stevenr

RR-

I know you have addressed Motocraft oil in your journals, but I wanted to clarify a couple of things.

I was at Walmart today - looking for Motocraft Synblend oil. I found it at a phenomenal price $1.42 per quart. Interesting thing is that it is the same price at the "Super Premium" conventional oil and the Havoline dino oil.

Motocraft Synblend was only available in 5W20 and 5W30 and 10W30 was "Super Premium". Do you have any comments on 5W20 vs. 5W30 for winter time? I live in MD and the temps can get quite cold (single digits to the teens) in Jan and Feb.

Also, I understand the advantage of running 10W30 for spring and summer, but since this is not a Synblend, is the advantage reduced with Super Premium relative to 5W30 Synblend?

I also noticed that Havoline has some reasonably priced Synblend and Full Synthetic oils. Any comments on these relative to the dino counterpart?

As always, we appreciate your input. Seems like 5W30 Synblend at $1.42/qt is tough to beat!!!!

SodaLuvr

LONG POST

Although I'm a newbie to this forum and I do not own a TL yet, I am quite knowledgeable about oils. Motorcraft 5W-20 is probably the best oil as far as a price to performance ratio. In winter climate especially when you face temperatures in the teens, I'd definitely use 5W-20 over 5W-30. Its thinner, and it will give you better fuel economy than 5W-30. Although 5W-30 sometimes gives you better protection in the summer, some cars requiring 20 weight oils have been known to perform "sluggish" when 30 weight oils are used. Where you live, I'd definitely use 5W-20 over 5W-30; if possible, I'd use Mobil 1 0W-20 over all of these oils, it is a zero weight, which will flow better in colder temperatures, and it will last you 5,000-7,000 miles under most conditions.
As far as Halvoline oils go, they are excellent oils that are somewhat underrated. They and their Chevron dyno counterparts actually hold up very well in oil analysis. I'd suggest that you'd take a look at Pennzoil 5W-20 oils as well. Even though they have been stereotyped by enthusiasts as lousy oils, after looking at several oil analysis reports with 5W-20 Pennzoil dyno, they are actually just as good if not better than the highly rated Castrol GTX. Pennzoil contains lots of moly for extra protection compared to other dyno oils. Out here in Sacramento, I'm able to purchase Havoline/Chevron dyno oils and Pennzoil dyno oils for 59 cents and 69 cents a quart, respectively, after mail-in rebates if you purchase a case.

As a final note, I think that 10W-30 is an overkill for summer use. 5W-30 is more than sufficient. Although synthetic blend oils are somewhat better than their straight dyno counterparts, if you can get Havoline/Chevron dyno or Pennzoil dyno for 60 to 70 cents a quart, the $1.34/quart price for semi-synthetic is hard to justify. Both semi-synthetic and a good dyno oil can last you 5,000 miles under most conditions.

Hawhyen51

Check thread https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...ht=RR+Journals

Welcome to the forum and let us know when you get your TL. Any idea what color scheme ? Check out some of RR's posts. Lots of info and knowledge.....

BTW, What part of Sac? PM me.

stevenr

Hawhyen51,

I have read all of RR's Journals, but my question was more specifically about Motocraft Super Premium, which is not addressed. It is interesting that the Super Premium is the same price as the Synblend, but with different viscosity.

I hate to say it, but i use Jiffy Lube to change my oil - with 3 kids and a job where I travel I just don't have time to deal with my own oil changes. Besides, I know the owner at my local JL and they take EXTRA care with my car when I go there.

I have been using Mobil 1 5W20 and supplying my own K&N Oil filter. It looks like I am okay to use the 5W20 Pennsoil from the JTeam and I will keep providing my own filter.

The incremental cost of providing my own oil as well is not a big deal to me, I just want good stuff, especially with the lower weight oils used today.

Road Rage

stevenr:

The MC Super premium line uses hydrocracked base stocks, similar to the MC 5w20 synblend. But the MC 5w20 synblend additive package is costlier, and better - it uses the amines I mentioned, which are going to be more widely used by SM/GF-4 competitors. I think it is the best of the 5w20's out there. That $1.42 price is terrific!

Castrol Syntec has shown some excellent UOA's, but of course is nearly 3X as costly.

Are you quite sure that the 5w30 MC is a synblend? I have not seen it in that viscosity - I have seen it in the "premium" blend, which uses the severely hydrocracked base stocks. Not saying you are making it up, just want to make sure we are comparing appoles to apples. According to this, only the 5w20 is a "premium synthetic blend".
http://www.motorcraft.com/Products.a...M=15&PageID=74

Regarding "sluggishness" in using a 30w over a 20w. I have not seen it - although the engine will worlk a bit harder to pump 30 dub, the differences are tiny, Any sluggishness is far more likely to be psychological. NASCAR teams often run a lightweight 20w during qualifying, where a fraction of a second can make a difference, and the few laps run will not present a significant wear risk to the engine. But once they qualify, they switch back to 30 weights, as being at the front of the pack at the beginning is one thing - being in the lead at the end quite another. They know that running super hard is beyond a 20w. 20's aree always touted for their emissions and fuel economy, but the 5 and 10w30's return the lowest wear. All things being equal, the narrower the spread between 32degF rating (the "w") and 212degF rating (the second number as in 10w30), the better. A 20 pointer usually has little or no VI improver, and is consequently more shear stable.

0w20 is not spec'd for the Honda, and is demonstrably thinner at all temps than even a 5w20. Should it fail, I doubt Honda would cover the repairs. Neither would Mobil. There is no need to go to that extreme anyway, unless you live in the Arctic. Even then, a syn or synblend has a pour point well below -30degF. Mobil tends to formulate at the low end of the API vis ranges fopr any given viscosity number as it is - why push it?

My favorite 10w30, Lubrication Engineers 8130, is a pretty thick 10w30, yet has a PP of -30degF.

Keep in mind that even a "normal" 5 or 10w will flow better than your Dad's oil did - the GIII severe hydrocracking process results in 2 major benefits:
1) it greatly reduces the wax crystals that occur in mineral oil, and whose lattice is what causes most of the thickening of the oil at low temps. Even with GII stocks, pur point depressants in the add pack lower the oil's effective temperature.
2) it causes higher saturation of the oil (bad for youre blood, ghood for your engine's lifeblood). This means that the oil is much more mono-molecular, like a synoil. Synoils are nearly 100% saturated.

Only you can make the decision on what to use. The Havoline is terrific, the MC 5w20 synblend is also terrific, with a hardier add pack. In summer, should you wish to use Honda's factory recommendation, the ecxtra margin of safety with the MC synblend might be worth it to you - that would be my choice, and is indeed what i have in the car right now (along with a bottle of MaxLife Engine Protector until I hit the 7500 mile break-in point). If you drive under conditions where oil changes at the "old school" magic 3000 mile mark, I would go with Havoline's "regular blend", because of the value proposition. Such conditions would be where you tow, drive in extremely dirty ambient air, use a gauze type air filter (K&N), track your car either at drags, auto-x's, or road courses; or regularly sit in long idle conditions (like a daily commute in Los Angeles).

I likely will go with LE 8130 year 'round. I like its SH formula, which is high in phos and zinc. It has the best oxidation performance I have seen in any oil, syn or min. The TFOUT (thin-film oxygen uptake test) is a very good metric to evaluate an oil's consistency and longevity in extreme shear and heat conditions, and LE does amazingly well in that KPI. LE 8130 is about 20% GII+ paraffinics which are highly saturated, of the mid-continent type. The syn part is about 70% PAO's. In conversations with their tribologists a few months ago, they hinted that they had found that their unique additive pack, which has proprietary content you will not see in any other oil, or on the UOA's, works very well during the warmup cycle with the mineral oil, providing wear protection at temps lower than other mins/syns. Most anti-wear/anti-friction (AW/AF) chemistry does not really work until about 200degF oil temp - if you or your family do only short hops, it should be apparent that this is a performance factor more important than the performance at redline. It can take 20-30 minutes for cold oil to reach 200degF.

I will pop over to the Motorcraft web site and see if I can clarify the syn or min question i raised earlier.

P.S. I do not see a large enough bump of the Havoline syn over the min to make a blanket recommendation of it. Ditto for the MC synblend. And I agree with michaelwan that Pennzoils minoils are super, although i do not think much of their synoil. He cites moly, but moly is only one of many colloid additives - LE uses boron and their secret "monolec" additive in addition to the high amounts of ZDP, Man does not live by moly alone. LE-607 uses their own proprietary colloid, Almasol, which has just as high a film strength as moly, but none of its drawbacks.
http://www.le-inc.com/Welcome/PropAdditives.html

stevenr

RR,

I am pretty sure the 5W30 is a Synblend, but I will go to Walmart on my way home today and verify. I will let you know for sure this evening.

Thank you very much for your input.

Road Rage

The link I posted says otherwise......

Brokedoc

I went to Walmart yesterday and snatched up some of that 5W20 Motorcraft for $1.42/qt. I thought that there would be a regional price adjustment or something because real estate and operating costs are higher around NY, but I'm glad I was wrong.

I thought that I saw Motorcraft 5W30 Synblend at Walmart as well. Going to MC's site, they only list 5W30 in Full Synthetic formula. Maybe I read it wrong? I'm going to get some of that for my Sienna on my next trip so I'll double check. It's easy to mix up the oils because the labels look almost identical. It would be easier to tell apart if they had a different color or design or something.....but for $1.42/qt, I'm not complaining.

Road Rage

I have not looked at the 5w30 synoil - there is no guarantee it is as good as 5w20. If they farmed it out to Conoco, it likely is very good - but there is no knowing if the great formula Conoco developed for the 5w20 is in the 5w30. However, all the Motorcraft oils and filters (Purolator made) have checked out very well, so I would have high confidence using any of their products.

stevenr

RR,

I did verify today that Walmart does carrry Motocraft 5W30 Synblend. The 10W30 is standard Dino Oil.

I am more interested in 5W30 Synblend because my Surburban calls out for 5W30 and I would like to standardize on one oil, if possible. You would like to think that manufacturers would try and standardize their additives as much as possible, to help reduce costs.

As previously indicated, Walmart price, $1.42.

They also had Castrol Syntech 5W30 for $2.47, I think.

How do we find out if the 5W30 has the same add pack as the 5W20? I would be happy to do the research myself, if I can get access to this detail.