Recent content by Mike O'Connor

Is rust really an issue on engine parts that spend their lives bathed in oil? I have never heard of an engine failure that was due to rusting of an internal engine part.

BTW, I am trained in engineering; please use technical/scientific language and arguments where appropriate.

I think idling would be the best environment for exhausting water vapour through the crankcase ventilation system, since the engine temperature is higher than it is in a car on the highway. Why is water vapour harmful anyway? Why would idling cause unburned gas to be blown by into the...

I searched quite a lot but was unable to find an answer to this question: It is well known that if your driving is done mainly on the highway, you can extend your oil change interval versus the case where the driving is of the stop-and-go/short trip "severe service" type. What is the...

Last year, I can remember buying a 4 litre jug of Mobil 1 5W30 for about CAN$27.00. I just bought a 4.4 litre jug for CAN$38.00 at the local walmart. I thought there was no dino oil in Mobil 1 at all, so I'm wondering why the price spike? Has the price gone up that much in the US too?

I didn't know the base stock of Mobil 1 was derived from natural gas - thanks for the info, k1xv. I learned from a friend on the board this afternoon that Mobil 1 can still be had for sub-$30 in the Toronto area, which is a much bigger urban centre than the one I live in. It's possible that my...

The quick oil change place (called oilchangers) used a Purolator filter. Is that a good filter? (I've been doing some reading about the Fram extra guard and the opinions are overwhelmingly negative.)

Sorry ekpolk, I went to one of those quick oil change places (It was -25C and I didn't feel like crawling around under the car!) and they put in one of their house brand filters. I will try to find out what kind of filter they use. Does Blackstone Labs do the particulate analysis you want? I...

After doing some surfing, I found out that the glycol can be burned and hence not be detected in the oil, so even a trace amount can indicate a big leak. The labs look for coolant additives like sodium and potassium typically not present in oils to indicate coolant contamination. Clearly, the...

I don't understand why the antifreeze percentage, at 0.1%, isn't higher if there really is a serious leak. 0.1% by volume of (roughly) 4 litres of oil is 0.8 teaspoons -- that's not a lot of antifreeze at all. In my UOA, the antifreeze percentage was 0.23%, two and a half times yours, and my...

Oil filter was Fram Extra Guard. That's what was on sale at the time at Walmart! I should probably use the OEM filters though, huh?

Thanks for the feedback. I should be clear though: when I sampled the oil I did it directly from the oil pan into the Blackstone sample bottle. The possible antifreeze contamination happened at the time I put the oil into the car. There would have been a cubic centimetre of antifreeze in the...

No obvious coolant leak; I haven't had to top up the reservoir at all.

Vehicle is a 1999 Camry 2.2 Litre 4 cylinder. (Yes, this is the sludgemonster engine but there's no evidence mine's afflicted.) Oil used was Mobil 1 5W30. Kilometres on oil: 8000 (4971 mi) Total Kilometres on car: 108 000. (67108 mi) This car lives in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Oil was in the...