Anyone know of someone successfully filing an oil warranty claim with Mobil 1, Pennzoil, et al.?

[tired]

There was a small side discussion in another thread about oil warranties. Made me curious if anyone has successfully or knows of someone who successfully filed a claim with Mobil 1, Pennzoil, et al.?

Taking a look at the Mobil 1 warranty fine print, it doesn't seem too stringent, except perhaps for proving it's a lubrication related failure.

Pennzoil's warranty has a few more hoops to jump through. Namely, the second requirement is that your vehicle is "in good working condition." That seems open to a lot of interpretation and rejections. Otherwise, you just have to update the oil change record on their website.

Castrol also has a warranty, with some more stipulations.

Essentially, it seems like there's potential for success filing these claims. Just curious if anyone knows of someone getting their engine fixed by an oil company. I wonder about all those oil burners on M1 EP, for example. Seems like a good option to pick one and stick with it when you buy a new (or new to you) vehicle.

 

[tired]

I should add that AMSOIL also has a guarantee. Appears to be tied to their oil being "free of defects." Whatever that means in terms of qualifying for a claim. @Pablo - know of anyone who was successful qualifying for a claim?

 

[Slick3914]

Following

 

[kschachn]

We had a good thread about this a few years ago. The problem is that there aren’t warranty claims because there aren’t any failures attributable to the oil. ExxonMobil may have had a few in the Katrina era but motor oils just don’t cause your engine to fail.

 

[Furious]

Likely nobody has filed warranty claims in recent history, maybe during 80s with the issues QS had with paraffin wax.

Engine failures are usually the result of poor maintenance then of course you have bad engine designs and faulty components.

Unless Mobil, Shell, etc manufacture a faulty batch that you can verify with an oil analysis then it would be hard to prove oil was the cause, they also have a lot of quality control checks in place it is not very often you see any form of recall, obviously if you are running oil and the batch ends up recalled and you had an engine failure then that would be on them.

 

[carl1963]

I think you're misinterpreting these "warranties". They're really just consumer protection in the event of a bad batch of oil similar to filling up with a bad tank of gas. Modern oils are so advanced I don't think it's possible to have a lubrication related engine failure unless you got a bad/defective batch of oil. And with all the R&D that goes into manufacturing oil I don't see how a bad batch could slip through. Even when you get a bad tank of gas from a gas station 99% of the time it's an issue with the underground tanks or the fuel was put in the wrong tank, not an actual issue with the gas itself that was brought to the station.

 

[tired]

I think you're misinterpreting these "warranties". They're really just consumer protection in the event of a bad batch of oil similar to filling up with a bad tank of gas. Modern oils are so advanced I don't think it's possible to have a lubrication related engine failure unless you got a bad/defective batch of oil. And with all the R&D that goes into manufacturing oil I don't see how a bad batch could slip through. Even when you get a bad tank of gas from a gas station 99% of the time it's an issue with the underground tanks or the fuel was put in the wrong tank, not an actual issue with the gas itself that was brought to the station.

Probably accurate. They seem a little more promising than they likely are in real life. But with terms like “lifetime” and “500k miles” from Pennzoil, I think it makes sense that people might expect a little more.

 

[SammyChevelleTypeS3]

It makes one wonder. How many folks here on BITOG ever knew anyone who has even lost an engine from oil related issues?

 

[tired]

It makes one wonder. How many folks here on BITOG ever knew anyone who has even lost an engine from oil related issues?

Yeah that's a common saying around here, but you can't toss a rock around here without coming across an awful oil burning engine story that everyone just seems to overlook. I'm not the first to point it out, but most engines these days seem to fail from coked rings and excessive oil burning, not because they "wear out."

 

[4WD]

Yeah that's a common saying around here, but you can't toss a rock around here without coming across an awful oil burning engine story that everyone just seems to overlook. I'm not the first to point it out, but most engines these days seem to fail from coked rings and excessive oil burning, not because they "wear out."

Squeaky wheels get the grease. Bet not many folks with a gunked up engine actually bought it new. They bought neglect in a country full of irresponsible people.

 

[SammyChevelleTypeS3]

Yeah that's a common saying around here, but you can't toss a rock around here without coming across an awful oil burning engine story that everyone just seems to overlook. I'm not the first to point it out, but most engines these days seem to fail from coked rings and excessive oil burning, not because they "wear out."

I think that is true. Not wearing out. Thing is we are all living in different places, situations. I am sure people do have engine failures. Some of us simple do not know anyone who has blown an engine. Just because many of us do not personally know of people who have engines die , engine do. I am reminded now. My oldest son had a used Kia Soul he picked up for a (10 mile round trip) week day work commuter car. He knew it was using oil. He ran it into the ground till it crashed. I blame it (KIA does too) on poor design and not engine oils. It really does sound like it would take a whole lot of info and proof to get any type of settlement for a crashed engine off any Oil company these days with things so advanced in the production of modern day oils.

 

[tired]

Squeaky wheels get the grease. Bet not many folks with a gunked up engine actually bought it new. They bought neglect in a country full of irresponsible people.

Plenty of reports from new.

Audi Q7 on Castrol Euro from new, burning a quart every 300-400 miles

One of my many examples of Hyundai engines burning on good oil, this time M1 EP

Another Hyundai burning on boutiques at 3k OCIs

Subaru oil burner on Valvoline EP, M1, and Amsoil (only 10k miles) - with 5k OCIs

Another Subaru oil burner on M1 EP since new

Honda Fit on AMSOIL and HPL since new, burning 1 quart every 2500 miles

This is just a few examples.

 

[Sandstorm]

We had a good thread about this a few years ago. The problem is that there aren’t warranty claims because there aren’t any failures attributable to the oil. ExxonMobil may have had a few in the Katrina era but motor oils just don’t cause your engine to fail.

Unless we are dealing with crappy oils such as T...X.

 

[4WD]

Plenty of reports from new.

Audi Q7 on Castrol Euro from new, burning a quart every 300-400 miles

One of my many examples of Hyundai engines burning on good oil, this time M1 EP

Another Hyundai burning on boutiques at 3k OCIs

Subaru oil burner on Valvoline EP, M1, and Amsoil (only 10k miles) - with 5k OCIs

Another Subaru oil burner on M1 EP since new

Honda Fit on AMSOIL and HPL since new, burning 1 quart every 2500 miles

This is just a few examples.

That’s “plenty” ?
You actually think you know the root cause of each ?
Another story on correlation (or not) - and causation (or not)

 

[Glenda W.]

The only oil related engine failures I’ve ever seen were in 1981 when Quaker State was solidifying under a certain temperature. They replaced a bunch of engines and had a recall. Our dealer used them for bulk oil…

 

[4WD]

The only oil related engine failures I’ve ever seen were in 1981 when Quaker State was solidifying under a certain temperature. They replaced a bunch of engines and had a recall. Our dealer used them for bulk oil…

I have seen oil oxidation so bad that the dipstick was a coal black corn dog (Castrol) - but, that car ran perfectly for years after - and it never used oil …

 

[demarpaint]

It makes one wonder. How many folks here on BITOG ever knew anyone who has even lost an engine from oil related issues?

I had a 1980 Caprice Classic Wagon I bought used from a mechanic/Mobil gas station owner friend. He bought the car new and ran Mobil 1 according to their advertising. The engine needed a complete rebuild due to what he and Mobil deemed an oil related engine failure, at somewhere around 40K miles IIRC. Long story short the cam and lifters failed sending metal throughout the engine ruining it. They paid him to rebuild the engine, with zero push back. I bought the car from him with 50K miles on it, and ran Mobil 1 in it until I sold the car with 150K miles on it. I used Mobil 1 and changed the oil every 3K miles. He did a fantastic job rebuilding the engine with performance parts, Edelbrock manifold and several upgrades. It was one of the best cars we owned.

 

[ATex7239]

It makes one wonder. How many folks here on BITOG ever knew anyone who has even lost an engine from oil related issues?

From a lack of oil. I know a few folks. Turns out that genie lamp light means something important.

 

[factorytuned2012]

 

[kschachn]

The only oil related engine failures I’ve ever seen were in 1981 when Quaker State was solidifying under a certain temperature. They replaced a bunch of engines and had a recall. Our dealer used them for bulk oil…

And even there it wasn’t really the oil. It was a problem with how the test for the winter rating was designed, it didn’t know about nor test for rapid cooling which was a defect in the procedure. This was addressed in a revision to the test procedure. All oils were essentially subject to this testing flaw.