Makes me wonder about all older carbed engines that had to have fuel dilution issues but used and abused.
is there any benefit of going 'thicker' if uoa already checks out?
- Thread starter apollo18
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I am sure they are aware of the issue. You wont hear them making a public announcement though.
This argument might give some people peace of mind, but not when it comes to my engine. Its a weak argument to claim that 5% fuel dilution is fine. How long Honda DI will hold up still remains to be seen, and yes, I saw few making to 200k
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We dont know that, maybe you have some insight into Honda? Next argument is that honda is so brilliant that this was all by design?
industry norm is that fuel dilution should be under 2.5%.
I use the recommended 0w20 in the Camrys. It makes me as nervous as driving without a seatbelt. It will do fine unless something fails to cause an overheat. Then?
I use 0w-16 in my 2.5 Camry, no issues, viscosity is pretty stable unlike Honda
You keep stating this but without any evidence of it being true.
And beyond that, why would they do this? What responsible automaker would deliberately engineer in fuel dilution into their product? It makes no sense.
Sometimes the excuses people come up with to justify their belief is pretty amazing.
Carbureted engines generally did not have ongoing fuel dilution issues. There was definitely more fuel dilution during a cold start but not so much during normal operation. This is unlike the modern engines that have problems.
Fuel dilution of the oil is bad on several levels all of which are been discussed here in detail. There is nothing good nor beneficial about diluted oil. Even your oft-quoted HPL tells you that.
What happens to engine durability, across the board, for owners who use 0W20 and experience fuel dilution ?
Why is there not a greater number of anecdotes about engine failure ?
This is the relevant question, over miscibility.
You really don’t know what you’re talking about do you? Sometimes it shows like here when you’re conflating miscibility with engine reliability.
Anecdotes. That is your world isn’t it? Wear increases with lower HT/HS. Or would you like to deny physics as well?
I did not "conflate" anything.
Failures no, but I see the frequent trend of low mileage, newer vehicles, with oil consumption issues. Some are blamed on low piston ring tension and/or ring coking but some are also blamed on worn cylinder walls and piston rings. Manufacturers are experimenting with coatings to combat the low vis oils but, as I have seen, the coatings don't last very long.
I owned a late 80's BMW with, what I would call, an experimental "high MPG" engine that used low tension piston rings. To compensate, this engine still called for a 5w40 grade oil and got great MPG with no oil consumption.
Are you conflating BMW with Honda ?
That's not entirely true.
There is no evidence that I could find that a 528e used low tension rings. The engine was tuned for low rpm tq at the sacrifice of high rpm hp much like some cars today. I researched these cars heavily when I was looking for one in my younger years.
Also the oil chart in the manual is all over the map with maybe 15w40 being a good universal choice but you would easily be fine running a 10w30, heck depending on the outside temp even a straight SAE20 is acceptable. Honestly with today's oils running 5w30 wouldn't be a second thought. It's not a high strung motor that needs to rev.
Why would fuel dilution ever stabilize. That does not make sense to me... but if it is the case, you would be advised to choose between 3k oil changes or 7.5k oil changes, since there is no middle ground.
Because fuel is eliminated to some extent during driving. It completely depends on the amount and the cause.
My statements in this regard generally support the use of 0W20 in the many, many modern cars in which it is specified in the U.S. I used the word "wear" loosely and it is not what I meant. The fallacy is that somewhere down the road, a car that is specced for 0W20 will have engine failure that could have been avoided if, to paraphrase, the owner had the smarts to understand the CAFE conspiracy, and the courage to ignore the manufacturer recommendation and move to at least an XW30 oil. The fact of the matter is that you cannot find an example of this particular engine failure anywhere. It's far more dangerous to miss oil changes and maintainance. Most cars in the modern era fall apart around their running engines. I would cede that no harm is done choosing thicker oils.
So the question is whether you actually believe that OW20 oils provide adequate protection. I think they do, and I think real world experience bears this out.
