I am using Pennsoil with a fram filter with teflon. Now I hear Fram is crap and I started using Lucas motor oil stabilizer and it states "no chlorine, teflon,etc. Now is teflon bad? I was thinking to switching to Castrol GTX. What brand does everyone agree is well worth it and what type of filter and where to get them becuase some stores dont carry certain brands.

 

amsoil oil, amsoil full flow and amsoil bypass filters. gotta love once a year or longer oil changes :hail:

 

For availability issues, Mobil 1 and AC Delco filter.

 

Castrol GTX-2 15w-50

Ac Delco filter "Silver" version (there are "normal", "silver" and "gold").

Regards,

Denis V.

 

Heh stop buying that kragen crap, it sucks. I've broken like 50% of the tools I bought there. I use mobil 1 synthetic and ac delco filters. The teflon in those filters is just the same crap as in oil additives. It's worthless. Don't bother.

 

Not only is Fram crap, but so is Pennzoil.

I use Mobil 1 and AC Delco filters. Anyone who tells you synthetic oil isn't worth the price, hasn't torn down an engine that used crappy oil all of its life. Plus, you can go longer between changes... that partially offsets the price right there!

 

any namebrand oil/filter is o.k. Anyone who changes their oil once a year dosent care about their engine. Amsoil is overpriced because you should still change oil every 5000 miles max.

 

Tell that to the people who have used amsoil, five7kid for one, don't make that comment before doing the research. Course, I don't know if I leave oil in that long..

 

I'd spend a little time learning about the physical properties of synthetic and conventional oil before I spout off about how often you need to change your oil.

Dino oil breaks down because its physical properties change due to heat and the presence of carbon and other contaminates left over from the combustion process. This breakdown is called oil oxidation. It actually causes the oil to become acidic. Acidic gasses combine with moisture in the crankcase which can cause rust and corrosion inside the crankcase (read: bearings). The oxidation also causes sludge to form in the crankcase.

The other problem is that dino oil can lose its viscosity due to temperature extremes. Dino oil is basically long chains of carbon, which break down under high temperatures.

Then there's synthetic oil. Synthetic oil does not oxidize, and it maintains its viscosity FAR longer than conventional oil. Within reason, the only limiting factor with synthetic oils is how clean it is. Once your oil filter gets dirty enough to prevent the oil from staying clean, you have a problem.

If you don't put a ton of miles on your car, there's no reason why you can't cange your synthetic oil annually. That's all I do. Because it's not becoming acidic, there is no problem with leaving it in there that long. My milage stays low over the course of the year, but I change it annually anyway just because it makes me feel good.

When Mobil 1 first came out, they advertised that you could go 25k miles between oil changes. Then they realized that they'd sell more if they stopped promoting that idea, and now they give a more generic statement:
FWIW, if you look at your owners manual, you'll be surprised how many miles they suggest you go under normal driving conditions. It's WAY more than 3,000 (and that's with dino oil). On my father's 95 F150, they reccomened 7,000 miles under normal driving conditions, 3,000 under severe conditions (plowing, towing, etc).

So anyway... back to what got me on this soap box. With synthetic oil, there is absolutely no reason why you can't safely go with annual oil changes as long as your milage is not excessive, and you're running a quality filter.

 

actually i am paying less than a dollar more per quart than mobil 1. the quality mobil 1 has today is where amsoil was 25years ago. my amsoil dealer has been doing synthetics since amsoil first came out.

 

i think amsoil is great but it's hard to come buy. i can pick up pennzoil for dino oil and M1 at wal mart. wix filtes are great too but in my area no one sells them so i buy ACs frmo auto zone.

 

I used to do pennzoil with ac filter.
Then I used pennzoil with Napa filter (wix).
Now I use Amsoil with the Amsoil filter. I change my oil annually and have yet to have any problems.

I read a study on filters where somebody cut them all apart. I believe Pure1 was on the top followed by Mobil 1 and then Wix (Napa filters). Amsoil filters weren't part of the test.
AC was decent and Fram was crap.

 

right now ive got regular valvoline 10w30 in it with a k&n oil filter. this weekend im going to change it and im putting in penzoil or castrol 10w30 and a new k&n oil filter.

 

Valvoline 10W30 and a AC Delco filter.

Love that valvoline stuff.

 

Fram is a name-brand filter, and based on the data (cardboard end caps on the filter insert, leaking unfiltered oil, etc) I'd say there's one problem with your statement.

 

running ac delco and royal purple..but now switching to amsoil and amsoil filters...i want the best for my ride and in my humble opinion amsoil is the best....plus my co-worker is a amsoil dealer sooo about 5 bucks a quart for 5w-30....

 

I know plenty about oil. I am a chemical engineer and i build race car engines for my own race car. All I can say is beleive what you want. You will anyway. But mobil1 or any other syn oil is a good if not better than amsoil at half the price.Still change it at 5k max (beleive me) Anyway anybody who drives a Ford pickup needs a check-up.

 

beleive it or not, but you will most certainly not, a few of our school districts scool busses and all of our city trucks run all amsoil fluids and the same amsoil bypass remote filter system that i use. the school busses have not had their oil changed in 4 years. every 6 months they send samples out for oil analysis and it always come back that the lubricant is still good, no need to change it. the same thing with our city trucks. one of my dealer's customers has a mac dump truck that runs amsoil with the bypass filter system as well. his truck has had amsoil fluids since he got it from day one. i won't even tell you how many miles he has on his oil because you'll just flame away anyways. but all he changes are his filters about every year and a half and tops off the oil he lost from the filter. if ya really wanna know how many miles he has on this truck without a complete oil change i'll tell you......but if i get any flames or bs flags then that person can open their jaws and suck on my *****. i just found out about amsoil in the last year and have been researching them and talking to a local dealer for about that length of time. i am sold on all of their products and will not use anything but amsoil in all of my gas engines, transmissions and diffs. weedeaters and mowers included.

 

Mobil 1 avg price: $4.99 qt
Amsoil website price: $5.20 qt

This was for 5W-30, using Amsoil XL-7500 line item. Mobil 1 price data from Advance Auto, K-Mart, and Pep Boys and they were all very close.

4.99 != (5.20*0.5)

Guess that ChemEng degree is one of those "Prestigious University" ones I keep getting spammed about...$39.95 and you too can have a degree.

 

Waste your money if you like. Amsoil will love you for it. I am not a big fan of syn oil in a everyday driver. No need. In a race engine with extreme heat and high rpm's it is a great asset. In the average street car you are wasting your money. I have seen many cars/trucks driven daily with proper maint. go well over 300k with no problems with pet. oil.You can make fun of my degree all you want,I dont care. At least i have one!!!

 

I've seen plenty of 300K petro oil engines too...pull a valve cover and it looks like a coal pit w/ all that hardened up sludge under there. That said, my old Honda ran to 265K miles before I traded it, using Valvoline 5W-30 and Purolator oil filters @ 3000mi it's whole life. Wouldn't want to see what was under the valve cover, but it got me around and didn't burn oil.

For my Camaro, which occasionally hits Pocono, Lime Rock, Nazareth, and the local drag strip, that extra $0.20 per quart versus Mobil-1 is pretty trivial. Amsoil got my business by publishing objective ASME wear test data on their products, where Mobil and the rest only publish pour temps and whatnot...nothing indicating how well they lubricate.

For the daily driver, plain old Valvoline and Purolator filters again. 170K miles and counting. 4500mi change interval now.

 

You have made MY point.

Thank You.

 

Firebird 15w-50 Mobil 1 AC Filters 75,000 miles
Maxima 15w-50 Mobil 1 Bosch Filter 116,000 miles
Lumina 15w-50 Mobil 1 AC Filter 135,000 miles
GP GT 10w-30 Mobil 1 AC Filter 33,000 miles
Z71 15w-50 Mobil 1 AC Filter 49,000 Miles

 

I always thought that engineers analyzied a particular situation and came up with the best solution to it. At least that's the type of engineering that I do.

"5,000 miles" is a half-assed blanket statement that does not apply to all situations. That's the sort of junk we get from our Human Resources department, not Engineering.

 

i don't think ya guys caught my point. i'm not just talking 400k miles on the engine.......i'm talking 400k miles on the OIL ITSELF. when you use amsoil's bypass filter system it filters down to less than one micron. when the oil comes out of the bypass filter it is analytically clean. use my car as an example: with the 7quart pan, the dual remote system with the two huge amsoil filters i have a 10 quart oiling system. every last drop of oil has gone through that bypass filter after ten minutes. what do you get after ten minutes.....analytically clean oil......every ten minutes. hence that in my area there are commercial trucks with almost 400k miles WITHOUT A COMPLETTE OIL DRAIN AND FILL. they change their oil filters maybe every year and top off the oil that they lost and thats it. i have talked to these people personally and know a few of them. and no they are not amsoil dealers feeding me a line of sh|t. they are just the customer like me. i've seen it work and i'll see ya in a year when i have my oil analyzed and they tell me it is still good with no need to change it.


didn't mean to get anyones panties in a bunch...it just didn't seem like anyone was getting my point with the exception of the few fellow amsoil users. i admit the initial switch over to amsoil can be expensive. after bying the oil, the bypass filter system, filters, trans fluid, gear oil, and antifreeze i paid $400. but now i will only have to change my oil once a year maybe, my coolant in about 6 unless i go to change heads or cams again, as is the same with my tranny fluid. in the long run you save alot of money with amsoil. i'm sold on it for life

 

Your point being that non-synth oil cruds up the inside of your engine. Not very well stated, but OK whatever you're welcome I guess.

 

what's everyone's problem with dyno oil?

I'm a proffesional mechanic, and i dont have a problem at all with running dyno oil in anything i use.

Case in point.

My 3.8 had 236k miles on it, i crashed the car....so i figured i'd just pull the engine out and dismantel it just for kicks. I always used dyno oil (castrol gtx) in it, with an ac delco filter. The entire engine was just as clean as it would of been if it was a brand new engine, wasnt even very worn either.

The thing alot of people dont know is: oil has detergents
in it. Now the longer the oil has been used, the more of the detergents are used up. The key to keeping an engine clean with dyno oil is simply changing the oil every 3k, hell i've even tell you to change synthetic every 3k too. Think of it as dumping soap into your washing machine. You cant just forget to do it one time and think that your dishes are going to get clean.

Everyone always whines about how their engine has sludge in it from evil dyno oil.....but i'm telling you flat out: These people aren't changing their oil regularly!

another case in point:

I did a saftey check on a used malibu (3.1) at my dealership today. Only had 35,000 miles on it. When i went to change the oil, i could not remove the oil fill cap. I finally had to get a big pair channel locks to get it off. What did i find? Well...the oil cap had been practically glued on there by sludge. The entire bottom of the cap was covered in it, looking down into the valve cover all you could see is blackness.

Now is this dyno oil's fault? No....i've seen malibu's in there with 100k miles on them and the engine looked clean as the day it was forged. The problem was someone leased it, and didnt care about maintaining the car, so they never changed the oil in it.

So get real guys, if your engine sludges up EVER, that means you're slacking off on your oil changes, period.

 

People really should try a search on this, cause this flame war just keeps popping up.

Look for Vader's/ Five7kid's / and I think RB83L69 too, all of them make great points.

 

Granted Castrol GTX is probably better than most dinosaur (dynosaur?) oils, and 3000 miles crawling in traffic versus 3000 highway miles don't inflict the same stress on the engine and oil. The truth is synth will handle the extremes better than dino. If you don't drive in extreme conditions, you don't need it.

 

I don't think people are necessarily saying that there's anything wrong with dino oil. I think we're just arguing about how long you can run synthetic.

I run dino oil in everything except my IROC. My sport coupe got $.88 wal mart oil, and I can tell you that it didn't get changed very often. The car's got 165k miles and still runs like a brand new car. I pound the snot out of it too.

My GTA gets Valvoline Max Life every 3,000 or so. I run the GTA pretty hard too, but other than the bad valve seals, it runs like new.

The IROC gets babied and breaks all the time.

 

i think Kevin C nailed it. Dyno oil ( i like that one ) changed regularly with do the job in all but the most extreme condidtions. i have an 84 ( not the one in the sig.) with 130,000 NYC miles, many over 6500 rpm, yes 6500 sometimes 7000 rpm. it smokes slightly at idle from a bad valve guide, other than that ring seal is good and the RA is tight, never so much as a tap or tick, motor has never been opened. We give it regular oil changes with organic oil, i prefer AC and castrol but sometimes it just goes to the mechanic and i get what he has.

Synthetic oil is a great thing, especially if your a racer or forgetfull, maybe even both. i broke my 383 in on org. but will be switching to synthetic this weekend for extra protection. 6000 bucks and several months of my time says synthetic is good, especially for cold flow and extreme heat. Now i don't know if M1 or Amsoil is better but i bet there both very good. On the subject of price and complexity we routinely build 400 plus HP motors and beat the snot out of them, it would be hipocritical to point to a 400 oil system and say its as waste. i feel more comfortable changing my filters and oil every 3000 or so miles, if you prefer the amsoil type of setup good for you. I too know of people who have successfully run it without changing oil but i'm uncomfortable with that.

 

I run Amsoil, but change my Delco filter every 3,000 miles, oil gets changed at 6000. Before Amsoil I used M1, both are great products. Everyone has made valid points. The bottom line is that synthetics hold on to their additive package for a longer period of time through conditions that Dino oil would break down. When you change your oil, you are really changing the additive package the oil comes with, as the oil is still good. As for the argument that Amsoil is hard to get, I order a case, which is good for both my cars for the year. Saves me time and money. I get better gas mileage, the car seems rev smoother and maybe a little extra hp. Just my opinion, everyone should do what they feel will work best for them........

 

I'll pick this post to quote, although other silly statements were made later.

I've been using AMSOIL since 1983, changes at the recommended 1 yr/25k miles w/filter at half that (35k with one type of oil). The part that I don't "care about" my engines is doing unnecessary repair, i.e., replacing parts that wear out with petroleum oil but not with synthetic. I've got plenty of long-mileage stories, plus one engine that would have died if not for the synthetic in it (tow truck driver was sure the engine was toast, having seen the same thing happen to plenty of similar models).

Any namebrand oil/filter is o.k.? For what, exactly?

So, you're a chemical engineer - bully for you. I know mechanical engineers who were hired by GM that couldn't find a spark plug. You didn't say lubricant formulation is your specialty, so your rhetorical data isn't worth much more than anyone else's.

There's more difference between petroleum-based lubricants and synthetic formulated lubricants than change interval. Shear strength is one property you won't find any petroleum oil matching the performance of the typical synthetic, and unless your engine doesn't have any sliding parts (like pistons & rings), that should be important to you.

An engine being sludged up by 35k miles? AMSOIL has several formulations that would still be servicable after 35k miles without any special attention. So, yes, I'll blame that on dino juice, coupled with a negligent owner.

Since most of the "dirt" you see in your petroleum oil comes from the oil itself, and more comes from the air the engine takes in than from combustion itself, there is no reason you have to change oil often if you take care of those two sources of contamination. Synthetic (at least AMSOIL and Mobil 1) is more stable than petroleum, and doesn't break down as readily as petroleum or the additives in petroleum. Better air filtration (and I'm not talking about K&N) will reduce the 2nd source. Now you're in the 25k-35k oil change interval territory, with no reduction in lubrication protection.

Well, boys, I resisted responding to this thread for a couple of days, but the more misinformation I saw, I simply had to chime in. As for LowStyle187's original question, either continue using the major brand products changed at regular intervals (forget the additives, stabilizers, and Teflons); or if you are truly concerned about better protection, take the extra effort and spend the few extra $'s to get and use the good stuff.

 

oil is a funny thing, everyone is an expert at it, and everyone else but them only shells out "misinformation".

whatever guys, i have to deal with oil all day unfortunatly. If you think it's hard getting people to understand oil online....you should try explaining it to a customer.

 

Amen! I sense a lot of anger here. Fact is that even the lowest priced oils today contain high quality detergent/dispersant additives and when used in accordance with the service duty of the vehicle will usually result in long engine life. One thing not really mentioned is consumption between changes. I ran Castrol almost forever in cars and my sportbikes and never had anything fail due to lubrication issues. The selling point on syn's for me was that on my other cars using 5-30wt I would typically add a quart between changes. Running the Blazer and Cavalier on syn completely eliminated the need for any top off between changes. Conventional oils are so good today that Honda recommends 8k between changes on my one sportbike. The extended drain interval is also an added benefit. Oils such as Amsoil, Redline are fine products as is Mobil1, however one has to look at the cost/benefit to make an informed decision. 5-7 is doing his usual pontificating about Amsoil(he sells it) and is spouting the company line. While there is no getting around the fact that a syn is superior to conventional oil, there is no real basis in fact that throughout the normal service life of a vehicle it would provide a benefit that would justify it's additional cost. Wear test's, inspection data can all introduce fact's about superiority but to the end user it has to represent something tangible. That's where it comes down to the user and what he is looking for and how much he is willing to spend to achieve it.

 

I would consider wear a tangible item, the less I have the longer my engine will be in one piece. Tangible to me is less clatter on cold start up, longer change intervals and a good quality product. I do not sell Amsoil. but I am sold on their product. These are obvious benefits and are tangible. I feel Amsoil and Mobil 1 are great products and superior to what is out there, why would I not pay a little extra up front to save on the back end......

Engineers never made good business men, lol, j/k

 

Jeez, you didn't have to quote the WHOLE thing. As I said syn's are superior to conventional "dino" based product. Fact is that I refer to the normal service life of an engine and to be honest that's the business side of the discussion. Purchase a new car and do normal maintenance and most likely the engine will outlast the rest of it using conventional oil. If you want the extra peace of mind a syn offers that's your decision, however just about any API certified motor oil will provide a long service life for a properly assembled engine. You mentioned "tangible", in order for it to be tangible you would have to disassemble an engine and physically check it for wear and then compare it to something established. Honestly, it's the only way that you could safely say whether on product is superior over another. You should hear this discussion with our cycle group over a few brews-it's scary.

 

I'm not even going to get into this SUBJECTIVE battle, but I use:

Mobil One 5W30 in my Vette & Impala.
Quaker State 30 in the TA's race engine. (engine still being broke end)
K&N Filters in all.

Ron

 

A lot of good points have been made here and I think either product used correctly will do the job. Oil has always come down to personal preference.

My reasons for using synthetic (any major brand will do) have been the lack of viscocity breakdown during my usage period and, more importantly to me, the 20 degree drop in coolant temp vs dino oil.

Peace

 

Tangible: Capable of being percieved, precisely identified or realized by the mind.

As per Webster's.......

In other words, the engine does not have to be disassembled for the end user to realize a benifit. For me, it was reduced (non-existent) start up clatter, longer change intervals and everything I mentioned in my previous post. My point is that there are tangible advantages which can be immediate. I bring it up because you stated that the tangible advantages would be somewhat hard to realize and not immediate. I feel otherwise...