I've been browsing this site for a while and this is my first post. I must say that I like what I see happening here. I'm always looking for cold hard facts and data to back up what others may claim.
Anyways, on to the main reason I'm here. I own a small fleet of 7 taxi's up here in Saskatchewan, Canada. Currently they consist of 3 Pontiac Vibes which do 90% town driving and 3 Pontiac Montanas and 1 Dodge Caravan AWD which do 99% hiway driving.
I've always been intrigued by synthetic oils and extended drains and the latest fuel price spike finally gave me the push to run a little experiment of my own. I considered my options and decided to go with Amsoil. I equipped one of my Montanas with their DR filtration, Series 2000 0w30, synthetic ATF and dual stage air filter.
I immediately noticed the qualitative improvements ie: smoother quieter engine, better shifts from the trans and the foam filter seemed to muffle out the intake noise better than paper.
But that's not what I was after. I needed to see an improvement in fuel mileage to make this worthwhile for the rest of my cars. After a well controlled mileage test, I saw a gain of 3.8%. It was a little less than I had hoped for but considering the fact that I spend $70k yearly on fuel, it was enough to convince me to take the full plunge into synthetics and extended drains.
Currently 3 of my cars are converted, 3 more await delivery of the kits and 1 will not be converted(because of it's age) except for an Amsoil air filter and perhaps synthetic gear lube in the rear diff. I'm also going to try to install bypass filters on all the transmissions.
Currently the highest mileage is around 6000km on one of the hiway vans. I plan to to do UOA at each 20,000km filter change and share the results here. The in-town vehicles will be sampled more frequently, probably around 15,000km. I'm very anxious to see just how far the OCI can be extended. With the vans doing strictly hiway, I'm sure 100,000km is not out of the question. The GM engine oil life meter seems to indicate I could go 20,000km but I never wanted to push it that far with dino oil. Up to this point, the vans were drained every 10,000 and the Vibes at around 6000. Trans flushes were done every 50,000.
Just a note about conventional trans flushes. I dropped the pan on a 01 Montana with 240,000km(flushed every 50k since new). I was shocked to find the pan completely covered in sludge and metalic debris. I had to scrape some out to find the magnet...lol. Frankly I was surprised that the trans was still functioning. So from now on my trans flushes will involve dropping the pan, cleaning it and installing a new filter. Simply dumping in flush chemicals and exchanging the fluid through the cooler lines is not enough.
In conclusion, my goal is to get 500,000km(300k miles) out of each vehicle on the original drivetrain. Does anone think that's possible with only 5 oil changes and no trans flushes?(remember, bypass filter on the trans). UOA would be a given.
P.S- anyne considering a new vehicle should check out the Pontic Vibe or its sister car the Toyota Matrix. I've been simply amazed by the fuel mileage and reliability of these little cars. I'm at over 100,000km combined and have not touched a wrench to any of them yet. Fuel mileage is easily double(around town) from the full sized GM's cars that I ran in the past. They save more in fuel per month than the payment so I basically get them for free!
And they've got plenty of room for their size. The jury is still out on the long term(200,000km+) results but so far I couldn't be happier
P.P.S- for my fellow hot-rodders and tuners, check out my baby that has been a pet project over the past few years. I havn't updated my site in a while so some of the newest stuff is not there. I think you'll find it interesting!
Sorry for the long post..lol!
[ May 24, 2004, 07:20 AM: Message edited by: olympic ]
Anyways, on to the main reason I'm here. I own a small fleet of 7 taxi's up here in Saskatchewan, Canada. Currently they consist of 3 Pontiac Vibes which do 90% town driving and 3 Pontiac Montanas and 1 Dodge Caravan AWD which do 99% hiway driving.
I've always been intrigued by synthetic oils and extended drains and the latest fuel price spike finally gave me the push to run a little experiment of my own. I considered my options and decided to go with Amsoil. I equipped one of my Montanas with their DR filtration, Series 2000 0w30, synthetic ATF and dual stage air filter.
I immediately noticed the qualitative improvements ie: smoother quieter engine, better shifts from the trans and the foam filter seemed to muffle out the intake noise better than paper.
But that's not what I was after. I needed to see an improvement in fuel mileage to make this worthwhile for the rest of my cars. After a well controlled mileage test, I saw a gain of 3.8%. It was a little less than I had hoped for but considering the fact that I spend $70k yearly on fuel, it was enough to convince me to take the full plunge into synthetics and extended drains.
Currently 3 of my cars are converted, 3 more await delivery of the kits and 1 will not be converted(because of it's age) except for an Amsoil air filter and perhaps synthetic gear lube in the rear diff. I'm also going to try to install bypass filters on all the transmissions.
Currently the highest mileage is around 6000km on one of the hiway vans. I plan to to do UOA at each 20,000km filter change and share the results here. The in-town vehicles will be sampled more frequently, probably around 15,000km. I'm very anxious to see just how far the OCI can be extended. With the vans doing strictly hiway, I'm sure 100,000km is not out of the question. The GM engine oil life meter seems to indicate I could go 20,000km but I never wanted to push it that far with dino oil. Up to this point, the vans were drained every 10,000 and the Vibes at around 6000. Trans flushes were done every 50,000.
Just a note about conventional trans flushes. I dropped the pan on a 01 Montana with 240,000km(flushed every 50k since new). I was shocked to find the pan completely covered in sludge and metalic debris. I had to scrape some out to find the magnet...lol. Frankly I was surprised that the trans was still functioning. So from now on my trans flushes will involve dropping the pan, cleaning it and installing a new filter. Simply dumping in flush chemicals and exchanging the fluid through the cooler lines is not enough.
In conclusion, my goal is to get 500,000km(300k miles) out of each vehicle on the original drivetrain. Does anone think that's possible with only 5 oil changes and no trans flushes?(remember, bypass filter on the trans). UOA would be a given.
P.S- anyne considering a new vehicle should check out the Pontic Vibe or its sister car the Toyota Matrix. I've been simply amazed by the fuel mileage and reliability of these little cars. I'm at over 100,000km combined and have not touched a wrench to any of them yet. Fuel mileage is easily double(around town) from the full sized GM's cars that I ran in the past. They save more in fuel per month than the payment so I basically get them for free!
P.P.S- for my fellow hot-rodders and tuners, check out my baby that has been a pet project over the past few years. I havn't updated my site in a while so some of the newest stuff is not there. I think you'll find it interesting!
Sorry for the long post..lol!
[ May 24, 2004, 07:20 AM: Message edited by: olympic ]
