Blackstone Lab results (LM Synthoil, Edge & Ultra 5/40)

[skyship007]

Originally Posted by 5cilinder

Also they are scamming carbuyers with oilbrand recommendations wich must be followed because they otherwise void warranty
So castrol buys itself in the volvo instruction books and other brands in other instruction booklets

That was true about 15 years ago of BMW in particular, as they were selling their own label engine oil, but it's no longer true today. Every car manufacturer has to publish the required oil specs and as long as you use the correct spec oil changed at or before the max interval, the warranty is valid. Most manufacturers do publish lists of approved oils.

Even if you used an oil that was only recommended for that engine type by the engine oil company, it's very unlikely the warranty would be invalidated, assuming you stick to a major oil company. If you used some minor label oil saying it was recommended for the engine concerned and it had the requred Acea specs, then there is a chance that if those details were not correct (They are not in many cases), that the warranty would be invalid, although in a legal sense it's unlikely, as you would be deemed to have acted in good faith and the car company would have to prove the failure was caused by the oil.

[volvoid]

For years, on all my cars, Ive changed the oil & filter more frequently than the manufacturer recommends. Never had any engine wear problems.
To illustrate, I once had a head off due to blown gasket, 88,000 miles, and the honing marks in the bores looked looked new (rover k-series, ordinary oil).
Some of these long service intervals and high priced oils worry me a little - surely its better to get the dirt out.

[skyship007]

Originally Posted by volvoid

For years, on all my cars, Ive changed the oil & filter more frequently than the manufacturer recommends. Never had any engine wear problems.
To illustrate, I once had a head off due to blown gasket, 88,000 miles, and the honing marks in the bores looked looked new (rover k-series, ordinary oil).
Some of these long service intervals and high priced oils worry me a little - surely its better to get the dirt out.

The long service intervals are defined as maximum figures only. They assume the engine is in good condition, subject to normal use and that an approved oil is in use.
For an older car it does make more sense to change the oil more often, although there is no need to change the oil filter more often than the max figure unless you are cleaning up a black death (Sludge) victim.
It does not matter which type of oil is used if that oil is contaminated by anti freeze, fuel or ultra fine sand particles (Silicon), the result will be the same degree of extra wear.

The max OCI for my diesel is 20K km, so I change oil every 10K km and oil filter every 20K km, as new oil filters are far less efficient than old ones (Too many above average size holes in the media). The new oil does suffer a minor degree of additional contamination when the oil filter is reused, but that is much less important than the increased efficiency of the dirty filter that occurs once most of the above average holes in the media are obstructed by debris, thus allowing the filter to stop smaller particles than a new one.

Oddly enough for an engine in good condition, a long oil service interval can produce better results in wear rate terms, partly because of the increased efficiency of a dirty filter, but also because new oil has detergent levels that are high enough to partly dissolve some of the anti wear layer deposited by the old oil and it does that faster than a new layer is deposited for about the first 1K miles.

[5cilinder]

Originally Posted by skyship007

Some of the main refineries do sell base stock to other oil companies, but the cost and quality of an engine oil depends more on the additives used than the base stock (Assuming it's of a reasonable quality). Cheap engine oil brands buy their base stocks from lesser known refineries in the Eastern block countries, they don't buy them from BP, Shell or Mobil.

I've read through a lot of used oil analysis reports and I've never seen a cheap brand name engine oil perform as well as an expensive major brand one. Part of the reason is that such companies are not able to buy good oil additives to mix with the base stock, as there are only a few chemical companies making them.

When you buy a cheap brand engine oil, the labels on the can don't mean much, as they can print what they like and no one is checking.

It is worth considering if the extra cost of a top class full synthetic is worth it, as there is often not much difference between the results from using an oil like Castrol Magnetec and Edge (A3/B4). The more expensive synthetics do last longer and some of them clean better, but as long as you stick to major brand engine oils the difference in performance is often not worth paying for.
The turbo manufacturers do make a lot of noise about changing the oil more often if you don't use a good full synthetic, so I always use at least an HC Synthetic.

I would note that the US and UK definition of the term synthetic is different, as Ultra and Edge are both classed as "Synthetic technology" oils in Germany (Group 3). They are basically processed conventional base oils made by a refinery. Liqui Moly Synthoils are produced in a chemical factory, as they are Group 4 synthetics and don't used anything from a oil well and only group 4 or 5 oils can be called full synthetic (Synthoil) in Germany.
The difference in that definition is important, because you can produce a cheap HC synthetic, but it's impossible to produce a cheap group 4 Synthoil. So if you see some cheap brand engine oil saying it's a full synthetic in the UK or US, it does not mean much in terms of the actual quality of that oil.

It's also worth looking at the difference in cost between the different companies, as Shell in particular seem to be cheaper. Ultra for example costs 30 Euros and Edge costs 50 Euros (Fleabay main dealer price for 5 liters) and there is no real difference in resulting main block wear rates. Only the Germans seem to be ahead in technical terms, although that is to be expected as their auto industry dominates the top end of that sector.

Thats indeed an advantage in germany that they only can use "synthetic" on the label for at least group 4 oils
But on the other hand a good hydrocrack oil with superior additives can be better quality than a group 4 oil with less additives
But generaly speaken a group 4 oil is marginally better with the same additves compared to an hydrocrackoil

I know that some labels have diferent additives withe the same baseoils but i also know out of first hand that some base oils have same additves wiith different labels

[5cilinder]

Originally Posted by skyship007

That was true about 15 years ago of BMW in particular, as they were selling their own label engine oil, but it's no longer true today. Every car manufacturer has to publish the required oil specs and as long as you use the correct spec oil changed at or before the max interval, the warranty is valid. Most manufacturers do publish lists of approved oils.

Even if you used an oil that was only recommended for that engine type by the engine oil company, it's very unlikely the warranty would be invalidated, assuming you stick to a major oil company. If you used some minor label oil saying it was recommended for the engine concerned and it had the requred Acea specs, then there is a chance that if those details were not correct (They are not in many cases), that the warranty would be invalid, although in a legal sense it's unlikely, as you would be deemed to have acted in good faith and the car company would have to prove the failure was caused by the oil.

Ofcourse they can use oils with the same quality , but the extensive naming of castrol has effect on the volvo customers

[5cilinder]

Originally Posted by skyship007

The long service intervals are defined as maximum figures only. They assume the engine is in good condition, subject to normal use and that an approved oil is in use.
For an older car it does make more sense to change the oil more often, although there is no need to change the oil filter more often than the max figure unless you are cleaning up a black death (Sludge) victim.
It does not matter which type of oil is used if that oil is contaminated by anti freeze, fuel or ultra fine sand particles (Silicon), the result will be the same degree of extra wear.

The max OCI for my diesel is 20K km, so I change oil every 10K km and oil filter every 20K km, as new oil filters are far less efficient than old ones (Too many above average size holes in the media). The new oil does suffer a minor degree of additional contamination when the oil filter is reused, but that is much less important than the increased efficiency of the dirty filter that occurs once most of the above average holes in the media are obstructed by debris, thus allowing the filter to stop smaller particles than a new one.

Oddly enough for an engine in good condition, a long oil service interval can produce better results in wear rate terms, partly because of the increased efficiency of a dirty filter, but also because new oil has detergent levels that are high enough to partly dissolve some of the anti wear layer deposited by the old oil and it does that faster than a new layer is deposited for about the first 1K miles.

Try using a bypassfilter up to 1 micron parallel to the main fullstream oilfilter and a magnet on the oilsump and bypassfilter
With a bit of oilconsumption used dopes get refilled with topping up oil
And only the filters needs to be changed and the quality of the oil stays cleaner than between regular intervals without bypassfilters

I did alot of oilanalysis on submarine diesels and wih centrifugual and bypassfilters and adding used consumption the oil never needed to be changed
Only once with a waterleak wich was detected with the analysis

[skyship007]

Originally Posted by 5cilinder

Try using a bypassfilter up to 1 micron parallel to the main fullstream oilfilter and a magnet on the oilsump and bypassfilter
With a bit of oilconsumption used dopes get refilled with topping up oil
And only the filters needs to be changed and the quality of the oil stays cleaner than between regular intervals without bypassfilters

I did alot of oilanalysis on submarine diesels and wih centrifugual and bypassfilters and adding used consumption the oil never needed to be changed
Only once with a waterleak wich was detected with the analysis

I looked at a bypass filter installation, but there is no room in the engine bay of a V40, unless the battery was moved to the cabin. There is an approved installation for a rear battery for the 4WD version of the V50 that has a bigger engine, but it would be an expensive conversion.
Oil sump magnets don't make a difference for engines (They do for gearboxes and most cars already have one included), although I've not seen a good study of oil filter magnets.
In economic terms, the cost of the oil analysis and the ultra fine filter would probably be the same as changing the oil. It might save money for a truck which has a 25 liter sump capacity, but not for a car.

[5cilinder]

Those sumps of submarine diesels where 120 liters of oil
Besides of the costs ,changing the oil on submerged patrol is risky due to noise (airpressure pumped) and availibilty of the diesel , recharging batteries are sudden when a oppurtunity arises not scheduled
Freightships have even larger sumps with 1000 liters and there cost is more important also if it is the cruising main engine that one will only be stopped if real damage will occur , so there is also good filtration to ensure clean oil and oilchange prevention

Ofcourse the cost of 4 liter oil isnt the point , the point is that with sufficient oilconsumption and bypassfiltration oil doesnt need to be changed also the analysis needs to be twice to confirm there is no degradation trend in dopes/tbn