40wt oil in a 1.8L Toyota engine

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I've got a toyota matrix with a 1zz-fe engine. I'm not gonna lie to myself or anyony, I drive this car hard day in day out. I want the car to last as long as possible. I have a 100k mile powertrain warranty on this car, but I'm really doubting that there will be any problems prior to 100k miles. I'm more worried about the post 100k mile timeframe. As you could probably guess, the recommended oil for this car is 5w30. And I'm sure that in most cases this oil is more than enough for this car. But I can't help but think that a 40wt oil, or a heavier 30wt oil would be better for me. I'm considering something allong the lines of amsoil 5w30HD( http://www.amsoil.com/products/hdd.html ). or possibly amsoil 10w40. Any comments/suggestions?

--Matt
 
I have the same engine in a Corolla, only less HP. I'm using Amsoil 5w-30 and the consumption is better. I'd use any of the following oils: Mobil Delvac 1 5w-40, Amsoil 5w-30, 10w-30, German Castrol, or wait until the new Mobil 1 0w-30 R comes out. Reality is, with these engines, any oil will do.
 
I like to use 0w-30 or 5w-30 synthetics in all these high revving, 4/6/8 cylinder engines. If I was using Mobil 1, it would be their 5w-30 in this one as well.

Ted
 
No sweat, I've recommended Syntec 5-50 for my brother's 1.6L Honda Civic...he drives the car hard. Anyways, he tells me the car never ran better...and he's had 100ml of consumption after about 4k mi...relative to about 1qt of M-1 5-30 by this same mi..

I've also gotten great results thusfar from my girlfriend's 1.6L Suzuki on 5-50...

This is why engine size and type don't really matter. ie. just because you have a 4cyl. you're OK with a 5-30...or because you have a V-8, you need a 15-50.
 
If you can do a UOA of the oil you use. 10 weeks before I change my oil and get it analyzed.
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I have a '93 Integra with the 1.8l engine. Mileage is now at 360 000 km (220 000 miles)
The car is driven firmly; you gotta rev it to get any giddy-up, if you no what I mean...and I'm sure you do with that screamer of an engine !

The engine has run almost exclusively on M1; currently running 0W40 for the winter, use a mix of 10W30 and 15W50 in summer.

The engine is quiter and smoother on thicker oils, performance MIGHT be slightly slower with the thicker oil. The engine has never run better, and I find oil consumption is much lower with slightly thicker oil as well.

My advice: try a good 40 weight, and then decide if you think your engine likes it better...

As for durability, the jury is undecided. I personally lean towards the thicker is better camp...

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A lot of people here use 40 wt oil in their toyotas, but none have ever passed the 120,000 km mark that way. I have a customer who is rebuilding all of the engines of a drilling company who used 40 wt in their toyota pickups (2.7 lt) with oil changes every 2500 km. All 15 pickups have between 90,000 and 115,000 km. After rebuild they have agreed to use nothing but Chevron Supreme Synthetic 5W-40 with 10,000 km changes. (or the repair won't be warranteed).
Even here where there is no CAFE, Toyota does not recommend single grade oils except in Diesels when the minimum temp will be over 10 C. In gasoline engines they recommend 10w30, 15w40, or 20w50. My 1999 4Runner (turbo Diesel) and 2002 Pickup (Gasoline) are happy with Delo.
 
I am new on this site, lots of good stuff to read here!

One thing to keep in mind.
The thicker the oil is that the more stress is put on the oil pump and drive shaft for the oil pump.
If the factory recommends 5-30 why go thicker than at the most 5-40 or 10-40? Especially if it is synthetic.
At a certain point the oil pump is trying to force that heavy weight oil through the oil galleys, lifters, rocker arms ect. If it is petroleum oil, even more so.

I guess what I am trying to say is there are negative effects by going too thick, I feel.
I feel that a high quality oil is the way to go and leave the thicker stuff more for racing or high performance driving.
Thanks for letting me voice my opinion.
 
My opinion is you won't see any advantage to running an xW-40 oil in this engine vs. a similar 5W-30, or 10W-30 but try it for yourself. Do a couple of changes on each and compare the UOA's, fuel economy, etc...
 
quote:

What I am trying to say is there are negative effects by going too thick...

I tried straight M1 15W50 one summer...and the engine didn't like it. Felt sluggish and didn't rev as freely.

But it likes 40 weight...so who knows.
 
Run a synthetic 0, 5, or 10w30 and do a UOA. If everything is fine, then don't worry about it. Run the thinnest oil that will protect your engine, for maximum heat transfer, HP, and fuel economy.
smile.gif
 
quote:

Originally posted by widman:
-*-* Toyota does not recommend single grade oils except in Diesels when the minimum temp will be over 10 C. -*-*

Why is that?
I have run almost nothing but Straight Weight.
 
THeir is no weight of multi-weight oil that can not be run in these engines! Common sense must be used though. You would not want to run 15W50 in dureing New York winter!

My professional opion is that synthetic 10W30 is the best place to start. I really do not like 5W30. I belive that long term ring life is sacrificed with most 5W30 oil. I am talking past 120,000 miles. THeir may be synthetics like AMsoil HD5W30, Redline 5W30 that are ok but I have not tested them on my vechiles or my customers so I can not say that it is so.

I can say that runing 10W30 in the winter and 15W50 M1 in the warmer months has provided me, my family and alot of my old customers with vechiles that just do not wear out!! I am not even a big fan of Mobil it was always about cost! I am curently testing Redline 5W40 in my 2AZ-FE Camry as a year round oil!

I have never seen antone make it to 300,000 miles running a diet of 5W30. While this does not mean it can not happen I have never seen it happen.
 
when I speak of 40wt oils I am by no means talking about straight 40wt oil. I'm refering to 0/5/10/15w-40. My previous car(saturn) ran many times better on 15w40 than it did on 5/10w30, now I know the toyota engine is more advanced than that engine and probably operates under tighter clearances but I can't help but think that a 40wt oil would do good things for a high-winding 4-cylinder engine. This engine warms up very quickly(it's japanese) so the only real thing I'm concerned with is the warm viscosity. I drive 100 or so miles a day, many of those miles at 80+(3500-4000rpm).

--Matt
 
I am thinking a good 10W30 is the thickest anyone would want to go in the 1ZZ engine.
 
JohnB......Why do you think that a good synthetic 5w30 is a bad thing. We will use mobil 1 5w30 for example.......It is completely shear stable and is still thicker when cold, than when hot, although not as thick as the 10w30. At operating temps, they are virtually identical. So why do you think that the 5w30 can't do the job?
 
quote:

Originally posted by mkosem:
This engine warms up very quickly(it's japanese) so the only real thing I'm concerned with is the warm viscosity.

For my jap engine, the water temp warms up in 3~4mins, but the oil temp takes 20~25mins to fully warm up to normal operating temp, even in my kind of climate. Therefore full benefits of heavier viscosity oils are only realised if your drives are typically longer than 30mins.
 
sbc350gearhead, I did not say that synthetic 5W30 oils were bad. I said I have not tested them so I can not coment on them. I have seen thousands of cars ran on 5W30 and all of them were worn out and tired between 120,000-150,000 miles it did not matter if they were import or domestic!! By worn out I mean burning more oil then they should, uneven compression, low compression, a lot of carboned up rings seveer taper in the bore, low oil pressure, main and rod knocking at 100,000 miles with 3000 mile oil changes etc....


I always recomended M1 10W30 and 15W50 to all of my customers and those that did this always had long life. THe shop also pushed this combination. Most places I worked pushed simalar combinations. For those customers that did not want synthetic due to cost I used to use Castrol 10W30 GTX in the winter and 20W50 GTX in the warm months.

5W30 and 0w30 are soloutions looking for a problem. Short of artic conditions these oils do not protect any better then their 10W30 counter parts. Short of artic temps they are not going to flow that much faster then 10W30. They tend not to be as stable and consistent as their 10W30 counter parts of the same chemistry. No one has run 10W30 M1 or Amsoil then run the same brand of oil in 5W30 with the same chemistry and shown any advantage under identical conditions.

To date evertone that has run a thicker oil like M1 15W50, Delvac 15W40 etc. in the warmer months has shown a huge improvment over the anemic 5W30 they ran before. It is also preety funny that the company(General Motors) that has pushed 5W30 oil the longest and hardest is also one with the most oil consuption problems under 120,000 mile LT1,LS1, North Star, Saturns. Companys that have jumped on board are now haveing pronounced problems with oil burning and gelling in engines that traditionaly did not have that much of a problem with either issue(Toyota). BMW had issues with 5W30 synthetic in their engines.

Just about everyone on this site that has oil burning issues under 150,000 miles has been runing a diet of mostly 5W30! I say run a good 10W30 conventional or synthetic and a good 5W30 synthetic if you live in artic like temps in the winter. Then run 15W50 M1 in the warm months and skip all the oil burning and premature wear.

Their is enough evidence all around that it should not be a difficult leap to make! I am currently trying 5W40 to see if I can find a truly year round oil that will give the same type of life as my old combo of 15W50 warm weather 10W30 cold.

Personely I think it is a combination of ash due to volitile oil wearing out the valve guides and carbon deposits loading up the rings. I have no intention of testing 5W30 since it does not solve any need that I have yet.
 
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