How long can you leave synthetic oil in car

Don, I don't think brake fluid is oil based but rather is something like glycol, at least it feels that way when you get it on your hands. I also agree that most oils are not hydrscopic or will not absorb water.

 

I have a BMW 530I as a daily car.
The recomended oil change is at 15 - 20000mls dependant on the way the computer sees you driving.
What is special about this 6 cylinder 7000rpm engine and oil that Ferrari has overlooked?
On another note when I moved from England to the states I was supprised at the 3000mile oil change, most cars in England (if i recall ) had a recomended oil change at 6000miles minimum.

Russell

PS It would be interesting to see what the euro/english Ferrari hand book recommends.

 

I was on the Rennlist many years back when these high extended mileage oil change intervals started being floated around. This is a bunch of garbage that is being perpetuated by the German Gov. I have had people tell me they have gone so far as to sell German cars in country with no oil drains, and that it is now illegal to change your own oil. I have no first hand knowledge any of this is actually true, but several from Germany have nodded in agreement.

I have been an aircraft enthusiast at least as long as I have loved cars. My father and Uncle both instlled it in me further as over all my years we can always get into good "hanger" talk. I even worked as an aircraft mechanic for a time while I was learning to fly, kinda became an airport bum. The point I am making is that both cars and aircraft share things in common. Both have pistons, valves, sparkplugs, carburators, and motor oil. You could argue they are aircooled, but then so is a Porsche.

If you were to compare oil clearances on engine bearings you would also find close simularity, yet aircraft as a rule all generally run 20-50 motor oil even though they operate a lot more at high altitude cold tempertures more than our lowly cars spend burning along the asphalt in 100 degree heat.

Most aircraft see 25 to 50 hour oil and filter changes. In a Cessna 172 that works out to 2500 to 5000 miles. All the engine manufactures dont go over 100 hours, and in commercial use the FAA demands the oil filter be cut open and inspected and the oil changed during every 100 hour inspection.

My lowly 308 cost more than most any Cessna 152, and as much as an older Cessna 172. I could probably own an old Bonanza for what I have tied up in Ferraris right now, and the engine in the Ferrari is worth every bit as much as any of the engines in those aircraft.

Engines and oil are both very odd things, even after almost 50 years. I have seen engines that used oil and yet were spottless inside, except they had carbon in the oil rings. Only way to get that carbon out and keep it out is with strong detergents, and that takes oil changes. I am also not convinced that simply analysing your motor oil is going to tell you if any coked up in the rings. Personally I wouldnt pay squat for any car that had 20K mile oil changes. The stuff isnt that expensive or rare to worry about. Besides, every gallon of gas you burn causes about a quart of oil to be produced. All used oil is brought back to the refinerery and burned to heat the condensors. So no matter if you change your oil at 3,000, or 30,000, they are still going to burn the oil. You aint saving any precious trees by neglecting your car.

 

I agree with Mr. Colberg and also being a flyer know the importance of frequent oil changes.

Oil is cheap, frequent oil changes keep an engine clean, and all your engine bearings will love you for it.

Makes good engineering sense to me.

 

And yet I understand that the modern art of oil analysis was developed by the Navy for THEIR airplanes ! Whatever. You old farts will die off eventually and then those of us that accept new technology can (1) use the oil life monitors in our cars to not waste perfectly serviceable oil or (2) go on blissfully never realizing that oil has to be changed, then sue the manufacturer when the engine siezes at 45,000 miles! LOL

 

Per my earlier comment about european oil change intervals.
Just pulled up the service interval for the 2002 360 euro version from the Ferrari owners site and they recommend changing oil every year or at 20000km (12500mile) intervals.
Is the oil in the US crap or is the rest of the world destroying engines at a rate 3 times higher.
Or was the 3000mile oil change a product of the oil companies marketing?

Russell

 

Don, what an awful thing to say about the old farts dying off, no sensitivity whatsoever, who the hell are you? True form shown with magnification. Must be a arrogant youngster with somethig to prove. Learn some wisdom.

 

I just completed an advanced oil analysis course a few weeks ago.
In my line of work, we rely on cleanliness of all oils, to maintain superior component life in our Mining equipment. Oils worldwide are crap in general. The "clean" oil you buy from the shop, in the 5L bottles or whatever, is not clean at all. It has around 50-60 micron particles in it. Very visible to the human eye. They are around the size of a human hair in thickness. They can filter the oils more and get the particle ratings down, but that costs money. To keep costs down, they sell it 'dirty'. Before we send our oils underground in the mine, the oil gets filtered and filtered and filtered again and again, till we reach the target of 3 microns. All the oils in our machines underground get changed weekly. Weekly service's on everything. 3 microns are only visible under a microscope. A normal engine oil filter, can stop 40 micron particles, from passing through the engine. 40 mircons, are around the size of a human hair in thickness. Still visible. General Motors apparently did a test back in 1996, where the tested what different micron engine oil filters could do in car engines. They ran engines 24/7 with the same oil and filter, till they blew. If you go from a 40 micron engine oil filter to a 30 micron engine oil filter, you will double the engine/component life. Simple as that. The lower the filter micron rating, the longer component/engine life you will acheive. The filters go from the standard 40 to 30,20,10 and 5 micron. But.........the more particles the filters stop, the quicker the filter blocks up. So instead of doing one oil and filter change per year with a 40 mircron filter, you will be doing maybe 5 more oil changes using the 30 micron filter. The cost is not viable. Well, maybe to some people, but not most. To sum it all up, I would stick to doing one oil and filter change, every 5000km or every year. Which ever comes 1st. Garage queens also need oil changes every year. I do the same in every car I own and the same with my mums car and my brothers car ect.... Always have, and I always will. I also tell my friends to so also. Whether its a Ferrari or a Ford. I dont have the means to clean the "new" engine oil from the shop, before I put it in the Ferrari, so thats why its a good idea to stay on top of the oil changes. I would change the engine every 5000km.

 

Its not worth it mate. The older the oil gets ,the more accelerated the engine wear will get as the oil is starting to break down and it basically will stop sticking to engine components, rings/cylinders/bearings ect...But if you want to skimp on oil changes, thats fine, your choice.

 

I think the straight answer is oil change depends on usage. As a rule of thumb, I would say:
1. tracking the car and heavy use: once every six months
2. normal road use: once a year
3. car being properly stored and seeing only very little use: 12-18 months

like underlined above, oil does break down and being in an engine, it starts to loose its qualities. But you have to differentiate between what is isgnificant or not. I just think it's plain silly to change oil every 6 months on a car that does 2000 miles per year. Such frequent oil change will not have significant impact on the car. I'd save the money for something else.

 

If you look at his profile you will notice it says, Automotive Engineer. And guess what? He works in the industry. Still bitter that you had your azz handed to you in this thread huh? http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=85335&highlight=aviation+oil
And even after that, you are still touting the merits of Aeroshell (aviation oil) in an automotive engine. But it doesn't stop there. You continue to peddle BS like acetone in gasoline which has been debunked by professionals. http://www.fuelsaving.info/acetone.htm http://www.kettering.edu/news/archivedDetail.asp?storynum=406
and in episode #53 of Mythbusters.

Learn some wisdom? From who? An old fart nitwit like yourself? You obviously lack the intellectual rigor to accomplish what Don has. It shows through your continued bad advice on this forum.

Tell you what, go ahead and continue to use Aeroshell and acetone in your 246. When the acetone eats through the fuel lines and fuel leaks on the header giving you a nice CarBQ, I will give you a toast. Get it. Ha, Ha. Because schadenfreude is a wonderful feeling.

 

OWNED

 

my uderstanding is that synthetic oils ie mobil 1 etc have molecules that are linked and therefor if the car is sitting for any great length of time ie 30+ days then it is wiser to use a standard high quality oil as because the molecules are linked they drag each other to the sump and therefor very little residue is left in the upper parts of the engine for the cold start therefor more friction and wear. There was a post re this some months back.

 

After my oil analysis course 2 weeks ago. I decided to do an engine oil analysis on my 348 for something to do. Im lucky enough to monitor the engine oil for as long as I want to also. My brother and I are good friends with the "Reliability Engineer" that works for the underground Mine(Xstrata) where we both work at. He said he is more than happy to do it for me. Xstrata have built a chemical lab here, just to do oil analysis for all their machines on the mine lease and every other mine in the area. They do around 1200 oil samples per month with a 3 man team. To give a true account of any oil condition, the oil sample should be tested within 2 days of being sampled. I took my sample down straight after I took it and I have just got the results emailed back to me yesterday. Baby GG my head mechanic pulled the oil sample from the oil tank while I supervised and took the pics.

Here are the sample results. Anyone care to interpret the them? Before I tell you's what the lab reported back.

Fe (Iron) (ppm) 20.5
Pb (Lead) (ppm) 8.5
Si (Silicon) (ppm) 26.5
Cr (Chromium) (ppm) 1.7
Al (Aluminium) (ppm) 8.2
Cu (Copper) (ppm) 60.9
Sn (Tin) (ppm) 0
Ag (Silver) (ppm) 0
Ni (Nickel) (ppm) 3.7


Mg (Magnesium) (ppm) 846.4
Ca (Calcium) (ppm) 1290
B (Boron) (ppm) 10.3
Na (Sodium) (ppm) 9.3
V (Vanadium) (ppm) 1.8
Ba (Barium) (ppm) 29
Mo (Molybdenum) (ppm) 5.7
P (Phosphorus) (ppm) 683.4
Sulphation (ppm) 0
Zn (Zinc) (ppm) 825.9


Ferrous Density 16
Fuel (% Concentration) (%) 0 
Water (% Concentration) (%) 0
Water in Oil
Fuel in oil
Viscosity @ 100C (cSt) 15.56
Soot (A/cm)
Oxidation (A/cm)
Base Number (mgKOH/g) 11.27
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You should post your results here: http://theoildrop.server101.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=forum;f=3

F-chat's own "enjoythemusic" posted his 308GTS results there.

 

I've never heard this about a time limitation on getting the oil analyzed. What's the reasoning?

Off the cuff, it seems like some of those wear metal numbers are a little high, what's the history on the oil?

 

Very good sir. The 2 day time limit, isnt crucial apparently, but it will give you a better indication on the oil sample if done sooner, rather than later. Doing it asap is best way they told me, but with no real reason to back it up.
The engine oil is Shell Helix Ultra which was used last service before I got the car. Around 1 year old and 3500km on the oil.

The Si(Silicone) is a little high. Dust in the engine they reckon.
The Cu(Copper) is a little high. Wear on the engine bearings they reckon.
But.............."since this is a one off sample, we have no trend line to evaluate the level of this element properly. Other than that, it is normal for engine oil." That was what the lab reported back with.

As stated with my original post, I am going to monitor the oil. Whats in it now, and when I change the oil and filter when I do the major service. I can do the oil samples for nothing, so I will do it around once a month. Every 1000km would be good, but that will take me months to get the kms up. Every month should be ok to start a 'trend' for the lab and I to monitor. When I do the major and replace the oil and filter, then we will start another 'trend'.

 

Explain to me how oil analysis works, in light of differing intervals between oil changes.

I assume that wear particles are additive over time. Meaning, the longer the interval between oil changes, the greater the chance for accumulation of copper/lead/etc in an oil sample...

So, if you change your oil daily...I would expect the numbers to be very low, even if you had extreme wear on your motor.

If you change your oil every 5 years ( ), I would expect the oil sample to show tons of contaminants, as a lot of time and wear has occurred on an ADDITIVE basis...

Seems to me that comparing oil samples means little, unless the same time change interval is used??? I would expect an oil that is one year old to have more particulate matter than one one month old...but does that mean more wear on the motor??

 

Applying Occam's razor, Don't see how it could be otherwise. I'd assume that samples need to be taken at consistent intervals for sample-sample analysis to reveal trends.

Of course if a sample taken say a month or 2 after an oil change showed an abnormally high amount of Fe or Al, there's probably grounds for concern.

 

Ideally, changing the engine oil daily on any engine oil, would see the engine last an eternity. The new oil and filter daily, would get rid of the contaminants all the time. But in the real world, you does that? And who can afford that. As I said earlier, just from changing from a 40 micron filter, to a 30 micron filter, you can get double the engine life. But the filter gets clogged alot quicker and it will have to be changed probably 5-10 times more throughout the year, instead of the once you would do with the normal 40 micron filter. You can go down to 20,10 and 5 micron filters. Which are awesome, but you will have to change filters every day if using the 5 micron. The 'new' engine oil you buy from the shops, has around 40 micron particles in it. Visible to the human eye. We have our oils go through a kidney loop system, again and again and again, before the oil gets pumped underground and into our machines at work. They are not satisfied until it reaches the 3 micron target they set for the oil. Oil samples really only are benefical, if they are taken weekly, monthly or yearly to keep an eye on the condition of the engine or whatever component. Im going to do mine monthly and go from there. I need to start a trend, so that the lab can keep an eye on the silicone and copper levels. Obviously if they get higher next time, then obviously dust is entering the engine somehow and its wearing the bearings. Ive checked all the induction hose/airbox clamps ect..... Cant see anything odd. Will have to let the next oil sample tell the story.

 

Hey, you guys remember the "toilet paper" oil filter they had in the 1980's? Remember seeing it on 20/20 or some other show. Consisted of a roll of toilet paper in a cannister...was supposed to be the most efficient filter ever made...

Anyone rememeber this ?

Anyone want to try it on a ferrari?

 

That is the filter setup they use when they pump the 'new' oil into the kidney loop machines to clean the oils. The "toilet roll" type filters are good for 5 microns. Not actual toilet paper used in them. They use 12, twin canisters types which are around 1 metre high and hold 20 filters in both canisters. 240 filters in total for all 12 kidney loops. They get changed daily, because they block up. They also have a centrifuge to seperate the water from the oil, before it goes through the kidney loops, many many times.
You probably could mount something similar in a Ferrari.

 

Here is a similar pic of a kidney loop machine that we use. This is a smaller version, but still works in the same way filtering the oil.
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Synthetic blends are a joke. It's the manufacturers way to sell you dino oil and change you synthetic price. The "synthetic" used in blends is just highly refined dino oil. Nothing "synthetic" about it. Save you money and just buy Dino oil. It's the same stuff. Castol Syntec is made by a process called "hydrocracking". Fancy word for highly refining dino oil.

Syntec = JUNK

 

On a related point - I hadn't used my car for three months and the reservoir valve in one carburetor stuck open, probably due to varnish or sludge in the fuel. The result was that fuel flooded the carb (downdraft) and also one bank of cylinders - the starter couldn't crant the engine (fluid lock). After three days, we cleaned the arburetors, siphoned the gas from the cylinders, and the engine started.

Perhaps someone can advise me - should I now change the oil (Mobil 1) and filter? The oil level didn't seem to have gone up, but there is a faint petrol smell in the oil on the dipstick.

Have enjoyed this informative and useful thread. Many thenaks in advance.