More about synthetic oil

[Grant Lenahan]

My apologies, by the way, the Eric, who shared useful experience that we shoudl all pay attention to.

But his post sparked my interest is explaining a bit more about lubrication and syntehtics in particular.

Back to the ideal that "synthetics are too slippery for break -in". Synthetics are not, ont he surface, more slippery.  
Rather, they hold up under a wide variety of conditions where normal oils fail.  Thus, the lower wear. Its not uniformly lower wear, its lower wear because the oil didnt fail under heat, pressure, cold, differential bearing speed, etc.

Here's a listing of the advantages of Synthetic (Grp III and Iv) base stock) oils, for Wikipedia ( as a 3rd party).
Note that there is not a listing for "more slippery", but rather many cases where under extreme circumstances the oil wont fail as readily.
I think we can agree this is good under all circumstances.

Note also some true, but misleading statements..... its wikipedia
Advantages

The technical advantages of synthetic motor oils include:

Measurably better low- and high-temperature viscosity performance at service temperature extremes
Better chemical & shear stability
Decreased evaporative loss
Resistance to oxidation, thermal breakdown, and oil sludge problems
Extended drain intervals with the environmental benefit of less oil waste.
Improved fuel economy in certain engine configurations.
Better lubrication during extreme cold weather starts
Longer engine life  <--- this is a result, not a advantage
Superior protection against "ash" and other deposit formation in engine hot spots (in particular in turbochargers and superchargers) for less oil burnoff and reduced chances of damaging oil passageway clogging.
Increased horsepower and torque due to less initial drag on engine
Does not contain detergents  <-- not really true - detergents are added in the additives package, and typically more than in regular oils.

Grant Lenahan
glenahan at vfemail.net



On Nov 29, 2012, at 8:15 PM, Eric Huppert wrote:

> Alrighty, here's my 2 cents based on my service manager duties in a small
> shop specializing in Vintage cars (but working on everything).. We have a
> very varied clientele, vehicles range from million $ collectable Rolls
> Royce's to daily drivers (all makes, nice to POS's!) Have had numerous
> occasions with customers switching to us (from other shops) and having oil
> consumption issues using "special" European synthetic oils. Switch back to
> dino and consumption decreased drastically.  
> 
> 
> 
> Okay, flame away synthetic believers... I've had four Audis that exceeded
> 300k, USING dino! (200 20v hit the mark last week, still no oil consumption,
> wahoo!) Understand the alleged reasoning, molecular structure, etc behind
> synthetic (heat, turbo, etc) but really haven't personally experienced the
> benefits. 
> 
> 
> 
> Nor do I recommend synthetic for vehicles not speced that way from the
> manufacturer. (Our Lexus 460 customer specifies synthetic, 9.1 qts worth!)
> I feel its way overpriced, I don't believe in extended mileage oil changes
> and I like for my customers to keep some of their hard earned money. 
> 
> 
> 
> Poor break-in, oil changes "overdue" by many thousands, so on and so forth
> will create mechanical/consumption issues, regardless of oil used!. 
> 
> 
> 
> Regardless, have seen many times where switching back to dino decreased
> consumption! I'm basing this statement on "my" firsthand experience, several
> of which were VW's!
> 
> 
> 
> So, game NOT on... I probably shouldn't have gone down this path! 
> 
> 
> 
> Signed,
> 
> 
> 
> Anonymous
> 
> 
> 
> (Will my username show????haha)
> 
> 
> 
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