Only if your vehicle is designed for the longer service life of such oils. Using them, and changing them at 'dino' intervals hasn't shown them to have any advantages over a good quality non or semi synthetic.
IMM is alive and well.
And that contamination doesn't go else where, either via the pump or via splash ?
Why do you think that oil is best drained when warm and thus more fluid....
What I'm saying is that rather than spend money on snake oil additives it would be better to change the normal (recommended) oil more frequently IYSWIM.
Yes, talk of his Usenet death has been greatly exaggerated. :~(
Ordinary mineral oils can be seriously degraded after 4K miles, while fully synthetics will easily surpass the makers recommended change intervals with only slight degradation, or none at all. Only a little research reveals this. As I have said previously, this point is not open to question, it is vox pop. Anyone saying the opposite usually has some financial gain somewhere in order to do so.
What I'm saying is that engines last longer and longer despite even longer oil change intervals. Ie, the makers know what they're talking about. Both oils and engine manufacturing techniques - and or materials - are improving all the time, so there really is no need to change oil more frequently than the maker's recommendation.
So use the maker's recommended oil and service intervals, and don't thrash the engine until the oil is hot, and the engine will outlive the rest of the car, in most cases.
What modern car has 'ordinary' mineral oil as the maker's recommendation? Or '4K' oil change intervals? And what fool would think of using a base mineral oil in a modern car?
Err, if the maker recommends a fully synthetic, they'll also recommend an 'extended' change interval...
Might do if you knew what you're talking about.
Try reading this research accurately and applying it to the thread. If you're not IMM, you're the new one.
You have to remember that makers have extended the service intervals to appeal to the 'Fleet' / contract hire market, they don't actually care what the mechanics are like post X [[1] mileage as the car will have gone though the auction market by then in most cases.
anything from 12k to 50k in most cases
Very good point and hit the target. I did point out that cars are designed to have a life of 50K miles before harshness is apparent using average grade mineral oils. Use the best oils, full synthetics, in the engine and transmission after run in, and change the transmission oil approx 20K miles then the newness feel and sound of the drivetrain will stay for most of its life. Service cost are designed to appeal to the company car market, who ditch cars after 3 years maximum.
I find that in countries that do not have a company car culture, people are more aware of using high quality lubricants in new cars as it protects their expensive investment. Company car fleet runners in Britain don't care. In Britain, anyone buying an ex fleet car expects the car to have been abused, and the fleet market accounts for a considerbale share of the new car market.
You are missing the point, the same can be true even if the recommended oils and change periods are used, it is also true that engines and transmissions can fail even if the best oils are used, life of components has far more to do with how the car is driven than what oil might or might not have been used - keep trying to 'crash' through the gears and any transmission will have it's life expectancy shortened.
Rather than spend extra money on expensive 'snake oils' you are just as likely to improve the life expectancy of engine components by using the recommended oils and just change them more frequently. I don't agree that a gearbox that has been treated with respect needs it's oil changed to a (so called) higher spec', the biggest wear points in any gearbox are the syncro cones and as they use friction to do their job no oil or additive is going to help - indeed some oils or additives can make things worse and thus cause far more wear in other parts of the gearbox due to people trying to force the syncro cones to engage rather than slip past each other...
Service (mileage / time period) points were changed to save servicing cost, not due to improved components / oils as their is far more to a proper service than changing oils and filters.
transmissions
The point is not vehicle abuse.
Some people seem to think that makers only recommend cheap mineral oils unless otherwise stated. That is not the case. Makers recommend a viscosity and API rating. Some poor oils may meet that and most high quality full synthetics meet and exceed the API by a long way. The difference in quality and protection of the oils at each end of the price scale is marked.
Full synthetic oil is not snake oil. Its benefits over run of the mill mineral oils is beyond question, and I have no intention of going down the synthetic vs mineral argument. My automotive engineering friends, not mechanics, say that Slick 50 in the gear box will prevent wear. I believe them. :-) Slick 50 g/box treatment is not a one off treatment like the engine version. It has to be in at all times.
You put the spec in the makers say. It is the quality of the oil that counts. Full synthetics are miles ahead of mineral oils. I don't believe that a gearbox is sealed for life, unless it has an oil filtration system and full synthetic from new. Gear oil "does" deteriorate with use, that is certain. Some makers specify changes at 27K miles, about every 3rd service or roughly 3 years. Changing at every 2nd service and using the best synthetics is very, very wise to keep that smooth newness for the majority of the cars life. It does work, I assure you.
Yes it is. If a vehicle is not abused it will rust away before the mechanical (engine / transmission) parts wear out even if only serviced as per the makers recommendations.
You are talking marketing clap-trap and you know it, if the recommended oils are use the vehicle is good these days for at least 100,000 plus miles and with some makes engines and transmisions will achieve thos mileages even if those recomondations are not kept to.
I expect you also believe that using aero-spec air / water hoses improves performance, or that simply fitting a K&N filter boosted performance....
No, because you will loose that argument at every point, also full synthetic oil is most certainly snake oil when people advise it's use in engines that are not designed to need it.
My automotive engineering friends, not
So what do they do, design engines, gearboxes, body-shells, doors, seats, dash-boards, just what is their expertise that allows them to make an across the board statement like that and if they are correct why don't their fellow engineers specify it's use in the factory service documents ?...
That is what I've been saying you don't need slick-50 or any other snake oil, just what the unit has been designed to use !
It is the quality of the oil that
Oh and that's why they don't fit drain plugs then - to make life easy when they expect the oil to be drained....
Changing at every 2nd service and using the best
You carry on wasting your money on 'snake oils' then, those with 1/2 a brain will use what the components has been designed to use, be that mineral, semi synthetic or fully synthetic along with any additives. If these snake oil additives were so good why doesn't the oil companies include them in their oil blends anyway and why don't the vehicle designers specify their use ?.... Ho, hummmm !
recommended
If you read the thread you will find it is not. I read the rest of your post and it is clear you should focus on the points at hand.
Not maintaining a vehicle correctly is vehicle abuse, so it is very much the point in question.
I also see that you can't answer the direct question asked about your 'automotive engineering friends' ?...
Engines, transmission and engine management systems for the large auto makers, like Ford, Rover, GM, Renault, and the rest. A lot of the design work of the large companies is farmed out to specialists. They know their stuff.
So they are electronic engineers [1] then, hardly qualified to comment on oils !...
[1] anything from full design engineers to PCB CAD operators to equipment case designers etc.
I have read this thread and anyone who states that synthetic oil i snake oil is half mad - Porsche, and others, have it in from new, s maybe they have been conned by sythetic snake oil too. It is best no to bother with this sort of disjointed, scattered, incoherrent rantin and rambling. Only on the Internet you find this type, or shouting th "end of the world is nigh" along Oxford St.
Here is a cut and paste of a posting of mine in December:
I totally disagree with that, so would just about every tribologist. have been using synthetic oils for about 15 years and there is n comparison to mineral oils. the engine always has that newness fee and sound to it. I started using it after visiting an oil researc centre on business, where the techies there explained it all and sai all cars should have fully synthetic and it is foolish not to for th protection it gives. They take a long time to break down and the shea (resistance to compression) is phenomenal compared to mineral
-- Doctor Evil
The point you are missing, is that whilst snake and full mineral oils may well be better, are the standard and much cheaper oils GOOD ENOUGH. Just about any modern oil - synthetic, mineral or whatever - exceeds the sort of crap we used to chuck in a mini transaxle in the 60's, and just about any gearbox is built to better tolerances with better a seals and out of better materials.
All gear oil has to do is keep teh shear faces of teh gears apart under stress. The more stress, teh more critical teh oil has to be, and teh hiotter the box gets, teh more crirtical.
So obviously a top notch gear oil that won't break down at high temps in say a rally car, is good news, but in boxes not under that sort of stress, its very arguable whether it makes any difference whatsoever.
Modern teeth are much better hardened, and modern seals are much better organised.
In which case engines would be failing earlier than before due to oil related problems. This simply *isn't* the case. They last longer than ever. Failures like cambelts and head gaskets excepted. Strange the way some think that oil changes are a major cost in a car but ignore cambelt changes which in some cases can cost hundreds.
The servicing costs over 50k miles is peanuts compared to the deprecation.
Unfortunately, this is not the experience of the fleet users. They are whingeing regularly about having to fit new engines at 40K miles when extended oil changes are used. There is a tendency for the fleet driver to never look under the bonnet, so the fact that the oil has disappeared through the tailpipe doesn't register, with unfortunate consequences. God help you if you buy one of these in the second hand market! The main reason for extended oil change intervals is to reduce the servicing costs as a marketing bull point. Jerry and the Americans are correct, change the oil very regularly, and you get good engine life with almost any engine oil under normal driving conditions. I've seen much greater than >100K miles on a Ford Popular 1200cc van used in London, the oil was sae10 and changed every 1K miles. Normal engine life with 6K mile oil changes was about 50K IIRC. Before the point is made that it's a low performance engine, I would add that I've also experienced >150k miles on a 2.7L Honda engine run on bog standard reclaimed 20/50 but changed every 5K miles.
Regards Capitol
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