Conventional oil vs synthetic oil question

[DarkBlack]

I ran a certain gas engine with a certain bottom of the barrel model filter and walmart dino for 50K miles. @ 5K changes the oil was always black.
I made a switch to a 'premium' filter and stuck with it, and the same walmart dino, at the same 5K changes. The oil comes out brown, not black.

I'm no oil, or lube filtering engineer, but I can conclude the following:
The black color in the oil is not just 'color' but is suspended particles that must be pretty large-large enough to be captured by the 'better' filter.
The 50k miles with the 'crappy' filter seemed to do no real damage, since the now worn engine is producing clean looking brown oil changes with the 'good' filter.

 

[bdog]

Engine oil is one of the most overthought subjects there is. I have no doubts that some oils are better than others but pretty much all modern oils are more than adequate.

What matters is having an appropriate oil change interval and sticking to it.

I have been around a ton of engines in all kinds of applications and I have never seen one fail due to the type of oil used. I have seen them fail from overheating due to cooling system problems, fail from running out of oil, bad air filters, etc but never once have I seen one go bad where we could say "if we just used synthetic or whatever it won't have happened."

That being said I use synthetic in some applications because they are started often in cold mornings and they start easier with synthetic. Other applications like my tractor which has over 8,000 hours on it get regular Dino oil with no problems.

 

[MikePA]

Engine oil is one of the most overthought subjects there is. I have no doubts that some oils are better than others but pretty much all modern oils are more than adequate. What matters is having an appropriate oil change interval and sticking to it.

I could not agree more. Ditto on using synthetic for engines that need to run in cold climates. Way too much petroleum navel gazing. :laughing:

 

[BarnieTrk]

Engine oil is one of the most overthought subjects there is. I have no doubts that some oils are better than others but pretty much all modern oils are more than adequate.

What matters is ....... fail from running out of oil........never once have I seen one go bad where we could say "if we just used synthetic or whatever it won't have happened."

110% Agree. One of the Grand-Dad's favorite sayings:
"I don't care what brand or type of oil you put in there - just make sure it's on the dipstick!"

BarnieTrk :confused2:

 

[Thomabear]

I agree with the last 3 posts 100%. Well I guess that's all I got to say about that!

 

[kevin37b]

Baked a chicken in the oven last night , little to hot . That peanut oil got a little black !

 

[TomSeller]

Baked a chicken in the oven last night , little to hot . That peanut oil got a little black !

See, you should have used synthetic motor oil

 

[RalphVa]

No, dino oil has ppm/ppb levels of really bad stuff in it. These start chemical reactions with blowby (from your piston rings) that cause the oil itself or its additives to react and form black material.

Synthetics do not have any extra "stuff" in there.

Ralph

 

[DarkBlack]

OK....So where does the ring blowby go, and what happens to it, if there's synthetic in the crankcase?

 

[Buggs67]

I don't use Synthetic blends for the reason stated; how much synthetic is in there. You could blend yourself, 50/50 or such. But are you really saving significant $$$? My turbo car REQUIRES synthetic (possibly because it also lubes/cools the turbo), and it's recommended for my high revving 4 banger. The 4.0L straight 6 Jeep gets high quality conventional. The tractor got brand name conventional diesel oil. Not sure if I should've used syn, but I'll prob be changing it before it's very worn, and the diesel runs at low rpm vs my 4 banger which regularly sees 5k RPM.

I think quality filters are worth the $ or two extra.