92 Chevy Astro Van?

[wn1998]

My brother recently bought 92 Astro VAn with 78k 4 months ago ($2,000) to tote his tools around. Today, I thought I would change his oil fo him (very easy oil filter to change)

Anyway, I start draining the oil and went inside for about 20 mins. When I went out it had stopped dripping. I filled it with 4 quarts of havoline and 3/4 quart of some M1 that I wanted to use up and toped it off with a little more havoline and put in a cheap STP filter.

When I went to put nasty sludged up super black oil into the used oil bottles to my horror I found there to only be TWO QUARTS in the drain pan! this is a 5 QUART SUMP! I also think this oil had been in the Van for a LONG TIME!

This is a beater and don't think the van is worthy of auto rx, however I would like a few pointers about what I should do. I was thinking about running a 1k interval with the oil in there now and than change the oil to do a kind of flush.

 

[wn1998]

anyone?

 

[KW]

A couple of short OCI's sure would not hurt anything. An ARX treatment would be the best way to go though.

 

[huffmuds9320]

Well it depends on how long that van would be kept. If its for heavy duty use or for work, then I wouldn't put that much money into it. Yeah I think what you planned to to sounds good. Run the oil to clean things out a bit and then change the oil again. I don't really know if those engine flush really works. Just stick with the recommended weight oil and use conventionol oil will be fine.

 

[wn1998]

I meant short OCI's to flush, not use an engine flush.

 

[JohnnyO]

I bought an ex-phone company '87 Astro two years ago with 108k, now has 126k on it. All indications were that it was well-maintained. I did run a double ARX treatment, on my second rinse now, and it does run much smoother. It had some rear main seal leakage. The engine seems quietest with either 10w30 Havoline or Max Life in it. If I put 5w30 in, I get a puff of blue smoke out the tailpipe which I don't with the 10w (but that was before the ARX too). I'd recommend spending $25 on a bottle of the stuff but if not, Astros are pretty indestructible little tanks so just start giving it an oil change every 3000 and it will be fine. If his did not seem well-maintained, I'd give it a transmission and coolant flush also and get the diff at 100k.

 

[JohnnyO]

quote:

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Originally posted by wn1998:
and put in a cheap STP filter.

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BTW, the STP is a pretty good filter actually. I used NAPA Golds for a while but the formerly local NAPA store moved so now I get AC's at AutoZone.