2010 Traverse 3.6L/ 5,026 VWB

[rbarrios]

Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: rbarrios
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: oil_film_movies
Very true. This engine is beating the Universal Average by a lot!


With the massive amount of make-up oil, that's to be expected.


here are the earlier UOA




So this, with your current trend, iron seems to be all over the map, which is unusual. Do you always run the same oil?



Ive used nothing but Valvoline White Bottle. (Conventional).

The UOA where the lowest iron counts were reported, these were oil change intervals were the vehicle was used on a road trips, with passengers, cargo on the roof, inside, and on a hitch rack.
about 3200 miles roundtrip.
1600 miles out in 2 days and 1600 miles back in 2 days.

Then the vehicle was driven daily as normal until the UOA.

 

[oil_film_movies]

rbarrios (OP), You may have a point about some carbon getting loose after your clean-up task. Hard to tell. Could be your rings are simply getting a little black stuff on them, causing them to stick a little, getting more oil into the combustion chamber. Might be valve stem wear causing the additional oil consumption, with that many miles its expected.
MaxLife for sure here; it was made for this.

Do the old sodium compounds Valvoline is famous for using in the past act as friction modifiers (FM)? No moly here. Unless they put in some form of ester which doesn't show up on a UOA, yet I thought throwing in 50 ppm or so of moly was the cheapest way to pass GF-5 fuel economy tests.

 

[rbarrios]

yeah, hard to tell.
Could it be
-the carbon cleaning,
-the higher mileage,
-the change in driving pattern
-sticking rings

or a combination of all.

I think adding the Maxlife as make up oil----little by little vs making a sudden change is better.

Maxlife- on the website says "Extra detergents keep older engines cleaner by bonding with and removing sludge and deposits "
My thinking is, if I make a sudden change, what if it cleans up a little too good--- and causes blocked passages. (the 2009 3.6's apparently had small oil journals (I think theyre called-- that would clog up and cause accelerated timing chain wear).
Id prefer a slow cleaning vs a sudden change.

What do you think of this?

 

[oil_film_movies]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios
What do you think of this?
Should work fine.
I'd put in Rislone for the last 1,000 miles of your oil change interval you're currently running to dissolve more.

 

[WobblyElvis]

GM had it's share of problems with this engine. They created Dexos oil and they shortened the OCI for the OLM in order to help. I don't see the logic in avoiding a Synthetic Dexos approved oil. The new Dexos 2nd gen, also helps prevent timing chain wear as well as keeps the pistons/rings clean.

 

[oil_film_movies]

Originally Posted By: WobblyElvis
GM had it's share of problems with this engine. They created Dexos oil and they shortened the OCI for the OLM in order to help. I don't see the logic in avoiding a Synthetic Dexos approved oil. The new Dexos 2nd gen, also helps prevent timing chain wear as well as keeps the pistons/rings clean.

Valvoline MaxLife full-synthetic version 5w30 is dexos1 Gen2 rated. If rbarrios avoids the syn-blend version, he's got dexos1 Gen2 covered. Yes he 'should' use it for the proof of timing chain wear tests, among other reasons.

 

[rbarrios]

The 2009/2010, did not 'require' Dexos. This began in 2011/2012 interestingly

 

[oil_film_movies]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios
The 2009/2010, did not 'require' Dexos. This began in 2011/2012 interestingly

Back then, yes that was true. Past tense. . From the 2011 model year to the current, dexos1 Gen2 technically replaces GM6094M, so in a very real way, your car actually now specs dexos1 Gen2.

When GM says dexos1 Gen2 "replaces" GM6094M, they are saying forget GM6094M. & GM4718M too for that matter, forget that one, use dexos1 Gen2 now.

 

[SatinSilver]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios
Originally Posted By: SatinSilver
Time for some Maxlife to see if that helps with consumption. Or at a minimum top it off with Maxlife. Since it's trending up. Also replace the pcv valve(s).


My goal was to run this engine with nothing but Valvoline Conventional....

I went and looked at the Maxlife info... and it has the following- that VWB conventional does not...

-Seal conditioners to help seal leaks (my engine has no external engine oil leaks by the way)
-Lower volatility to help reduce oil consumption (oil burning).
-Increased protection against deposits and sludge
-Enhanced anti wear system
-Synthetic Blend.


I guess I will head to the store and begin using Maxlife as my make up oil.

That sound good?


Sounds good. What about replacing the pcv valve? I'm running VWB in my dd.

 

[rbarrios]

I did, I bought a new one- and drilled the 3 holes to make them bigger.
my factory unit was not totally plugged.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios



Ive used nothing but Valvoline White Bottle. (Conventional).

The UOA where the lowest iron counts were reported, these were oil change intervals were the vehicle was used on a road trips, with passengers, cargo on the roof, inside, and on a hitch rack.
about 3200 miles roundtrip.
1600 miles out in 2 days and 1600 miles back in 2 days.

Then the vehicle was driven daily as normal until the UOA.



Well, it is nice to hear that your trending is all with the same oil at least. I'm really surprised with the variation in iron then, as it generally tracks pretty consistently with mileage, and with the same lubricant, it is very predictable. Your long trip OCI's seem to really upset this, which is interesting.

Given this engine's history of timing chain issues, you may be well served running a DEXOS lube, as others have mentioned.

 

[rbarrios]

The iron being lower on the long trips-- shouldnt that be expected?

Its 3200 miles of essentially non stop cruising on the highway.
Gas up and drive until the gas is low again. Stop refuel. and keep going- repeat.

I would think the cold engine starts is where there is more wear... 3200 miles can be 4 months.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios

The iron being lower on the long trips-- shouldnt that be expected?

Its 3200 miles of essentially non stop cruising on the highway.
Gas up and drive until the gas is low again. Stop refuel. and keep going- repeat.

I would think the cold engine starts is where there is more wear... 3200 miles can be 4 months.





Iron normally tracks with mileage, may go up a tick in the winter months due to cold start condensation/corrosion, but generally, given a typical usage profile, your ppm/1K remains relatively constant. Yes, I would expect an OCI that constitutes a single long trip would yield better results, but there's still the other couple thousand miles in there that would be more typical to offset it.

Your iron tracks:
1. 6,811: 4.463ppm/1K miles
2. 12,314: 3.634ppm/1K miles
3. 30,677: 1.764ppm/1K miles
4. 40,578: 3.398ppm/1K miles
5. 68,777: 1.964ppm/1K miles
6. 91,297: 1.912ppm/1K miles
7. 105,001: 2.200ppm/1K miles
8. 116,502: 1.628ppm/1K miles
9. 137,862: 3.780ppm/1K miles

Which looks like this plotted:




So wear rapidly went down from break-in, then spiked at 40,000 miles, then levelled back down to your ~2ppm/1K miles average only to spike again on this most recent OCI. Additional trend data would be useful, but it appears, that the "normal" for your engine is ~2ppm/1K miles for Iron. If the trend continues its present trajectory, particularly given the consumption you are now seeing, I'd start to be concerned.

 

[rbarrios]

ok, now I see what you mean.
I wonder what I did/happened at 40,000.
Ill go back and try to figure out what was going on around then.

Thanks.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios
ok, now I see what you mean.
I wonder what I did/happened at 40,000.
Ill go back and try to figure out what was going on around then.

Thanks.


You are quite welcome.

One interesting thing, and it probably has zero bearing on this, but look at the TBN for that run compared to the others.

 

[rbarrios]

Quick search.

@ 39,451 my water pump began to leak and was changed.
There was no overheat.
As I saw coolant on floor- and drove it to dealer the next morning.
No overheat condition.


Around 38,000-did a trip up/down the local mountains where I had 8 on board- and used engine braking to slow vehicle down.
Manually controlled gears to keep revvs up- when going uphill

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: rbarrios
Quick search.

@ 39,451 my water pump began to leak and was changed.
There was no overheat.
As I saw coolant on floor- and drove it to dealer the next morning.
No overheat condition.


Around 38,000-did a trip up/down the local mountains where I had 8 on board- and used engine braking to slow vehicle down.
Manually controlled gears to keep revvs up- when going uphill




That makes sense. So if there was the possibility for debris to make its way into the sump during that service, that would explain the elevated reading, and of course the harder driving may have contributed as well.