hello guys. i took my car in to acura after 3700 miles to get an oil change but they turned me back. They told me that this car is a "smart" car. They said once the oil life percent display in your dash goes down to around 5%-10%, thats when it needs an oil change. Now if i remember correctly, most cars need oil changes after 3000 miles and it just sounded odd to me that the TL does not until the oil life goes down to 10%. Is this true or are they BSin me? Does this car need an oil change every 3000 miles? thnx for your info guys. out

 

A whole can o' worms awaits you...

1. I'm not being a smarta$$, but definately use the search within the 3G forum. There are TONS of posts on this exact subject...

2. FWIW... Some people trust the MID to tell them when to change the oil. Some people do not... There are camps both ways here. You need to read and decide what is best for you... Acura does, and will continue, to believe in the MID. (If you lease, I'd trust the MID!)

Personally, I switched to Mobil 1 at 3900 miles and change every 5-6K miles after that.

Hope this helps...

 

Many people on this forum have recommended doing the first oil change earlier than later. At 3700 miles, you should get it done. If Acura dealer is not willing to do it, bring to the Honda dealer. Or better yet, DIY.

 

ah lol thnx dark, i'll def use the search now =D. new to this place and all. thnx to you too alvonchui. damn acura dealer..

 

If you DIY, do a search for the additive that replicates the chemistry of the factory "break-in" oil. Add this to your early oil change to enjoy the best of both worlds.

 

No MLEP...NO MLEP....I hate anything that thickens up the oil.

MW

 

A can o' worms for sure -- as many opinions as posters!!

My dealer offered me "1" free oil change so I took 'em up on it, at about 6700 miles. I then changed that oil myself at 10,000 with Castrol Syntec 5W-20 and ran that till 20K. At 20K, I changed again w/ syntec, and decided to go back onto the MID schedule and continue synthetic. I figure, rightly or not, that using a synthetic for the acura-recommended fossil oil interval should have me covered (that is, keep the engine in good shape for a long time).

 

MW, you are a broken record on that issue. Amsoil ATM has been showing some UOA's with thickening, which of course you know is unusual. But it is still doing its job, and a good choice.

MLEP or its equivalent is only needed for a short time - why make such a fuss over it, thread after thread? I am starting to question your point of view lately. What's up?

 

Has anyone really calculated the amount of thickening 8 oz of MLEP would do to a TL full of 5w20? Would you then have 5w22 or something as horiffic as that???

 

No calculation, but I do have a Blackstone UOA that shows that the SUS viscosity @210 deg. F was 54.5 under the following conditions on my '05 TL:

Type of oil: Exactly 4qts Motorcraft 5W-20 Synblend w/ 1 bottle (15 oz.) MLEP.
Starting mileage: 3000 (it just worked out this way)
Ending miles: 7576
Total Miles: 4576
SUS viscosity: 54.5
Molybdenum: 409
Flashpoint: 380
Copper (27) and Iron (81) were high as is expected during early miles of our Acura V6.

Previously, the original Acura factory fill had a SUS viscosity of 51.7 on replacement at 3000 miles .

On another car, a 2002 Honda CRV with 75,000 miles, the SUS viscosity was 51.7 after 7,043 miles on 100% Motorcraft 5W-20 Synblend. Yes, I'm aware that I pushed the oil to near it's limits on this one but all results came back perfectly fine and showed a bit of active additive left with a TBN of 2.8. I did this to see how far I could push the Motorcraft 5W-20 Synblend with an OEM Filtech filter on an engine that I feel would be harder on oil (4 cyl, higher mean rpm's) than our V6.

In all three cases, Blackstone said the SUS Viscosity should be between 50 and 57 for a 5W-20. By the way, I can't find a VOA of Motorcraft 5W-20 Synblend on BITOG that includes the out of bottle viscosity. If anyone can help with this, I'd be grateful.

This data (albeit a sample of one) confirms that 15 oz. of MLEP will thicken a 5W-20 but NOT ENOUGH TO MOVE IT OUT OF THE RANGE OF A TYPICAL 5W-20 WEIGHT OIL. Even if the 5W-20 oil that was used was on the thicker side, it wouldn't move it out of the range of a 5W-30 weight oil which, by all accounts that I've read here and on BITOG, is perfectly okay to use in our engines in all but the coldest climates.

 

Jack,
Say you took a 5w-20 engine oil, that tests out @ 8.3cst, at 100C. If you add 8oz MLEP to that, which is a solid 40wt, it'll bump the viscosity up to about 8.5cst.

MW

 

BTW, I reached the viscosity "figure" in my previous post by using a Viscosity Calculator by Shell.

Chuck, also remember that dinos do tend to shear by at least 3%, for fuel efficiency purposes, so you do have to factor that in. The MC 5w-20 that was tested was of the SM version, if I recall correctly, which may have been different than the version that you had used.

If you added a full 15oz of MLEP to a 5 quart sump, it would go up from 9.1cst to about 9.5, barely a 30wt.

MW

 

RR,
Yes I'm getting a bit tired of some of the questions being asked on this forum, but I do agree that I've been posting a bit differently that I have, lately. I'll definitely change.

Rage, keep in mind that Amsoil ATM thickens because that oil has serious oxidation issues, and thickens about 2% every 1000 miles. I wouldn't necessairly say that its doing its job either, since when the oxidation levels rise bearing wear, and other wear can suffer. For a while, Amsoil relied on fuel dilution to keep their oil in grade and to maintain solvency, which ultimately didn't work out since Fuel Injected cars don't dump so much fuel into the crankcase.

Besides, their new dual rated, diesel ACD 10w-30/30wt is a better choice.

I still make a big fuss about the MLEP since it is unneccesary.

MW

 

The Motorcraft 5W-20 I use is a synthetic blend according to the label. Does this reduce the amount of expected shearing? And yes, the oil I have is SM rated on the bottle. Actually, it's SL in the official seal thingy, but the text says SL and SM rated.

Can oil viscosity easily be converted between Saybolt Universal Seconds (SUS) and centistokes (cST)?

Based on Road Rage's suggestion from a long time ago, I used the MLEP in my car to mimic the Acura factory fill oil. I liked his logic back then and still like it now. Whether the Acura factory fill has high Molybdemum from the manufacturing process or in the break-in oil I don't know.

By using MLEP once after my early 3000 mile oil drain;
- I don't have as many break-in metals floating around due to the early change out,
- I keep the Moly high, as Acura seems to want us to do,
- and the oil viscocity stays at a 5W-20

All this for under $20.

And better yet, by continuing to use the Motorcraft Synblend, future oil changes will cost under $15. Best of all, after several UOA's and now that my engine is broken in and nearly flushed out, I'm gaining confidence that I will be able to rely on the MID to tell me when to change the oil.

Another oil change or two and I can stop thinking and reading about this stuff and just enjoy driving my car. On that note, I'm off to Maine on vacation (500 miles each way and PLENTY of curvy backroads to enjoy once I get there.) See ya!

 

MW: Thx for taking some feedback in a + way. We all get a bit "testy" when peeps who add value get hastled by those who have nothing to contribute but wise-azz sarcasm.

U may be right that keeping the break-in moly levels high may be unncessary, but having studied the relevant eng'g principles and practicing them professionally for awhile, i have seen what happens during break-in to the metal, and believe SOME SORT of extra colloid that will ensure honing rather than shearing of the metal is a good idea. ChuckDu hits it right when he reminds us that whether the colloids get in there from assembly lube or direct additive, there they are. And honda is adamant about the break-in oil. Why would they be if it were unncessary? In the S2000, Honda warns about using synoil before 10,000 miles! (The Mugen oil additive is very very high in moly, and Mugen has a long association with Honda racing - as I recall, the founder was a descendant of Sochiro Honda himself.).

Of ocurse, other colloids may do the trick, but this is one case where I will leave it to the good judgment of Honda engine engineers. Like the old joke about giving an enema to a dead man: it may not help, but it won't hurt!

The ATM analysis is very interesting info - if I infer correctly from your info, then ATM has an "old school" formulation, and since as you rightly state, fuel dilution is much less of an issue today than in years past, Amsoil's approach leads to thickening? Point is, is it enough to significanbtly degrade the cold weather flowability?

More frightening is the assertion that the oil has "serious oxidation" issues. Why would that be, do you suppose? ATM is touted as a "true synthetic" with GIV base stocks. Is the add pack failing? I think this is very important, as the VOA's I have seen suggest that Amsoil's add pack is pretty much the same across the board.
************************************************** *************

ChuckDu:
All things being equal, a synblend should show better HT/HS stability, since the synoil components usually show good performance in that regard, being more monomolecular. But "label analysis" is like "arnchair racing". Fun, but no guarantee of real-world validity.

Point is, you have chosen an excellent oil in the MC 5w20. Barring some major change in formulation, it will always serve you well. So while you will not to scrutinize every oil topic, you will want to ensure that MC does not get cheapened out. It does happen. Even MC's products vary from one vis to another. They outsourced the work for 5w20 to Conoco-Phillips, who do fine work in everything I have seen that they have touched.

I do not recall a direct conversion factor between SUS and cSt.

I like your common-sense approach. You are near the end of the break-in period, have done right by your car, and will soon just be driving it.

However, and I am sure MW will nod approval, that before you give yourself over to the MiD's OCI, that you get a UOA at the Mid's first recommendation (<10%) with the MC 5w20. if it looks good with your driving habits, your conditionsk, then you are good to go. Otherwise, you will be able to catch a borderline or iffy situation before you do lasting degradation. I would certainly think that 5k OCI's with MC would have no risk - zilch, zero, nada.

 

Rage,
If I remember correctly, a working GM engineer who used to be a member of BITOG stated that in GMs, the assembly lube used in engine manufacturing process with mix in with the engine oil, and provide extra protection against break-in wear during the break-in process. Now, he also stated that GM doesn't use Molybdenum, simply extra levels of ZDDP. So, I guess that Honda follows the same idea, except they use Moly instead of ZDDP?

These are his comments on the M1 Factory Fill used in the 'vette: http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/...=010515#000020

These are his comments on special factory fills in general: http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/...=010493#000013

As far as Amsoil goes, I dunno about the flow. They did rely on the fuel dilution to maintain solvency and keep the stuff in grade, and I'm hoping that their new API SM formulation that is launching soon will solve this problem.

If I recall correctly, Terry said that the oxidation issues lie within the chemistry of the oil. Remember, oils, and particularly ATFs, can "hide" a lot of stuff. What you see in a VOA is only a small portion of the oil's composition, especially in ATFs which can appear quite lame on the surface but it contains a lot more "stuff" that is not revealed in a VOA.

Think of MC 5w-20, it looks lame on the surface in terms of add packs, but its baseoil does a very good job thus the excellent results.

BTW, there is a direct conversion factor between SUS and Cst...I don't recall the exact formula as I simply use a calculator on a website that converts it for me.

As for Chuck's OCI with MC 5w-20, I'm beginning to have more and more faith in OLMs in general, and enough data suggests that following the MID's suggested interval once the engine has >10K is fine.

Chuck, just make sure that you don't let the oil's TBN fall below 1.0 when testing with Blackstone Lab's TBN scale.

MW

 

I use Pennzoil 5W20. What do you think Michael?

 

Its fine, and its avaliable at a good price ($7.97 for 5-quart jug at Walmart).

I'm still looking for that Trop Artic 5w-20.

MW

 

How the heck do you reset the MID so that when you do the oil change yourself it is accurate?

 

MW:

Crane Cams makes various assembly lubes, and is well known and trusted in the rebuild aftermarket. Some use moly, some use ZDDP.

http://www.cranecams.com/?show=brows...a570ca71c9fa4c

Now for Hondas, it has been speculated that the high moly gets into the "oil wash" by splashing off off the assembly lube. However, I have asked repeatedly for anyone at the Honda engine plants to confirm this. If not the case, then the moly is more likely part of a special break-in oil, which explains Honda's position on early (they no like).

Then, there is the Mugen oil additive which I mentioned, but which you did not - it is loaded with moly, and it is not assembly lube. Mugen is very tight with Honda engineering. Not a smoking gun, but more than coincidental I submit..

https://acurazine.com/forums/archive...p/t-21168.html

I wonder if anyone has seen a VOA from an AMG Mercedes? I took a tour of the AMG engine assembly area, and they used Mobil 1 on every part I saw assembled. So it would not surpriseme if the moly count was low.

Again, I am inclined to put more credence in what Honda says about Honda engines than what GM says about GM engines. Ther are apples and oranges.

I have been involved closely with Corvettes for almost 30 years, and went to the press intro of the LT1 engine when it first came out. I recall that was the first Vette to come with factory synoil. As I recall, the engineers told me:

1) The reverse coolant flow of the LT1 heads resulted in very high oil temps, and Chevy motortrain enginners spec'd synoil because it resisted oxidation and provided decent OCI's for that hot running engine. Regular oil temps at or above 300 degF would oxidize the oils of the early 1990's.

2) KC4 - This was the oil cooler RPO, standard with high perf engines, gear ratios (RPO G92), etc. It was a liquid to liquid cooler, expensive to fit, and a source of leaks. GM wanted to eliminate it, and going to synoil spec 4718M helped with that.

But the main driver was #1, as head failure is costly.

 

It's easy. The reminder message should appear when the key is turned on (even before you start the engine). When it appears, push the Select/Reset button below the MID and hold it for about 10 seconds, until a confirmation message appears, asking if you're sure you want to reset it.

At that point, push Select/Reset again, and the message goes away.

There are instructions in the owner's manual, but they are not entirely clear and it took me a couple of frustrating weeks the first time to discover how simple this is.

 

 

Sorry 'bout that, it was a brief hijack anyway... I know there's another thread about resetting the MID but I didn't feel like searching. Back to the regularly scheduled thread.

 

I just received this UOA from Blackstone. I was hoping for some feedback from the resident
experts on how the results look. Should I be concerned about the low viscosity after 6,000 miles
on the oil?

 

Chuck,
I've busy these last few days thus I've been unable to answer your question.

The results look fine, considering that this is only the third fill in the car. Yes, the viscosity is low but it doesn't seem to be affecting wear. Flashpoint is at 395F, which is excellent, as well as the insolubles which are at 0.2%.

If the Iron does not drop to less than 10ppm by 30-35,000 total miles on the car, and the Copper does not drop to less than 30ppm by the same time, you'd want to switch to a more stable lube, viscosity wise.

Ohter than that, the TBN is solid and running this oil until the "service due now" message @5% is not a problem.

Michael

 

Michael,

Thanks for the reply. I also cross posted on BITOG figuring I might catch you there. I AM concerned about the thinning of the MC 5W-20 Synblend. It doesn't look like fuel dilution, I wasn't driving the car all that hard and the temps weren't that extreme during this interval. Go figure.

 

Chuck,
Remember that PCMOs WILL thin by 3%, if not more, for fuel efficiency purposes, then thicken back up thru oxidation.

Generally, as long as its not affecting wear, shearing is not a concern.

I'm not as anal about shearing as some other people are on BITOG.

Michael

 

Chuck, this is what I wrote in response to your thread on http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=3&t=002862#000007.

Since the wear is not being affected by the low viscosity, I wouldn't be concerned about it.

Note that if the Iron does not drop to less than 10 and the Copper does not drop to less than 30 by 30-35,000 total miles on the car, you may need to switch to a different lube. I don't think that is would be an issue, and most of the "wear" you see here is simply residue wear metals leftover from the break-in period.

No, fuel dilution does not necessairly show up in the Fuel % reading unless there is a LOT of fuel. Amounts of fuel present in the oil that are large enough to affect wear, but are not large enough to trigger the fuel percentage reading, are noticed in UOAs by seeing a drop in the Flashpoint, drop in the TBN, drop in the Viscosity, and elevated Iron.

Honda V6 engines are high in Cu because of their bearing overlay design.

 

Blackstone should understand that Hoinda engines use copper as part of the bearing material, and it is not unsual for them to show how Cu for the first XX thousand miles. I wonder sometimes if they have a "knowledge management " capability at all, such as the ones we use in our R&D Labs, and our enterprise Service Desks - electronic lab notebooks, shared databases and scripts, etc.

Blackstone's "analyses" do not seem to have shared info - they vary greatly from one to another, and sometimes leave the customer hanging unecessarily, as in the copper reading in this last posted report. It hints there might be a problem, when actually the great preponderance of evidence suggests there is none.

They should do better.

 

It's not really continous to story going on here but..

I am overdue on my first oil change. I recently got busy and won't be able to hit dealership for another few days... My car says I'm over by xxKM(Canadian)

 

I'd have to agree that BKlabs is not familiar with the performance or chemistry of many oils, as well as the designs of many engines.

Michael

 

Is there a question in there, or are you advertising your poor maintenance choices ?

Get the oil changed!