synthetic oil

[Accord9393]

yooo guys quick question.. in about 2 thousand miles ill be hitting 162k.. and im making the hop from regular castarol gtx to.. a synthetic brand, now the question is.. will i feel a bigger increase in the pep of the car? or will it be running cleaner, and also which synthetic brand should i go with? thanks for the help

[rnstein69]

bad idea to switch to synthetic at such a high mileage. stick with whatever oil you were using.

[MortsAccord]

Switching will be better for your cars performance, though you probably wouldn't notice much if anything at all.

The potential "bad" effect of switching to synthetic after many miles is the sludge that cakes up on internal parts of the engine will be gradually washed away by a good synthetic oil that keeps the engines internal parts clean.

That sludge would have kept the seals/gaskets in your engine from being conditioned by additives in your motor oil, which would make them fail because they dry up. Usually its the oil pan gasket or the valve cover gasket that develops the biggest oil leaking problems.

If your oil pans gasket looks good I'd switch.

If they do develop a leak should you switch you can retorque the bolts on the valve cover and the oil pan 1/4th a turn or until it snugs up, just don't over do it.

You can also run your car for 7000-10000 miles without worry about the oils viscosity becoming compromised. Which is less work you have to do and in some cases less cost incurred for running better oil and filtration.

Good choices would be Valvoline SynPower, Havoline synthetic, and Mobil 1. For weight I would go with 10w30, unless its -40 degrees outside you wont need 5w or 0w30 grades.

Upon switching to synthetic it wouldn't be a bad idea to get some gunk motor flush and a cheapo fram filter before you put the synthetic in there.

I did a few myself and the oil is noticeably more clean after 5000 miles as theres a lot less gunk in there, I've had 3 oil changes since I got the car and ran 2 sessions of motor flushing. I got right at 8500 miles on this change and the oil is just now starting to darken, as it would have with only 3000 miles on it before.

5 quart bottle of Mobil 1 at walmart is like 25 bucks. The filter is usually like 7-10 bucks. They say 15000 miles, I do 10000.

[Accord9393]

yea mort.. i just replaced my oil pan gasket, and as did the valve cover gaskets about 3 days ago... i dont think it would be a bad idea..? lol =D

[cefiro80]

On the topic of performance difference you will not tell a difference between oil. How ever if you use good synthetic and filter you can tell a difference sometimes in MPG. Be careful with engine flushes some of them are not ment to be done close toegther because they are potent chemicals and can ruin seals etc if they are done too often. I would just do one seafoam treatment and just make sure you change the oil on time everytime. Lastly, if you have the money motul is great oil.

[coachgreen]

What about the oil stabilizer from lucas? does that help anything at all? why or when would you use that?

[MortsAccord]

if you just replaced those gaskets, they might need to be retorqued a little after being heat cycled.

Since you replaced the stuff I hope that you took time to clean everything throughly.

As for that motul oil, I think its junk. a flash point of only 428 degrees and its a synthetic? Not good. Compare that to mobil 1's flash point of 478 for their 10W30.

A potential advantage it has is higher TBN(total base number), though if its flash point is 50 degrees LOWER than mobil 1's its acidic buildup will happen much faster than mobil's.

I'm betting its NOACK score(which wasnt provided in the doc i read) sucks.

Id rather use walmarts oil than that motul stuff any day based on the stats I read and my understanding of lubricants.

[Accord9393]

aight man... and yea that whole seafoam thing.. i dont get it.. anyone wanna fill me in on that too?? ahah thankss ill appriciate it

[WVU97GS-R]

just switch to mobile one synthetic and change every 5K miles if you don't beat on the car. 3K miles if you do beat on the car.

[cefiro80]

Originally Posted by MortsAccord

if you just replaced those gaskets, they might need to be retorqued a little after being heat cycled.

Since you replaced the stuff I hope that you took time to clean everything throughly.

As for that motul oil, I think its junk. a flash point of only 428 degrees and its a synthetic? Not good. Compare that to mobil 1's flash point of 478 for their 10W30.

A potential advantage it has is higher TBN(total base number), though if its flash point is 50 degrees LOWER than mobil 1's its acidic buildup will happen much faster than mobil's.

I'm betting its NOACK score(which wasnt provided in the doc i read) sucks.

Id rather use walmarts oil than that motul stuff any day based on the stats I read and my understanding of lubricants.

Please don't take this personal. I am sure all the documents you have read state the information you provide. However, I am not going to argue with race team engineers in formula one, motogp, drift, rally teams, and many other racing circuits out there. I would be willing to bet that Motul oils are used in more high competition engines worldwide than Mobil one. Many of them use Motul fluids as there SOLE lubrication and gear oil. I switched in my rex from Mobil one to Motul and had a much smoother idle and less valve noise. Plus, I gained 50 horsepower (kidding), However, just speaking from direct experience between the two oils. Plus, be sure of the Motul type of oil they are comparing to. They have different competition levels of oils. Again, not trying to get personal.

[hondaboy95]

coachgreen....the oil additives like Lucas don't really help. This same thing holds true for STP oil additives, etc. I know that Lucas has an impressive countertop display showing the additive at work, but I've heard that these additives only promote foaming....which is bad.

Accord9393....Seafoam is a cleaner that can be found at auto stores like Napa. It's usually found in the oil additive/cleaner section. Do a search online and you should be able to see what the can looks like.

It can be used in several ways, as state on the can. You can pour it into a tank of gas to clean fuel injectors and lines, you can pour it into your oil to clean the sludge and buildup, or you can suck it into the engine (via vacuum line on the intake or PCV valve) and clean off the valves and pistons.

Do a search and you should be able to find out about how to perform the last procedure for your car, if this is of any interest for you.

[MortsAccord]

Originally Posted by cefiro80

Please don't take this personal. I am sure all the documents you have read state the information you provide. However, I am not going to argue with race team engineers in formula one, motogp, drift, rally teams, and many other racing circuits out there. I would be willing to bet that Motul oils are used in more high competition engines worldwide than Mobil one. Many of them use Motul fluids as there SOLE lubrication and gear oil. I switched in my rex from Mobil one to Motul and had a much smoother idle and less valve noise. Plus, I gained 50 horsepower (kidding), However, just speaking from direct experience between the two oils. Plus, be sure of the Motul type of oil they are comparing to. They have different competition levels of oils. Again, not trying to get personal.

Racing and daily driving vehicles are very different. In some cases race engines are torn down and rebuilt after each event. I seriously doubt its used more than mobil, over 50% of nascar uses mobil 1. Remeber just because they have the sticker on their car doesn't mean they use the oil. Some people who were signed up with valvoline used amsoil in their racing vehicles. Some of the people racing don't really care if the engine is shot after a race so long as they can win.

I can't comment on brake fluids and such, but I'll bet on neo schaeffers and redline any day over motul(as far as oil goes).


Check out some specs here
www.opieoils.co.uk - /pdfs/Mobil/
www.opieoils.co.uk - /pdfs/MOTUL/

Compare the flash points you'll see that motul isn't as stable as mobil is.

NOACK score is extremely important for street cars, but you wont find their rating anywhere. Its a stress test which puts the oil at 250 degrees C for 1 hour then measures its weight loss by %, the lower this number the more stable it is. Which is desireable for street.

I would be more interested in finding out whats used in the 24 hours of le mans or the 12 hours of sebring. These are extreme conditions that oil must endure for extended periods of time. These cars produce very high temperatures and would turn that stuff to sludge in a very short period of time.

[cefiro80]

NASCAR the pinnacle of racing technology and engineering....... Mobil One marketing should be applauded for doing their job. And turning oil into sludge because of high heat? Sludge occurs when oil solidifies. How would this occur in a high heat environment that you are describing in Le Mans races? It would seem that high heat would burn off/thin out oil that isn't durable. I think we are getting a little off topic (I myself am guilty of this) so this will be my last comment on this.

To the OP you will be fine to switch if you have looked at all your seals.


Seafoam is basically a engine treatment. I am sure there are tons of posts about it in this forums. In my maxima (last vehicle I used seafoam in) I feed some through the brake booster line to clean the IM then added some in the oil before changing it and did a good job of cleaning there were tons of deposits in my oil when I changed it the next days. Also, many people put some in their gas tank to do a fuel system clean. Again, I will state with cleaners be careful since they are powerful so using them all the time I would not recommend could eat away seals ring etc. I would just something like this once and just make sure you are keeping up with you fluid maintenance schedule.