'03 Kawasaki Vulcan 1500 - Motomaster 10W40 - 2Kmi

[va3ux]

Analysis #2 on this oil. Oil sampled hot.

Fuel still seems high although this may be normal for this engine. Shearing and fuel munched this oil down to a 5W30 in just 2K miles. Oil dumped and replaced with Shell Rotella T 15W40.

Code:


2003 Kawasaki Meanstreak 1500 (1500 V Twin)

27,800 km on engine (17,300K miles)

3,200 km on oil (2K miles)



Canadian Tire Motomaster Formula1 Premium Motorcycle oil



10W40 - made by Shell Canada



Analysis by Fluid Life, Brantford, Ontario

July 7, 2011



VOA 1000 miles 2000 miles



Sodium 0 0 0

Potassium 0 0 0

Silicon 28 15 14

Aluminum 0 4 6

Iron 1 15 24

Copper 0 8 11

Lead 0 0 1

Tin 0 0 0

Chromium 0 0 0

Calcium 2185 2073 2056

Zinc 1016 982 979

Phosphorous 858 805 808

Magnesium 10 22 23

Moly 81 75 73

Boron 163 140 122

Lithium 1 1 1



Fuel 0 1.44% 1.51%

Cst@40C 101 80 77.6

Cst@100C 15.1 12.8 12.2

VI 157 159 155



Oxid.(A/cm) 0.1 1.38 2.18

Nitr.(A/cm) 0.1 2.91 4.32

Sulf.(A/cm) 0.1 0.1 2.70




There's only one other UOA for a Vulcan 1500 motor on here that I can find so it's difficult to say if the wear numbers are normal or not for this motor. Here's the other UOA :
UOA Post 2096685

 

[va3ux]

BTW, the 1500 motor in the Kawasaki Meanstreak differs slightly from the 1500 installed in all the rest of the Vulcan series (ie Nomad, Classic, etc) :

1)Larger throttle bores
2)Larger intake valves
3)Different cam grind/valve timing
4)Different fuel mapping (this is a FI engine)
5)Different gear ratios in the transmission (all gears). This is a shared-sump engine.

I wouldn't expect any of this to result in a significant difference in UOA compared to the standard Vulcan 1500 engine, but I thought I'd mention it.

Also, I can regularly get 50+ mpg on this machine with easy, steady cruising on rural roads at 50 - 60 mph

 

[Brons2]

Shear is pretty significant, about 20% at 100C. Otherwise, looks like a decent UOA.

 

[sunruh]

1.51% fuel is going to kill the viscosity. until you get that to zero the vis numbers are worthless except for showing that you still have a fuel issue.

iron of 24 and copper of 11 maybe high for 2k or normal. we need a trend to form.

 

[va3ux]

Originally Posted By: sunruh
1.51% fuel is going to kill the viscosity. until you get that to zero the vis numbers are worthless except for showing that you still have a fuel issue.


That's what makes then 'not worthless' to me : knowing that at 2K miles (or less) I'm running the equivalent of a 5W30, and therefore the oil needs to be changed by then (rather than blindly running to 3K or 4K miles). And as you say, knowing that fuel is responsible for probably a good portion of the VI loss is useful too. I need to check crankcase ventilation, compression and look for possible leaky injector.

Quote:
iron of 24 and copper of 11 maybe high for 2k or normal. we need a trend to form.


Yea, I wish there were more UOA on these motors so we had some idea what 'typical' is.

My Chrysler 2.7L V6 produces less than half that much iron and copper during a 5K mile run. But then that's 'typical' for that motor.

Thanks for your comments BTW