Poll--What kind of oil do you use?

[PUR PONY]

Amsoil 5w-30 or 10w-30

 

[FordLover61]

I use Castrol GTX 10W30 in my X

 

[LDCExploder]

QS 10-30 Synthetic blend for 4X4's.

 

[Ford_Racing_Guy]

wow i didn't think that many used synthetic

 

[sk1er17]

castrol synthetic blend 5w 30. that stuff rocks!

My thoughts exactly.. ive been using that stuff on my 98 "doomed to blow up" SOHC and its still running strong after 145000 miles (and two hydrolocks )

whether its the oil making the difference, i see now reason to change to full synthetic or regular motor oil.. or brand or weight for that reason.

castrol syntec blend 5w30 every 3K and you're good to go

 

[92xlt4x4]

10w-30 castrol in this x.

 

[Ford_Racing_Guy]

in my car i recently switched to Castrol 10w30 Partial Synthetic, and up until i smashed it it seemed like it didn't use as much oil and got slightly better gas mileage

 

[old mechanic]

I used to work as a quality control technician at a major hydraulics firm and had acess to over 1 million dollars worth of oil testing equipment.

I decided to test a number of automotive oil brands for personal enrichment. Upside to the tests, synthetic is VERY good! Downside, some domestic brands are almost as bad as no oil at all!

Tests included: particulate contamination (how clean the oil was - huge factor in longivity) - Viscosity (is it really 10w30 and how does it change with temps) - Recirculating ball test (run a ball bearing against a shaft at 3000 rpm with an oil drip - measure at intervals for shaft wear).

In particular, both Pennziol and Quaker State oils were virtually worthless. Both fouled my Royco particle tester and both failed miserably in the recirculating ball test. (They cut the shaft in half after only several hours of running!)

Best domestics were Valvoline and Havoline (non-synthetic). The Valvoline in particular was almost as good as a synthetic on the recirculating ball test and was easly the best domestic natural oil.

Synthetics tested included Mobil 1 and Amzoil. Amzoil was better than Mobil 1, but both were better than any other oil tested (not a complete test, some new oils have hit the market since of which I have no info). The Amzoil did not even leave a mark on the shaft, which indicated to me their break in instructions were correct - ie, run standard oil for around 10,000 miles before changing over to synthetics. Valvoline left a shiny spot on the shaft, but could not be measured after a week of running. Other domestics wore groves in the shaft after days of runnig.

In doing mechanic work for 20+ years on the side, I have also noticed that the motors using Pennziol are usually full of crud, and I recently had to replace the crankshaft on a Dodge Dakota with less than 80,000 miles. Two bearings were completely gone, Owner swore by Pennzoil. Took the block to a local machinest to bore it and he told us the type of oil used in the motor. He said he sees it all the time.

In another incident, I started running Amsoil in a Chevette with 22,000 miles. I followed their standard 25,000 mile change with a filter change at 12,000 (add 1 qt to fill to caoacity). After 220,000 miles of this the car only used the one quart of oil per 25,000 miles from the change. I sold the car and it is still running. I don't know the current mileage.

One further story... I ran an F150 with a built 390 and 38's and had difficulty moving it off the spot on some of those -20 degree mornings in Wisconsin. I swtiched all the diffs, trans, and transfer case to synthetic and was able to drive away normally no matter what the temps.

All of this is anecdotal evidence, but I know where my money goes! I use synthetics all the way!

I guess you didn't test the CHEAP wally world oil out. LOL! I have used it along with fram oil filters on my Buick that has 190,000 miles on it and doesn't burn or lose any oil. I change my oil about every 7,500 miles. BTW: I used the Valvoline AND the Havoline from walmart when they were out of their chepo oil. They don't cost much more than the chepo so maybe i'll use just them from now on.
Thamks for the test results.

 

[cjbarron5]

valvoline 5w30 all the way i used to work for a well know quick lube co that features pennzoil(hmmmmm wonder who that is) and they tryed to push pennzoil down my troat too untill i showed them what it really does

 

[Jason94sport]

Regular mobil 10W40

 

[dtl 2k2 sport]

MOBILE ONE SUPER SYN TECH, 5w30, little pricey but i guess it's worth it if i wanna keep it around for a while,

 

[Cali' Explorer]

Thought I'd chime in here. Chaulk one up for me on the Synthetic side.

In all my past vehicles I always ran full synthetic but was hesitant to in my Explore. Mainly because I already had 60K on the clock when I bought it (and there appeared to be a ton of sludge in the oil pan when I did my first oil change on it).

I have since gone to Full Synthetic. This time I'm running Kendall (only because the Oil Change Place I go to uses it and I couldn't do this oil change myself). Next Oil Change is Royal Purple all the way.

I know a lot of people swear by Amsoil, but I found Royal Purple a few years back when I had a new '00 Ford Ranger. I was running regular oil to 20K and then switched to Royal Purple. After Switching to Royal Purple, I gained enough power that I could chirp my off-road A/T's in second and third, I could wind the motor out a lot more without it giving off that "I'm going to blow up" feeling and I gained about 2 mpg. Ohh, also, when I did an oil change at 5k, the oil still looked brand new.

All just my experience, no hard core tests, but that's enough for me.

 

[Crankcase]

Poll closed. The thread can still be replied to.