Conventional ("dino") oil in turbos?

3 Mad Ponchos · Jun 19, 2003

I put over 140,000 miles on a Shelby Daytona (Turbo 2.2) using regular ol' oil.

That said, if I had the car now, I'd use synthetic.

Cheers, 3MP

Pablo · Jun 20, 2003

Actually Ken2 currently you are correct, that's why I wrote:

"not to be confused with old diesel CF"

But back during the days of service class SH, there was a designation SH-CF that had NOTHING to do with diesels and everything to do with gasoline turbo engines. Really confusing and defunct, now....but dig up the history.

segfault · Jun 20, 2003

The TDI seems to be a different sort of animal compared to gasoline turbos. I am referring to the fact that VW recommends a 10,000 mile drain interval for the engine oil for the TDI, but 5,000 for the 1.8T gasser. In practice, the TDI UOA's tend to show that the oil was suitable for continued use after 10,000 miles, but the 1.8T UOA's show that the oil needs changing every 5-7,000 miles.

I second the notion that many turbo cars have never seen a synthetic oil. There is a breed of consumer (in stark contrast to those who never change the oil) who will buy a car and return to the dealer for every factory-recommended maintenance interval. Most of these people don't ask for (and therefore don't receive) synthetic oil, whether they own a turbo or not.

Mike242GT · Jun 20, 2003

Thanks to everyone for their input. The Delo 400 will be going into the '94 944 turbo this weekend, and a UOA will be posted in 3,000 miles or so. Given our driving habits, that may be sometime in late October or November!

Ken2 · Jun 20, 2003

Pablo,
API Service Category CF is strictly for diesels: "Introduced in 1994. For off-road, indirectinjected and other diesel engines including those using fuel with over 0.5% weight sulfur. Can be used in place of [Service Category] CD oils [which is an obsolete 1955 spec]." [Comments mine.]
http://api-ep.api.org/filelibrary/Guidechart2002.pdf

Mike242GT,
The Delo should work fine--it's the oil used in many, many diesel turbos for many hundreds of thousands of miles. As always, if you've been driving hard, allow your engine to idle before shutting it off, maybe two or three minutes if it's really hot. This keeps oil pumping through the hot turbocharger's bearings while it cools. If the hot turbo is promptly shut off, the oil in the bearings can become overheated, bake to carbon, ruin the bearings, and you'll need a turbocharger transplant. If you've just been driving easy around town, no cooldown needed.

Ken

Pablo · Jun 20, 2003

Mike242GT => btw, good choice - it's the off the shelf oil (dino) I would choose.

Stop me if I asked you this before - but with your name and then the B230FT's mentioned, is your 242GT a conversion? Or do you have 2 900's???

Quick_lude · Jun 20, 2003

quote:

Originally posted by segfault:
The TDI seems to be a different sort of animal compared to gasoline turbos. I am referring to the fact that VW recommends a 10,000 mile drain interval for the engine oil for the TDI, but 5,000 for the 1.8T gasser. In practice, the TDI UOA's tend to show that the oil was suitable for continued use after 10,000 miles, but the 1.8T UOA's show that the oil needs changing every 5-7,000 miles.

Is there a difference in sump capacities between the two engines?

Mike242GT · Jun 22, 2003

Pablo: No, the 242 GT is stock. We have a '91 744T (with M46) and a '94 944T. Then there are the two 240 wagons, the 240 sedan...

yannis · Jun 22, 2003

the strange thing is that valvoline europe doesn't recomment synthetic oil in some turbo engines?!?
(i didn't search all the lubricans advisor area)
Instead they recomment 10W40 durablend(semi) or
Turbo V 15W-40....and in some cases 10W40 or 5W40.

audi A6 turbo 1.8

audi A6 RS2

vw beetle 1.8T

yannis · Jun 22, 2003

I guess i could substitute the word "recomment" with " they don't believe it's absolutely necessary" to use synthetic in these engines.
In addition they have to follow manifacture's recommentation too.
I am not 100% sure but i think durablend is made with PAO in Europe.In this way it handles the heat better.
The 10W40 has a flash point of 453 F.

dagmando · Jun 22, 2003

quote:

Originally posted by darrenc:
There are many, many Volvo and Saab turbos around that have seen nothing but a study diet of dino juice with no ill effect.

246K miles; 1986 SAAB Turbo Convert(rare) nothing but regular 7500 miles intervals with dino oil. Original engine, turbo and auto trans, all without internal repairs. It has gone through a couple of tops and I replaced all the suspension bushing but it runs like a top, or actually topless :>) I had it out this past weekend and the A/C is even still original and COOOLD (gotta love R-12)

EDIT - this is an oil-cooled Turbo

[ June 23, 2003, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: dagmando ]

porterdog · Jun 23, 2003

quote:

Originally posted by segfault:
The TDI seems to be a different sort of animal compared to gasoline turbos.

Note that typical exhaust gas temps on turbo diesel vehicles are around 1200-1300F, while gas (petrol, not CNG) vehicles routinely see 1500 to even 1700F. Gasoline turbo cars are harder on oil than turbo diesels are.

Robert

Matt89 · Jun 23, 2003

quote:

246K miles; 1986 SAAB Turbo Convert(rare) nothing but regular 7500 miles intervals with dino oil. Original engine, turbo and auto trans, all without internal repairs. It has gone through a couple of tops and I replaced all the suspension bushing but it runs like a top, or actually topless :>) I had it out this past weekend and the A/C is even still original and COOOLD (gotta love R-12)

EDIT - this is an oil-cooled Turbo

Dagmando;

This is the kind of thing that makes me think you could run canola oil in most cars and get good results.

But I'm still mentally ill about using Mobil1, for the extra 30 bucks a year I figure there are worse things to be irrational about

Conventional ("dino") oil in turbos?

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