Mobil 1 0w-20 - 02 Honda Civic Si K20A3, 10k miles

[Surprise]

The numbers do all of the talking, new numbers are on the right

code:

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Date out: 3/13/03 6/21/03 11/29/0311/29/035/1/04 1/28/05

Lab: OG OG OG Black Black Black

Brand: Chevron M1 M1 M1 M1 M1

Supreme

Weight: 10w30 5w30 5w30 5w30 0w20 0w20

Miles on unit: 10170 15056 22476 22476 30067 40257

Miles on oil: 5072 4886 7420 7420 7591 10190

Gallons: 188.4 182.3 277.1 277.1 284.9 386.4

Filter: Honda Honda Honda Honda Honda Honda

Fram Fram Toyo-RkiToyo-RkiToyo-RkiToyo-Rki

Make up: 0 0 1/3 1/3 1/4 675 ml



Al- 8 5 3 3 3 2

Cr- 1 0 0 0 0 1

Fe- 8 2 0 7 6 6

Cu- 15 5 6 5 3 6

Pb- 4 0 0 3 3 6

Sn- 0 0 0 1 3 0

Mo- 76 82 53

Ni- 0 0 0

Mn- 0 0 0

Ag- 0 0 0

Ti- 0 0 0

K- 5 0 0 0 1 0

B- 135 149 90

Si- 40 15 14 10 9 9

Na- 10 11 17 8 8 5

Ca- 3517 2666 2553

Mg- 18 22 11

P- 798 778 602

Zn- 894 929 752

Ba- 0 0 0



Sus@210 61.0 57.7 58.3

Flashpoint 385 445 445

Fuel -
Glycol- none none none 0.0 0.0 0.0

water -
Insolubles 0.2 0.2 0.3

Oxidation - 6.3 10.8 13.5

Visc@100- 13.7 13.0 13.3

Nitration - 4.3 4.9 5.3

Sae-
TBN 4.0 5.8 5.5 4.3

OG=Oil Guard/MTM Black=Blackstone

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My drving conditions are close to last time but much more city driving as can be seen in my mpg for this run, 25.9 mpg (27/30 epa. I do show my age sometime (21) and drive in central California where I can go 300+ miles in 100+ heat for 4+ hours with my engine doing 4000+ rpm doing 80-90 with the ac on for that time, I also have fun on the weekends driving local backcountry roads with a lot of wot time and a few autox runs. The rest of my driving consists (50%) is my daily commute of 4 miles, twice sometimes four times a day. I live in a valley and work in the valley next to mine, so I am always going uphill on a cold engine.

Overall I am very happy with the report. I used 0w20 again and plan to extend the OCI, any suggestions?

 

[Al]

Nice organization and format. This is a really great post. Sometimes there is so much information arranged in non-sensical ways..its not worth the trouble to figure it allout.


You should be really happy with this report and the overall trend. I personally would not go beyond what you have done here (although you easily could). Why argue with success. Your oil did turn into a 30 wt.=who cares. Flashpoint is great. I would only suggest if you go further you change filters midway through (even though your insolubles are low).

Again great post

 

[Mickey_M]

quote:

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Surprise:
.....Overall I am very happy with the report. I used 0w20 again and plan to extend the OCI, any suggestions?

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These results certainly make it clear that the 0W-20 Mobil 1 protects as well as the 5W-30 in any sort of normal use.

Why the lack of a Calcium reading at 30067?

Your numbers certainly support extending the OCI.

 

[Jay]

Very interesting reports, thanks. I have the K20A3 engine also. The thing that looks inconsistent to me is the lead, and especially the lead/tin ratios. If you really had 6ppm lead in the latest report, where's the corresponding tin? Other than that, the numbers are pretty consistent and very good. The flashpoint is just amazing for this 0w-20.

 

[buster]

Mobil 1 0w-20

 

[wulimaster]

No fuel economy benefits with using the 0w20. What is the advantage then?

 

[Fred Bear]

No fuel economy benefits with using the 0w20. What is the advantage then?

quote:

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Look at the numbers of nearly all the 0W-20 reports...They are the advantage.

Could it be a thinner oil gets nore volume throughout the engine? Whatever the reason, I use M1 0W-20 in all 3 of our Honda's here in Texas, I am not worried about my oil in the heat and Dallas traffic at all

 

[pb11]

Hmm...I wonder if Mobil is discontinuing the 0W20, there is only 5W20 listed in their updated product description:
http://www.mobiloil.com/USA-English/MotorOil/Oils/Oils.aspx
Presumably this would give similar protection to 0W20 but up in Canada this might really help in the winter. If you have to switch make sure you do a UOA so the rest of us can see.

 

[buster]

quote:

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I wonder if Mobil is discontinuing the 0W20,

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They are bc people are dumb.

 

[Jay]

quote:

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Originally posted by wulimaster:
No fuel economy benefits with using the 0w20. What is the advantage then?

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Wulimaster, I found I had consistently better gas mileage with the 0w-20, even over M1 5w-30. There is a fuel economy benefit, no doubt about it. However, I did the math and concluded that the fuel savings were mostly offset by the higher price of the M1 0w-20 in qt bottles compared to the 5w-30 in 5 qt jugs. For this engine, I couldn't fault anyone using either oil. The 0w-20 gets the nod in very cold weather.

 

[Surprise]

quote:

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Originally posted by wulimaster:
No fuel economy benefits with using the 0w20. What is the advantage then?

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On the last run of the 5w30 at the very end I replaced the factory Michelin tires that were only good for fuel economy. I replaced them with some high performance tires that have a huge amount of grip in comparison and are wider. I believe that this is the reason that I have less fuel economy for the past 20k miles.

 

[ekpolk]

quote:

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Originally posted by Mickey_M:
{snip}
These results certainly make it clear that the 0W-20 Mobil 1 protects as well as the 5W-30 in any sort of normal use.
{snip}

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On this data, I'm not sure you can safely draw that conclusion, at least not yet. OTOH, I'm not condemning 20 wt oils. My concern is that he's showing what could be the beginnings of accelerated wear. In the first fill of 0w-20 (which we can assume had some of the old 30 in it), his lead increased from 1 to 3 ppms. On his second fill, which would of course be almost pure 20 wt, the lead ticks up to 6 ppm AND we see chromium (piston ring) wear show itself for the first time since he used dino.

Now everyone hold on. I'm not trying to start another "Does 20wt oil signal the end of civilization" debates. There are plenty of UOAs that indicate it does fine in many situations. All I'm saying is that I'd want to get this potential issue nailed down, for this car, before I moved on and consistently used 0/5w-20 for long periods without close monitoring.

I'd love to see the particle counts on this engine.

 

[TooSlick]

It looks like bearing wear - Pb/Cu/Sn - is directionally higher with the 0w-20, compared to the M1 5w-30. This is true even though the engine now has more miles and the wear pattern has stabilized.

I'd use the M1, 5w-30 or 10w-30 in a warm climate ....

TS

 

[Jay]

quote:

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Originally posted by ekpolk:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mickey_M:
{snip}
These results certainly make it clear that the 0W-20 Mobil 1 protects as well as the 5W-30 in any sort of normal use.
{snip}

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On this data, I'm not sure you can safely draw that conclusion, at least not yet...

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I think you can draw that conclusion based on my experience. I had the same or lower wear metals across the board with the M1 0w-20. There are other 4-cyl Honda comparisons that bear this out also.

 

[ekpolk]

quote:

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Originally posted by Jay:

quote:

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Originally posted by ekpolk:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mickey_M:
{snip}
These results certainly make it clear that the 0W-20 Mobil 1 protects as well as the 5W-30 in any sort of normal use.
{snip}

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On this data, I'm not sure you can safely draw that conclusion, at least not yet...

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I think you can draw that conclusion based on my experience. I had the same or lower wear metals across the board with the M1 0w-20. There are other 4-cyl Honda comparisons that bear this out also.

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That's fine. As I said, I was not trying to slam 20wt oils in general. But can you offer a specific explanation of why this car is showing what is likely an increase in bearing and ring wear, starting at the same time he changed from 30wt to 20wt oil? If I owned this car, I'd want to answer this question before continued using a 20wt indefinitely.

 

[Tommy]

I am very curious about the difference in zinc and phosphorous levels between the M1 0W20 in this report and those in AEHaas' report for his Ferrari & Expedition. (?)

 

[Jay]

quote:

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Originally posted by ekpolk:
...But can you offer a specific explanation of why this car is showing what is likely an increase in bearing and ring wear, starting at the same time he changed from 30wt to 20wt oil? If I owned this car, I'd want to answer this question before continued using a 20wt indefinitely.

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I don't see how you come to this conclusion from this data. Keep in mind that normal lab tolerances can show 2 or 3 ppm variation, and that virgin oil may have 1 or 2 ppm of any wear metal, and look at the 4th and 5th columns again.

It's easy to say that wear doubled when one 7kmi interval shows 15ppm of metal and the next 7kmi interval shows 30ppm, but when one interval shows 2ppm wear metal and the next shows 4ppm, did wear double? That's the problem with interpreting results for these extremely low-wearing engines. Even when you extend the intervals out to 7kmi, the wear metals are so few that normal lab variations mask the results.

 

[Mickey_M]

quote:

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ekpolk:
.... But can you offer a specific explanation of why this car is showing what is likely an increase in bearing and ring wear, starting at the same time he changed from 30wt to 20wt oil?.....

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That's not what I'm seeing with these numbers.


.

 

[ekpolk]

quote:

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Originally posted by Jay:

quote:

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Originally posted by ekpolk:
...But can you offer a specific explanation of why this car is showing what is likely an increase in bearing and ring wear, starting at the same time he changed from 30wt to 20wt oil? If I owned this car, I'd want to answer this question before continued using a 20wt indefinitely.

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I don't see how you come to this conclusion from this data. Keep in mind that normal lab tolerances can show 2 or 3 ppm variation, and that virgin oil may have 1 or 2 ppm of any wear metal, and look at the 4th and 5th columns again.

It's easy to say that wear doubled when one 7kmi interval shows 15ppm of metal and the next 7kmi interval shows 30ppm, but when one interval shows 2ppm wear metal and the next shows 4ppm, did wear double? That's the problem with interpreting results for these extremely low-wearing engines. Even when you extend the intervals out to 7kmi, the wear metals are so few that normal lab variations mask the results.

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Variance may well explain the chromium, and if so, fine. As I said, I have a question/doubt about this, not a definitive conclusion. The lead, on the other hand, is harder to pass off as random variation. He went from a flatline zero over several samples and jumped up to six at about the same time as the change to 20 wt. Lead = bearings, thus my concern.

Well Mickey, it's easy to tell someone their answer is wrong without saying why -- what's your explanation??? If not bearings, then what? Again, I don't think 6ppm of lead means disaster is around the corner, but I do think it bears consideration, especially considering the timing. I'l like to see two more UOA with 20wt to see what this engine is really doing.

 

[Surprise]

quote:

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Originally posted by ekpolk:

Well Mickey, it's easy to tell someone their answer is wrong without saying why -- what's your explanation??? If not bearings, then what? Again, I don't think 6ppm of lead means disaster is around the corner, but I do think it bears consideration, especially considering the timing. I'l like to see two more UOA with 20wt to see what this engine is really doing.

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Will do, I replaced this oil with another 4.4 quarts of M1 0w20 and plan on doing more UOAs.

I also think that some of the confusion might be from the different labs. In the first 3 columns show the report that I recieved from oil guard. The last three are from Blackstone. Column number 3 and 4 are of the same sample, as you can see the initial readings of my engine are not directly comparable to the last few readings. My lead with the 5w30 was 3, then 0w20 had 3 then the last rose to 6 ppm per blackstone. I would not place a lot of confidence in comparing the values obtained from OG directly with Blackstone.