Engine Oil

[EURO]

Ill be changing the oil in my YTS this weekend and havent done it yet as ive recently bought it

i was wandering what oil other people have used and whether they rate it or not.

it would be good to see a list of peoples oil types so that i can give only the best to my YTS (he he cheesy or what) :D

[knowlson]

I use Valvoline 5w-50 fully Synthetic you can get it from fensport mate should be cool for yours its top motor oil

[EURO]

cheers i was looking at either Valvoline or Castrol magnatec but ive heard stories of noisy cars post magnatec but these were older more worn cars.

[phil3345]

From a personal point I always avoid any Castrol.

everytime I use it my engine usually blows up

[srd]

I use Valvoline 5w-50 fully Synthetic you can get it from fensport mate should be cool for yours its top motor oil

i'll second that,valvoline is ace,fully or semi synthetic,is always a good buy

[2ZZ-GE Sportivo]

whateva happned to Toyota Motor Oil provided by Toyota

[Nick-Johnson]

Mobil 1 Fully Synthetic without a doubt, if its good enough for McLaren Mercedes it good enough for me!

[Viper_7]

Fully Synthetic oil, is way to thin.... yeah sure it's fine for Mclaren Mecades....but then those engines arn't expected to last as long... Sure it will do wonders now for performace...but not for longevity.

Vipes.

[TheNissanMan]

magantec 10w-40 here, nevre had a problem with it....

[Sandman]

Amsoil. Use 5w30 in my subaru, 0w30 in a new engine in my prizm. Better mileage, better protection, runs cooler, longer change intervals, blows all other brands away.

[spiz]

In my previous car i tried heaps of oil types. I used mobile 1 and Castrol fully synth oils for the first few years, but i couldn't tell any difference between them. then suddenly the oil prices went up 50% so i changed to semi synth oils. I tried heaps but I stuck to Mobil Synth S mostly. the only difference i could notice between the fully and semi synths was that the semi synths made the engine a little quieter ('cause it's thicker i think). but on the downside thicker oil means more friction, more heat, and less power (hotter air under the bonet)

i think that any fully synth oil is A+. if you don't want to spend too much money, go for a semi synth like mobile's Synth S.

but Vipes brings up an interesting point. i've never heard of this before but i'm very interested to know more about it. i'm going to seach for more info on it. but what i've noticed is that all of the fully synth oils on sale in australia are usually 0W50, 5W50 or 10W50 - but redline sells 20W50 which is a little thicker.

i'm planning to use redline oil in my cts. i personally have never used it before, but here in australia there are alot of guys who "really" know about cars that wouldn't use anything else. 5 litres costs about US$90 read more about it here ..... http://www.redlineoil.com

anyway, if your going to go for top oil, what about a top filter. check out this one .....

http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/u..._oil-filter.htm

best regards,

spiz.

[Fidgits]

For a YTS I'd reccomed semi-synthetic ... don't go fully synth unless you up the HP by 30% or more..

Just my 2 cents...

[Viper_7]

Strange argument this Sythetic oil...over your..."standard" oil. It is much much thinner...but then gets up to working temperature much faster...thus less where when your engine is relatvily cold... but it is thin...and doesn't protect as well as "normal" oils do. however "normal" oils...burn more than "syth" oils do.... hence "synth" oils generally result in less oil changes.

however I'll stand by my argument...synthetic oil for your average motor....even your TS is much too thin. We need to be talking high performance cars here, with bore/pistons made to a higher tollerance that can cope/and require full synthetic oils.

But look at this way..your old morris minior...with 300,000 k on the clock..is still going strong...on that standard stuff from say Tesco's!!.... and that goes for millions more motors...can you think of any cars that are running on full syth oils that have covered more than 100,000 ... the numbers are much lower.....

Only high 200BHP+ motors should use Synth oils.

Vipes.

[Sandman]

viper

The only reason oils are thinner is that they have different viscosity ratings. 5w30 is thinner than 10w30, and 10w30 is thinner than 10w40.

What does horsepower have to do with how oil works?

All engines are built to very close tolerances, they have to be or you would have low oil pressure and oil blowing by the piston rings.

The example of the old car with 300 thousand miles is a bad one because, even though the car runs ok it is not as powerful as it was when it was new. And that is because of WEAR. Synthetic oil exceed non synthetics in wear protection by a long shot.

[Nick-Johnson]

One of the main reasons I use Mobil 1 is that my old man managed to get 250,000 miles out of his Serria 1.8 GL estate with out any kinda major maintenance. That to me proved it own story, he serviced the car himself and just changed the oil every 8,000 miles.

Nick

[Cubic Incubi]

Just thougth I'd add to this topic as it is the first thing that came up on Google for 7AFE fully synth - I also searched Yahoo and Google with '7afe recommended engine oil' and got nothing.

oil grade has two meanings.

Lets use 5/40 as an example.

5 denotes the viscosity of the oil when the engine is cold starting, the thinner the oil when cold, the better the flow through the confined spaces within the engine.

The second part of the oils grade - 40 denotes the thickness of the oil when the engine is at peak temperatures. ALL oils regardless of wether they are mineral, semi synth or fully synth are 14 centicstokes at 100 degrees celsius.

Or in simple terms all oils once warm of the same secondary grade i.e. 10/40 or 15/40 are the same thickness in a hot engine.

The sytructure of the oils change when heated, this is chemistry. And all oils wether they be fully synth or mineral are the same thickness when cold if they share the same 'cold' grade i.e. 10/30 - 10/40

A fully synth with esters will stick to your internals better than mineral oils or semi synths, a good fully synth will last longer when shearing takes place, when the engine is at peak temps etc etc - you can extend service intervals.

Cold start protection is the key, after that ALL 40 or 30 grades are the same thickness - therefore Fully synths are NOT THINNER.

A 5/40 grade is thinner when cold than a 10/30 grade, but the10/30 grade is thinner when at peak operating temperature.

Type of oil has absolutley nothing to do with the oils viscosity as misconceived and so widely speculated.

Here is a cuurent thread being discussed on TOC http://tinyurl.com/atomv

and a recent one at Celica Club UK with an oil industry experts advice http://tinyurl.com/7mw8f

I wish to point out, that I am not a trade seller of car associated products and my Corporate level user group at Celica Club UK has nothing to do with selling oil, I run a commercial cleaning company and am a celica enthusiast - I'm also a GT4OC owner and member.

cold start protection can be used all year round, but the second grade, the 'hot' grade meeds to be thicker for summer i.e a 40 and thinner for winter i.e a 30 (general UK)

Who thinks there peak operating temps are under 100 degrees C?

Cheers

[clarky]

Millers 5w40

[oilman]

Yes, and that expert is in fact me :)

It's important to understand that when you use an oil that's too thick for your engine that you are creating friction which causes heat and leads to wear. Added to this you are wasting power.

The question is, at what (sump) temperature is the oil at a viscosity that suits a modern high-RPM engine.

Modern engines are happy on an oil viscosity of 10 to 15 cSt. (But many are OK on less than 10.) 30cSt is too high at high RPM. It can lead to foaming, air entrainment and cavitation.

.......Temp. for 30cSt (Deg. C).......Temp. for 15cSt.......Temp. for 10cSt

5W/40.................71...........................90........................117...............

10W/40...............70...........................99........................118...............

10W/50...............80...........................109.......................130..............

10W/60...............89...........................119.......................142..............

This shows that a 5W/40 or a 10W/40 is perfectly adequate for all engines except those that run an unusually high temperatures.

If your car is modded then you need to also consider your oil choice.

A standard oil will not be thermally stable enough to cope with higher temperatures without "shearing" meaning that the oil will not give the same protection after a couple of thousand miles as it it when it was new.

Let’s start with the fundamentals. An engine is a device for converting fuel into motive power. Car enthusiasts get so deep into the details they lose sight of this!

To get more power, an engine must be modified such that it converts more fuel per minute into power than it did in standard form. To produce 6.6 million foot-pounds per minute of power (ie 200 BHP) a modern engine will burn about 0.5 litres of fuel per minute.(Equivalent to 18mpg at 120mph). So, to increase this output to 300BHP or 9.9 million foot-pounds per minute it must be modified to burn (in theory) 0.75 litres.

However, fuel efficiency often goes out of the window when power is the only consideration, so the true fuel burn will be rather more than 0.75 litres/min.

That’s the fundamental point, here’s the fundamental problem:

Less than 30% of the fuel (assuming it’s petrol) is converted to all those foot-pounds. The rest is thrown away as waste heat. True, most of it goes down the exhaust, but over 10% has to be eliminated from the engine internals, and the first line of defence is the oil.

More power means a bigger heat elimination problem. Every component runs hotter; For instance, piston crowns and rings will be running at 280-300C instead of a more normal 240-260C, so it is essential that the oil films on cylinder walls provide an efficient heat path to the block casting, and finally to the coolant.

Any breakdown or carbonisation of the oil will restrict the heat transfer area, leading to serious overheating.

A modern synthetic lubricant based on true temperature-resistant synthetics is essential for long-term reliability. At 250C+, a mineral or hydrocracked mineral oil, particularly a 5W/X or 10W/X grade, is surprisingly volatile, and an oil film around this temperature will be severely depleted by evaporation loss.

Back in the 1970s the solution was to use a thick oil, typically 20W/50; in the late 1980s even 10W/60 grades were used. But in modern very high RPM engines with efficient high-delivery oil pumps thick oils waste power, and impede heat transfer in some situations.

A light viscosity good synthetic formulated for severe competition use is the logical and intelligent choice for the 21st century.

I hope this helps.

Cheers

Simon

[ogm001]

I'm trying BP 15w-40 Visco 2000 as this is my first service on my yaris 1.0lt

[ferrariboyuk]

I've been blind to see how complex oils are till now and which oil to use is a good question.

How do you get around using your own choice of oil if you take the car into Mr T to be serviced? Will they just leave the oil? Seeing as though toyota replaces windscreen washer fluid even though its full (I never use mine) and charging u £5, i cant see things going smoothly!

[clarky]

In the later stages of my warranty (Ie when it was still serviced by MrT ) I used to just bring my own oil and filter along with me and tell them to use that,

[ferrariboyuk]

And that didn't invalidate the warranty on the engine then? I've thought about trying different oil to reduce the tapping noise the engine makes. But with a brand new TS and a Mr T that says adding after market alloys will invalidate it makes me a bit reluctant!

[jaxx]

millers or Mobil one

i ran my mr2 on magantec once and it sounded like a bad of rooftilers nails!

[oilman]

Millers or Mobil 1 are you're preference but there are plenty of good oils out there and some better than both of those.

Cheers

Simon

[jaxx]

Simon

if you were sat with my car about to swap the oil what would you chuck in?

ive tried millers and Mobil and been happy, the Castrol seemed to make my engine noisy and 'rattle' i thought i had a problem, and had a few checks done on it but it was fine, as soon as the others went in it was as happy as pig in poo and purrs like a fluffy kitten