http://www.carcraft.com/techarticles...ventional_oil/

good read to start up on the differences of Conv vs Synth

and another
Would you not consider a 8000-9000 rpm reving motor a high performance motor? I was told that B16s and 18s vaporize some oil at high rpms(not much) from the heat, wouldn't this help that situation aswell?

 

I can revv my b20 to 8000rpm, does that mean its high performance?

 

that depends on what you consider performance

does your b20 make more heat @ 8000rpm then a stock b20 @ say 6000rpm? does it have an increased compression ratio? are you boosting it? are you running an i/e/h setup? all of these things increase the amount of air that is crammed into your motor.

So to say that Honda recommends that you use conventional 5w30 and stick by it on your not stock b20/vtec motor is silly. your engine creates a considerable amount of heat more then a stock b20 right? it is proven that real synthetic oils, or pure synthetic oils like amsoil can take more heat before breaking down or vaporizing. So yea I would consider your b20/vtec motor high performance, a motor that makes 80-100bhp/L = high perf

 

I see we're still beating this dead horse. If your worried about your engine and the oil check into these items


AMS-Oiler™ Oil Precharger
http://www.amsoil.com/StoreFront/amk.aspx

By-pass Oil Filter Mounting Kits
http://www.amsoil.com/StoreFront/bf.aspx

 

What is my oil temperature at driving around town? at 8000rpm?

What temperature will my oil breakdown at (if its fresh)?

You dont know the answer do you?

I've seen more spun bearings on synthetic oil then conventional oil. The last i'd say 5-6 spun bearings I've seen have been all synthetic and all 5w30 or 10w30. Yet when I recommend my customers to run 10w40 or 5w50(we're talking boost here) they never seem to spin a bearing. Obviously alot more contributes to bearing life here, but I'm just making a point. A bearing (IMO) does not spin from just one thing, it'll spin from a majority of things gone wrong (thin oil, high temps, age, contamination, etc)

Conventional oil IF MAINTAINED REG. will not breakdown and I dont give two flying ****s if you have a gt42r on there. Maybe if you track is everyday for an hour then it'll breakdown.

I've said it once and I've said it again. Synthetic oil is NOT needed.

 

I beat the **** out of my stock D16z6 and my motor does burn a little bit of oil. I always check it and stuff. The car is so quiet and never had a problem with the engine. I use wal mart cheap oil. Oil is oil as long as u don't keep it low u are ok. Synthetic is good if u got the extra $$$. If u are tracking the car, i would say synthetic oil might possibly be better. If street use u don't really need synthetic. That's just my opinion. It is people's preference. They say u can do oil change with synthetic oil at 10.000k or some say like 14.000k. The oil is very dirty and i would do it the most at every 7500k if i was to do an oil change on a syn car. Just stay away from castrol. I heard they are no good and i've seen ppl used them and blow up their engine.

 

but you just told us oil is oil. now I'm just so darn confused!!!

 

it's not the overall temperature of the oil that you see on your oil temp gauge. the oil is used to lubricate the turbine shaft, which as you know can potentially operate at 150-200,000 rpm. and it rides on a very thin layer of oil. this very thin layer of oil can potentially get superheated and chemically bond to the bearing surfaces, eventually causing a turbo failure. the process i think was called oil coking. so it's not the overall temp of oil, it's the immediate surrounding temperature of a small amount of oil that allows it to overheat. I guess the same happens to main bearings, I'm not sure. but that's what happens in turbos.

 

I forgot about oil coking. But for that to happen it would most likely happen under poor conditions (ie, hwy pulls, contaminated oil, etc). Thats why I wouldnt mind running an oil cooler if I was a tracker or something. I'm not too sure if synthetic serves that better protection for this though, since there are so many factory turbo cars running conventional..

 

Where is Cam Stableford when you need him! Cam sign-up again....

 

I'm just gonna keep my a$$ out of this debate. Getting stupid. Some of you get it some of you don't.

NOBODY SAID EVERYBODY HAS TO RUN SYNTHETIC!!!

REGULAR OIL WORKS JUST FINE UNDER NORMAL CONDITIONS AND FOR REGULAR INTERVALS (approx. every 5000kms/3 months or however long you run it). (a mild to heavily modded engine is NOT what I call 'normal conditions')

FULL SYNTHETIC IS SUPIRIOR TO REGULAR OIL UNDER NORMAL CONDITIONS AND ESPECIALLY UNDER MORE SEVERE CONDITIONS AND FOR LONGER INTERVALS.

Synthetic oil is designed to work well in normal engines and more specifically and especially mild to heavily modded engines. The oil that was recommended for your factory engine can't handle the extra stress.

I have experienced it first hand which is proof enough for me. That is why I decided to run full synthetic. I'm not telling you to run it, nor am I saying the oil you use is wrong. I have seen on my own vehicles, every time, full synthetic has worked much better.

Maybe you saw different. Thats fine with me. As I've said many times already: Run what ever oil works best for you.

Those are my last words in this thread.

Thanks.

 

Well you guys could keep this thread going forever!!!

Do you need synthetic oil? Hell no!! Is is better than conventional oil?? Hell yes!!

Let me ask you. Could you use conventional bias ply tires on your car, play all your tunes in mono, and get around without a GPS?? Of course you could.

Do the research. Synthetic oil does everything you expect an oil to do, except better. It lubricates better, has better shear strength, won't break down from the heat, won't build up sludge, will allow your engine to run cooler, will give you more hp, will last longer, will improve your fuel economy, will give you cleaner exhaust, will give you vastly better cold starts, and will not boil off like dino oil. Your toys will simply perform better and last longer.

Tests show that a quality synthetic oil with 10,000 miles on it gives your engine better protection than dino oil does fresh out of the bottle.

The quote from the first post is fraught with information that is just wrong .... actually down right humorous ....

Advantages of Synthetic Synthetic oil was originally developed for high performance racing engines. FALSE -- synthetic oil was originally developed for use in jet aircraft engines because it is the only lubricant that would not break down from the extreme heat

Mobil tried to popularize synthetic oil for passenger vehicles back in the early 1970's. At the time, Mobil was promoting 20K or 25K oil changes with synthetic, but they soon backed down from this. .... IN FACT in 1972 Amsoil was the first company in the world to market an API rated 100% synthetic motor oil. Shell followed Amsoil into the market in 1974 with the introduction of Mobil1. Amsoil promised a guaranteed oil life of 25,000 miles when it was first introduced in 1972 and never waivered from that to this day.

Synthetic oil is a good choice if you have a vehicle with a high performance engine (in fact synthetic is required for many of these engines). It is also a good choice if your vehicle is operated in extremely cold climates. It has higher resistance to breakdown caused by heat and it flows better in extreme cold. TRUE ... it is also an excellent choice for your daily driver, your motorcycle, your weedwacker, your lawn mower, your dirt bike, your snowmobile, moped, jet ski or anything else that has moving parts that need lubrication.

Unfortunately for the synthetic oil industry there is virtually no advantage to using synthetic oil in a non-high performance engine that is operated in moderate climates. ONLY if better fuel economy, longer engine life, fewer repairs, reduced maintenance costs, less down time, improved power, better cold starts, cleaner exhaust, reduced oil consumption, etc, etc. are not important factors to you. Standard industry testing shows that engine wear can be reduced by as much as 75% when compared to a conventional oil. In the last 18 months, I have saved myself over $250 in reduced operating costs for my car, including reduced need for oil changes and fuel savings. I also saved myself 5 Saturday mornings that I didn't have to spend going to the Jiffy Lube.

You probably could go a bit longer between oil changes with a synthetic, i.e. following the normal service schedule even if you fall into the severe service category, but I wouldn't advise this. People who "would not advise this" know nothing about synthetic lubricants. Amsoil Series 2000 TSO 0W30 Synthetic Motor oil is guaranteed for 56,000 km under normal service. That's not a BIT longer!! That's more than ELEVEN times longer. You might not want to run it this long, but don't let anybody tell that you can't.

In short, synthetic may give you the peace of mind of knowing that you are using an oil that is far better than necessary for your vehicle, but it won't reduce wear or extend the life of the engine. WRONG. Talk to the customers who use it. Do some reading.

Now since we all know that nobody wins in an oil thread, you now have my 2 cents worth to ad to this fountain of information. In the end, use whatever spins your spurs. Hell, use peanut oil if you want. Do the reading, do the research. You decide what is good enough for your application.

Cheers

Cam

 

here's how I see the issue. On motors that are under 60K (this interval comes from the JDM land, those that have taken many B16s apart) use synthetic but over 60K, use conventional oil. It comes down to blow by oil vapour and the ease of burning conventional oil vs synthetic.
No matter what, you should change your oil every 6 months if you're milage is low...

 

20w50

 

i run canola or evoo

 

mazola ftw