Hello all, I'm curious if anyone who uses Pennzoil Ultra Platinum has noticed any excessive sludge/deposit buildup issues. I have been using Pennzoil Ultra Platinum 5W30 almost exclusively in my 05 Honda Civic 1.7 VTEC and usually changing it around 4K miles or at the very most 5K miles and I have not been very impressed with it's cleaning and I'm wondering if anyone else has noticed this.
I recently changed my timing belt, water pump, oil pump seal, etc and I first noticed slight but noticeable crud buildup under the valve cover on the rocker arms and cylinder head similar to the oil pan below. I wish I thought to take a picture of it. The buildup wasn't much, but I refreshed that engine about 3-4 years ago and thoroughly washed the cylinder head and valve train to like new condition before reassembly, so my expectation would be very minimal to no buildup with almost all highway miles and 4-5K mile oil changes with synthetic oil.
I suppose mild buildup in the cylinder head area after several years of driving is acceptable, but IMO the worst buildup is what happened to the bottom of my oil pan after only 4400 miles. I slightly cracked my original oil pan on a rock several months ago and had to replace it with a used one, which I very thoroughly washed to like new condition before I installed it. It now looks like this. The bottom of it is lightly coated in some kind of greasy sludge. Again, not terrible, but that's after only 4400 miles. My daily commute is 50 highway miles per day (25 miles each way) 5 days a week and I don't idle much, sit in traffic, drive short trips, etc. I also regularly accelerate to redline, which I would think should help prevent buildup like this compared to driving like a granny all the time.
I'm considering switching to another brand of Hello all, I'm curious if anyone who uses Pennzoil Ultra Platinum has noticed any excessive sludge/deposit buildup issues. I have been using Pennzoil Ultra Platinum 5W30 almost exclusively in my 05 Honda Civic 1.7 VTEC and usually changing it around 4K miles or at the very most 5K miles and I have not been very impressed with it's cleaning and I'm wondering if anyone else has noticed this.
I bought a 2011 Mazda 3 as a commuter car to drive back and fourth to New Orleans, switched oil to at that time it was pennzoil ultra, there was no platinum, I think In 2014 they released the platinum and I switched. I changed it at 5,000 miles due to the long idle time in traffic. When I pulled the valve cover off at 170,000 miles to change the gasket, there was some buildup in one area of the head. I have never seen that in other cars with Mobil 1. I had an 06 Nissan Frontier with 310,000 miles on it when I changed the valve cover gaskets and the engine was spotless. Ran Mobil 1 5w30 for 5,000 mile intervals. Needless to say I strictly run Mobil 1 in everything, even my lawnmowers.I recently changed my timing belt, water pump, oil pump seal, etc and I first noticed slight but noticeable crud buildup under the valve cover on the rocker arms and cylinder head similar to the oil pan below. I wish I thought to take a picture of it. The buildup wasn't much, but I refreshed that engine about 3-4 years ago and thoroughly washed the cylinder head and valve train to like new condition before reassembly, so my expectation would be very minimal to no buildup with almost all highway miles and 4-5K mile oil changes with synthetic oil.
I suppose mild buildup in the cylinder head area after several years of driving is acceptable, but IMO the worst buildup is what happened to the bottom of my oil pan after only 4400 miles. I slightly cracked my original oil pan on a rock several months ago and had to replace it with a used one, which I very thoroughly washed to like new condition before I installed it. It now looks like this. The bottom of it is lightly coated in some kind of greasy sludge. Again, not terrible, but that's after only 4400 miles. My daily commute is 50 highway miles per day (25 miles each way) 5 days a week and I don't idle much, sit in traffic, drive short trips, etc. I also regularly accelerate to redline, which I would think should help prevent buildup like this compared to driving like a granny all the time.
I'm considering switching to another brand of oil next oil change because I'm not thrilled with this much buildup in the oil pan after only 4400 easy miles and I would expect the valvetrain and head to stay free of that sticky buildup for more than a few years with easy driving conditions and 4-5K mile oil changes. Do you think these expectations are unreasonable?
Any thoughts are welcome as always!
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