetic. Cars are currently at 80k (2005), 110k (2006), 173k(2001) and 221k(2005) so I suppose it works fine.
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Oct 26, 2015 18:02
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Sometimes I grab T6 instead of normal T because it can be cheaper depending on the sale. Usually a higher weight because Phoenix, too, like 20w50. What is the difference?
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Oct 26, 2015 22:06
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I'd love to read if Royal Purple actually lives up to any of the hype. I'm probably a bad person, but I run the parts store brand in the beater. Toyota never updated the manual so officially its still lists 3000 mile intervals. Seeing as how that lasts me about 6 months, I figure even if that is "early", I can spend $20 and an hour changing the oil anyways.
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Oct 26, 2015 22:11
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I asked about rotella before but then some rude yelled at me that it was a diesel oil. I used motorcraft synthetic for a while since it was so cheap, now I just go with mobil 1 because thats what everyone on this forum seems to recommend if it isnt rotella.
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Oct 26, 2015 22:35
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I use Total Quartz INEO 5w-30 (which is also an oil intended for diesels) in my BMW; it works great across a huge temperature range, it holds up tremendously well over my frankly short 6-7000 mile oil change intervals, and since I buy it in bulk, it's cheaper than Rotella T and a hell of a lot cheaper than the liquid gold that is Mobil 1 0w-40 European Car Formula. Also, I am a firm believer in getting your oil analysed by a lab as well; it can alert you to all kinds of little problems well in advance of them becoming big problems. Also, I heard that if you say AMSOIL SUCKS three times, one of their reps will register and start shilling his/her product... AMSOIL SUCKS AMSOIL SUCKS AMSOIL SUCKS
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Oct 26, 2015 22:45
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So is switching to synthetic on a really old engine not a bad idea anymore? All the vehicles in my fleet have 200K+ miles and are at least fifteen years old. I always assumed a switch to synthetic at this point was a terrible idea. The only car it really matters on is my wife's 1999 Avalon (3.0 1MZ-FE V6) with 335k miles. The car runs great, but the engine burns over a quart of oil every 1000 miles. My wife puts up to 2000 miles per month on the car, so the longer change intervals from synthetic would be nice. The extra expense from all the oil the engine burns might make a switch not cost effective. I don't put a lot of miles on any of my cars, so an oil change every 3000 miles is like once or twice a year.
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Oct 26, 2015 23:21
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For boring ol' daily drivers (Mazda3), does this actually matter? The manual just says to check for the SAE label, so I just chuck in whatever's on sale, often including store brand. It needs 0W-20, which for most brands seems real expensive.
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Oct 26, 2015 23:48
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PBCrunch posted:So is switching to synthetic on a really old engine not a bad idea anymore? All the vehicles in my fleet have 200K+ miles and are at least fifteen years old. I always assumed a switch to synthetic at this point was a terrible idea. I switched my WJ from exclusively dino (there's no way this from-new stack of oilchange receipts at no more than $25 per change is anything but dino) to synthetic and have seen no increase in consumption or leakage. Which is to say, it didn't leak or burn any before, and it doesn't now. However... PBCrunch posted:The only car it really matters on is my wife's 1999 Avalon (3.0 1MZ-FE V6) with 335k miles. The car runs great, but the engine burns over a quart of oil every 1000 miles. My wife puts up to 2000 miles per month on the car, so the longer change intervals from synthetic would be nice. The extra expense from all the oil the engine burns might make a switch not cost effective. The whole point of a longer interval is doing so safely. I'd wager there's a good chance the oil is getting drat dirty thanks to whatever seals are letting it burn that much, and a synthetic oil might not actually help you here. Maybe do a Blackstone analysis on it and see what happens? ColdPie posted:For boring ol' daily drivers (Mazda3), does this actually matter? The manual just says to check for the SAE label, so I just chuck in whatever's on sale, often including store brand. It needs 0W-20, which for most brands seems real expensive. I run synthetic in my Honda, but the maintenance minder (which for my driving, recommends ~8k mile intervals) is set up with the assumption of dino oil. Seeing as they say you can run synthetic, but don't require it:  For what it's worth, I ran a UOA on it once, and my CR-V's interpretation of "15% oil life left" was about dead on with Blackstone's analysis.
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Oct 27, 2015 00:00
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2002 wrx with 170k- I switched from mobil 1 full synth to castrol GTX high mileage full synthetic. I I saw decreased oil wear and consumption with castrol over mobil 1. 1997 honda accord - lol you're getting 5w30 cheapo oil. At least the shop I work at uses a synth blend as their house oil. 
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Oct 27, 2015 00:16
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0W20 is synthetic only; what are you talking about? The Honda branded 0W20 is Idemitsu, it's good for 10k OCIs. e: OCIs... IOCs.... it's all making sense now
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Oct 27, 2015 00:20
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Geirskogul posted:Sometimes I grab T6 instead of normal T because it can be cheaper depending on the sale. Usually a higher weight because Phoenix, too, like 20w50. What is the difference? I could be wrong but T6 is the synthetic one. Should've specified that's actually what I use for my Scirocco. I did use Rotella T for about one summer but the engine has a little bit of a tap on start if its cold and it seemed worse with plain T versus T6, how objective that is I couldn't tell you. For what its worth the Rotella T I have is the exact same oil weight required for my kart engine's crankcase so I've been using the spare jug I have for that.
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Oct 27, 2015 00:23
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Phone posted:0W20 is synthetic only; what are you talking about? I was going to post a picture of Mobil conventional 0w20, but turns out they only go down to 5w20 in conventional. For added confusion the Canadian Mobil synthetic oil apparently all comes in the darker grey they only use for conventional here in the US, not the lighter bottles they use for synthetic here. So I guess if you want 0w20, it's a moot point, you're getting synthetic either way.
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Oct 27, 2015 00:26
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MrChips posted:I use Total Quartz INEO 5w-30 (which is also an oil intended for diesels) in my BMW; it works great across a huge temperature range, it holds up tremendously well over my frankly short 6-7000 mile oil change intervals, and since I buy it in bulk, it's cheaper than Rotella T and a hell of a lot cheaper than the liquid gold that is Mobil 1 0w-40 European Car Formula. Also, I am a firm believer in getting your oil analysed by a lab as well; it can alert you to all kinds of little problems well in advance of them becoming big problems. <muffinpox> imagine you're walking down an alley at night <muffinpox> suddenly a large man steps out and says "i hope you wern't planning on remaining an anal virgin tonight" <muffinpox> you turn and run but a larger man behind you blocks your way and bump into him and fall over <muffinpox> on your rear end you start slowly crawling backwards and looking for escape routes <muffinpox> the larger of the two says "i hope you have a divided highway because we need two lanes for the mack trucks we're hauling" as he slaps his crotch soothingly <muffinpox> as they rape you in the rear end you cry <muffinpox> those tears are amsoil <muffinpox> and they're $15/qt
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Oct 27, 2015 00:46
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Yep that is the case. I am running Eneos in both mazdas (skyactiv 3 and 2). I have a couple of samples to send to Blackstone. For Canada Mazda recommends 8000 km or 4 months. Seems excessive to me. Edit: ^ Haha. What ever happened to Nutcup?
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Oct 27, 2015 00:48
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By the way, Tractor Supply sells Rotella in 5 gal jugs. Think it's like $70.
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Oct 27, 2015 01:45
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Brigdh posted:I'd love to read if Royal Purple actually lives up to any of the hype. Supposedly they were bought out and the quality took a bit of a dive. In the 8 months I've been working for O'Reillys, I've had 3 customers and a co-worker complain of issues after trying their car or motorcycle oil. Co-worker spun a bearing in his motorcycle, another customer spun a bearing in his old muscle car (it had a crate motor tossed in 30k miles ago, or so he claimed) and the other two had glitter in their oil shortly after switching to royal purple. Possibly coincidence, but given that I don't hear similar complaints about our other high end oils, I'll just stick with castrol's full synthetic when its on sale. The rest of their stuff like gear oil (and apparently their gun oil) is supposedly still pretty loving good, but I'd stay away from the oil and filters. Edit: Oh, and fun fact, the base for our house brand full synthetic comes from Mobil apparently. 
Elmnt80 fucked around with this message at 01:59 on Oct 27, 2015 |
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Oct 27, 2015 01:54
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I put T6 in the Miata to make the goddamn lifters shut the gently caress up for around ~2500-3000 miles. Then they start clattering again. It worked. About to do it again.
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Oct 27, 2015 02:28
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I use Redline oil in my motorcycle. Their gear oil is nice for my car too.
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Oct 27, 2015 02:33
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I, too, run T6 (5w40) in the volvo. Wish I could run pennzoil plat or ultraplat, but it's not 30bux a case anymore. 
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Oct 27, 2015 02:34
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I'm seriously considering a switch from Mobil 1 HM 5w30 to Rotella T6 in my 170k 00 4Runner. Got a small irregular idle ticking from driver's side valve cover--thinking it may be valve related. Heard it recommended for noisy valvetrains...worth a shot I guess. Full synth right?
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Oct 27, 2015 02:50
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I use Rotella T Triple Protection in my family's early 2000-era ski boat which is rocking a 1983-era replacement GM inline 4 which was put in by the PO. So far it seems to have done a good job in that role (infrequent use, older engine). The motorcycle (2005 Kawasaki Z750) gets Rotella T6 full syn because it lacks the Energy Efficiency additive package, which I believe is molybdenum and some other stuff which can quickly wreck wet clutches. PO used the same stuff, I've had no issues whatsoever. Both cars (2005 and 2015 Honda CR-Vs) get Pennzoil Ultra Platinum 0w-20 and Fram Ultra filters since they both take the same weight and filter. I buy in relative bulk from Amazon. Change intervals vary - I have basically standardized on about a 10k interval for both although I do follow the oil life indicator on the 2015 which first tripped at around 8500 on the factory fill. When I first bought the 2005 with 83k on it, I did a series of Blackstone Lab test kids on it to see how the engine was holding up, and the findings supported a 10k interval using synthetic.
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Oct 27, 2015 03:13
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You're nicer to your bike than I am. I have an 02 ZRX with somewhere around 52k on it and it just gets normal rotella every 2 months or so. Usually when I see it's low, or gets notchy on shifts.
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Oct 27, 2015 03:21
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I use Rotella T6 in my Blackbird and Vmax. Never had any issues. I use Costco Delo 15-40 in my F-350, along with Napa 15-40 and sometimes Tractor Supply's 15-40, which are made by the same refinery, Ashland. Good stuff.
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Oct 27, 2015 04:02
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Brigdh posted:I'd love to read if Royal Purple actually lives up to any of the hype. http://www.animegame.com/cars/Oil%20Tests.pdf This was something that got linked on AI years and years ago from the older old guard and used to be pretty well respected... It's bearing tests of various oils and you'll notice Royal Purple performed well. Who knows if it's out of date though and I don't even see Rotella in there. It also doesn't include the opinions an engineer boning his asian girlfriend.
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Oct 27, 2015 04:32
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Oct 27, 2015 05:04
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Rotella dino, T6, or delo 400 in everything under this roof.
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Oct 27, 2015 05:10
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I got charged $75 for a 5L jug of castrol edge 5w30 synthetic... Tho I buy my Delo 400 by the 44 gallon drum at a time for $1K. It's nearly $50 for a 5L container
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Oct 27, 2015 09:01
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20W-50 Castrol in the beater, Rotella T in the beater-motorcycle (125cc single, so redline is 9500... gotta have that zinc), Shell 0W-30 in the CPU fan, Spitiko Extra Virgin in the pasta sauce.
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Oct 27, 2015 09:19
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I've heard from multiple places that rotella no longer has higher zinc content. Supposedly they switched to something else for the cushioning effect that zinc has because the zinc kills cats quicker. According to a racer friend, he says even race oils nowadays don't have enough zinc for high lift/high spring pressure flat tappet motors. He'll usually put in a bottle of zddp additive. I run rotella or Dello on everything except the scion, which gets 0w-20 I believe.
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Oct 27, 2015 09:47
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I have no idea what oil was in my 2008 Panda diesel, as it never burned a single drop between services. Probably some expensive Selenia unicorn jizz of some kind. But for the 1996 Suzuki GSF600? That got Total Quartz 9000 5w40. 2006 Yamaha XT660? Total Quartz 9000 5w40. 2000 Peugeot 406? Hell yeah it gets Total Quartz 9000 5w40. Why? Because it's nearly as cheap as the el-cheapo DIY store's house brand oil, and because Peugeot/Citroën puts Total oils in all of their cars from the factory. If it's good enough for them (and my mechanic), it's good enough for me. Besides, the 406 has an appetite for oil, always has and always will. So it's nice that I can top up with something that isn't ungodly expensive. IMHO it's much more important to change the oil at sensible intervals rather than trying to stretch expensive oil for as long as possible.
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Oct 27, 2015 10:53
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I want to know if anyone, amped up on the ridiculous hype surrounding gun oils, has tried filling their car with BreakFree CLP or FrogLube.
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Oct 27, 2015 11:57
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Does anyone change their automotive oil based purely on the TBN? We do partial changes in our medium speeds (generators) on board.
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Oct 27, 2015 13:05
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