Mixing leftover oil quarts together

[bkbenjy]

I have 2 bottles of 5w40 castrol syntec, 1bottle of 5w30 Valvoline SYnpower, 1 bottle of Pennzoil 5w30 conventional. All leftovers from previous oil changes. I'm planning on putting this in my 2002 altima 2.5 for 3000 miles. Am I crazy?

 

[addyguy]

Nope. Could go a LOT further than 3k miles - 7.5k at least.

 

[GROUCHO MARX]

Listen, call it 'blending' instead of 'mixing' and you'll be fine.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Never found frankenstein mixture to run well - usually breaks the add pack and you'll have increased wear. The new low phos adds are very balance sensitive to maintain low wear - its not like the 1980's. Prob. wont blow anyhing up, but you may have increased wear. I would save 'em for the yard equipment or a "day-before" add to rinse the engine just B4 an oil change. That said, you'll live for the 3000 miles if its << 2 months.

 

[crazyoildude]

use them

 

[demarpaint]

Originally Posted By: bkbenjy
I have 2 bottles of 5w40 castrol syntec, 1bottle of Valvoline SYnpower, 1 bottle of Pennzoil conventional. All leftovers from previous oil changes. I'm planning on putting this in my 2002 altima 2.5 for 3000 miles. Am I crazy?


A fellow NY'er, welcome to Bitog! I've mixed stray qts, no problems at all. Not sure of your driving conditions, a lot depends on where you live in NY. I'm on L.I. and my conditions are severe. I would say 5000 miles is safe, if you live Upstate you could easily stretch it. JMO

 

[KrisZ]

My current fill is a combination Motorcraft, syntec and PP, car runs fine.

Maybe runnig these mixes all the time would cause some increased wear, but doing it every once in a while to get rid of left over oil will be fine, these oils are designed to be compatible with each other as part of the API (or is it ILSAC?) certification after all.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Studies and patents ive read for GF4 low phos oils show sliding wear goes WAY UP when the additives go out of balance. But, do as you will and take your chances. The oil compatibilty is way overstated, But more related to mixing dino and castor bean or vegetable drived oils. If some one says mixing is fine - they better show rigorous UOA data or footnote a study.

 

[MoparDak05]

I have 3 quarts of Q Torque Power 5w30 that I bought on clearance at walmart about a week ago ($2.50/quart). If I mix it with Quaker State Ultimate Durability or PP, is it going to produce any negative effects? From what I have read, Quaker State UD and Torque Power are just weaker add-pack versions of PP.

 

[UNC038]

I'd use the stray bottles for either the mower or top off.

 

[bobfather99]

I mix/blend up all kinds of combinations all the time. No problems with anything so far.

 

[Rumble]

That's kinda like mixing Crisco, Wesson and lard to fry an egg.

 

[shpankey]

I honestly don't think there is going to be any higher wear on any significant scale. Blending a bunch of synthetics is probably not going to wear more than say, a dino.

Oh, and there is a few used oil analysis on this board that back my opinion up. One of them had a mix kind of like yours and it had one of the lowest wearing used oil analysis for that vehicle. Which left some BITOG'ers to comment about how mixing really didn't matter.

 

[JT1]

LOL, your engine won't know that different brands of oil are in it. It doesn't know what brand is in it right now!

Competing add packs? On paper they mostly look the same with 6-800 ppm of zddp and 12-1700 ppm of calcium.

Rumble, terrible analogy, those are 3 different products entirely.........were talking about different brands of the same product.

 

[MegaCorp]

Why not buy more Syntec to make enought for a change, and use the others for top up or small engines

Mixing oil brands is a great sin on this board, but it likley won't matter..

 

[panthermike]

I agree with JT1, mix them, it's fine. Tell that to two of my brother's, they did this all the time w/ their F150's. One had 200K, the other 252K when sold. Ran great.

As others have said, it's only one oil change anyways.

Run it 5K+, no worries!

 

[Smokescreen]

Do it, Dooo it.

 

[CATERHAM]

AFAIK, there are only a couple of oil formulations, and those are race oils, that should not be blended for reasons of additive clash, but virtually all OTC street oils can be blended.
Besides every time you change brands results in a blend to some degree since at least 10% and as high as 30% in some cases of the old oil remains in the system.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Again - Too much opinion and not enough science here.

 

[Herz]

I mix odd things in my jeep all the time, with synthetic you can probably hit 5k with that frankenbrew.