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| Time to Change Your Motor Oil |
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| Written by Peter Carmel | |
| Tuesday, 03 January 2006 | |
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The primary thing to understand is that motor oil falls into two basic categories, natural (mineral-based) and synthetic. Natural motor oil is derived from petroleum that was originally in the ground.
In this case, synthetic oil is far superior and therefore more desirable than the mineral variety. Not only does it have a higher resistance to breakdown due to heat degradation, synthetic oil also keeps its properties for far longer than natural oil. This is why you often hear people advise you to change your oil every 3,000 miles. When using mineral oil, this is very sound advice. After only 3,000 miles, mineral oil will begin to lose some of its lubricating properties.
Synthetic oil lasts far longer between oil changes than mineral oil. Most synthetic motor oils advise you change the oil every 12,000 miles or 1 year, whichever is first. All manufacturers advise changing the oil more often if you drive in dirty conditions or do a lot of stop and go or short distance driving.
Cold starts are the devil for motor oil and engine wear. About half of all non-racing engine wear occurs during the warming up period when oil is cold and does not flow freely. Sometimes you hear that it is better to idle your car for awhile in the cold morning before driving away. More recently, the best advice is not to wait very long before driving away. This is because the car warms up faster if driven than if idling. Wait at least one minute so that the engine oil has a chance to start circulating and build up some pressure. However, it is best to be easy on the engine by not accelerating too fast until it has warmed up. Synthetic oil by nature flows more easily at the lowest temperatures than the even the lightest winter grade of mineral oil. When comparing motor oils, the first number (with the “W”) indicates low temperature viscosity, and the second number indicates high temperature viscosity. Viscosity is another word for how thick the oil seems and is a measure therefore of how well the oil flows. Mineral oils for most cars normally fall within the 10W-30/40 or even as low as 5W-20 for oils designed for winter use. 5W is good for cold weather startups but this type of oil may not offer good high temperature protection once the engine is hot. Even though synthetic oil costs from 2 to 4 times as much as mineral oil, any synthetic oil will reduce your engine wear by about 50% over the best mineral oil in the market today. This alone should motivate owners to switch to synthetic oil. How much is it worth to you to have your engine last twice as long simply by using more expensive oil? Ask your mechanic how much a brand new engine would cost. Add to this the fact that synthetic oil lasts 4 times longer than mineral oil makes the economics a no-brainer. Again, engine lasts twice as long translates into thousands of dollars. I don’t understand why people still use mineral oil! Ask BMW why they use synthetic oil! Old habits die hard, I guess. Discuss (0) There are no comments yet. Discuss this article on the forums. (0 posts) |
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| Last Updated ( Friday, 20 July 2007 ) |
If you haven’t given motor oil much thought, here’s a chance to catch up. In many ways the motor oil in your car’s engine is like the blood in your body. It keeps the moving parts lubricated so that the surfaces don’t get worn down and damaged. Even in water cooled engines, oil provides the primary heat path by drawing heat directly from the moving parts. Since the only thing that keeps your engine from overheating and becoming damaged is the oil in the crankcase, you may be interested in knowing which type of oil is the best at protecting your engine.| < Prev | Next > |
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