SAE Paper on Engine Wear with 20 wt. oil

[OFFRD]

The 5.7 liter Hemi V8 engine has been around for 20 years now, first debuting in 2002 as a 2003 model. Over the years, it has only been updated twice, in 2009 to add cylinder deactivation and in roughly 2018 or thereabouts to add a mild-hybrid system. Otherwise the engine itself hasn’t really changed.

Ram has treated the oil spec for the engine in yo-yo fashion, some years stating 5W30, then 5W20, then 5W20 with 5W30 acceptable, and lately 0W20 despite not changing the engine itself at all. As a result, they’ve had widespread lifter/cam issues with the engine, and widespread reports of ticking especially on cold starts. It’s become so rampant that Mopar enthusiasts have named the issue the “Hemi Tick”.

This summer I leased a 2022 Ram 1500. From day 1 it had a ticking noise, especially on cold start. The valvetrain sounded horrible. At 5,000 miles I drained the factory fill oil and it literally looked like water pouring out of the oil pan. Black water. The thin characteristic of the 0W20 oil is mind blowing. I refilled the engine with synthetic 5W30 and the valvetrain ticking immediately went away. Every single morning now regardless of temperature the engine fires up with ZERO ticking and purrs like a kitten. Truck runs fantastic and still shows identical fuel economy on my weekly hand calculations.

I will never go back to the watery “oil” in my new truck. I don’t accept the idea of saving 0.002 MPG on EPA tests at the sacrifice of costing the consumer lots of money within a few years of the sale.

 

[OVERKILL]

The 5.7 liter Hemi V8 engine has been around for 20 years now, first debuting in 2002 as a 2003 model. Over the years, it has only been updated twice, in 2009 to add cylinder deactivation and in roughly 2018 or thereabouts to add a mild-hybrid system. Otherwise the engine itself hasn’t really changed.

Ram has treated the oil spec for the engine in yo-yo fashion, some years stating 5W30, then 5W20, then 5W20 with 5W30 acceptable, and lately 0W20 despite not changing the engine itself at all. As a result, they’ve had widespread lifter/cam issues with the engine, and widespread reports of ticking especially on cold starts. It’s become so rampant that Mopar enthusiasts have named the issue the “Hemi Tick”.

This summer I leased a 2022 Ram 1500. From day 1 it had a ticking noise, especially on cold start. The valvetrain sounded horrible. At 5,000 miles I drained the factory fill oil and it literally looked like water pouring out of the oil pan. Black water. The thin characteristic of the 0W20 oil is mind blowing. I refilled the engine with synthetic 5W30 and the valvetrain ticking immediately went away. Every single morning now regardless of temperature the engine fires up with ZERO ticking and purrs like a kitten. Truck runs fantastic and still shows identical fuel economy on my weekly hand calculations.

I will never go back to the watery “oil” in my new truck. I don’t accept the idea of saving 0.002 MPG on EPA tests at the sacrifice of costing the consumer lots of money within a few years of the sale.

The lifter/camshaft issues aren't due to oil selection/grade, they are due to materials problems. GM has the same issue, but somewhat more severe are arguably more widespread.

We've run 0W-20 (it specs 5W-20) in our '19 since new. It has never ticked.

HEMI's "tick" for a variety of different reasons. The most common, by far, is exhaust manifold stud failure. Start-up rattle is typically the result of filter bleed-down (malfunctioning ADBV) as all oil is much thicker when cold than when at operating temperature.

 

[kschachn]

The lifter/camshaft issues aren't due to oil selection/grade, they are due to materials problems. GM has the same issue, but somewhat more severe are arguably more widespread.

We've run 0W-20 (it specs 5W-20) in our '19 since new. It has never ticked.

HEMI's "tick" for a variety of different reasons. The most common, by far, is exhaust manifold stud failure. Start-up rattle is typically the result of filter bleed-down (malfunctioning ADBV) as all oil is much thicker when cold than when at operating temperature.

But...but... what if you run Red Line 5W-30? What about then?

 

[StumblingElk]

My Honda 3.5 has had 5w20 for 200k miles. It still runs fine.

Anecdotal but worth noting.

 

[OVERKILL]

But...but... what if you run Red Line 5W-30? What about then?

Well, that's a whole other discussion! It rebuilds your lifters as you go, so you do need to be careful about periodic inspection because if it gets ahead of itself; if it makes the lifters "better than new" then it will just start building new lifters, and if you don't collect those, then they'll be rolling around inside your engine and have the potential to unleash havoc if they get bound up somewhere they shouldn't be!

 

[Bill7]

I have no problems with 20 grade oils in engines putting out 600 plus BPH but prefer thinner oils. 'Currently running a Redline 0W5 in my Lincoln Navigator.

Ali

Have you ever googled HTHS wear graph?
If HTHS goes below 2.6, engine wear begins to increase exponentially.
Since 20 weight oil starts at 2.6, and as it ages, it sheers down to 2.3.
It's beneficial to use 30 weight oils for the extra HTHS cushion.

 

[Brian123]

Have you ever googled HTHS wear graph?
If HTHS goes below 2.6, engine wear begins to increase exponentially.
Since 20 weight oil starts at 2.6, and as it ages, it sheers down to 2.3.
It's beneficial to use 30 weight oils for the extra HTHS cushion.

Bill7, realize some members on here can afford to buy another car if something goes wrong.

 

[Jimmy_Russells]

Bill7, realize some members on here can afford to buy another car if something goes wrong.

I think the bigger point is how often do 20 grade oil/viscosity related engine failures occur in today's world? It is an exceedingly low number.

 

[AEHaas]

Tens of millions of cars and trucks running 16 and 20 grade oils for billions of miles nor 2 to 3 decades of use to include many back spec'ed cars running thinner oils, will not convince a single "thick" biased person of any worth. That is the trouble with bigotry. Not a single compelling, colossal, metric will change those peoples thinking. Only upon their death will the base thinking change to accept that even though "science" says it is not so will help them.

Sad,

Ali

 

[4WD]

Warning … Oil bigots ahead …

 

[Wizz]

Nonsense regarding the paper. Like mentioned a lot of factors need to be considered. NASCAR teams are running 20W oils at 9K RPM without issue. Many Japanese cars at 200k+ miles. Some people just aren't ready for modern things.

 

[OVERKILL]

I think the bigger point is how often do 20 grade oil/viscosity related engine failures occur in today's world? It is an exceedingly low number.

I think it's important to consider context here. There's a relative chasm between a Toyota or Ford Modular, validated on and spec'd for xW-20, and a Super Car engine spec'd for 10W-60 with somebody putting 0W-8 in it.

Also, and it pains me to have to point this out for what must be the thousandth time on this forum, but more wear does not amount to a stack of failed engines, no matter how many times that strawman gets trotted out. When "more wear" is mentioned, what is being said is that one can accrue the same amount of wear over say 100,000 miles on 0W-8 that the same engine would accumulate over say 200,000 miles on 0W-20. That's an increase in wear, but it isn't engine failure.

If you are the OEM and you can improve your CAFE score and reduce the (useful) engine life from 300,000 miles to 200,000 miles but the average lifetime mileage accrued is 150,000 miles, this is a relatively inconsequential change to Joe Average.

Circling back to my "important to consider" statement, Ford did indeed spec the same engine for 5W-20 and 5W-50. The 5W-50 version got an oil cooler and revised programming, the 5W-20 version got neutered when oil temperature hit a certain point, to protect the engine from damage. Somebody with unlimited funds might be inclined to run the experiment of taking the 5W-50 car, filled with 5W-20, and putting it through the same conditions that would result in the 5W-20 car to go into thermal protection and "see what happens".

 

[demarpaint]

I think it's important to consider context here. There's a relative chasm between a Toyota or Ford Modular, validated on and spec'd for xW-20, and a Super Car engine spec'd for 10W-60 with somebody putting 0W-8 in it.

Also, and it pains me to have to point this out for what must be the thousandth time on this forum, but more wear does not amount to a stack of failed engines, no matter how many times that strawman gets trotted out. When "more wear" is mentioned, what is being said is that one can accrue the same amount of wear over say 100,000 miles on 0W-8 that the same engine would accumulate over say 200,000 miles on 0W-20. That's an increase in wear, but it isn't engine failure.

If you are the OEM and you can improve your CAFE score and reduce the (useful) engine life from 300,000 miles to 200,000 miles but the average lifetime mileage accrued is 150,000 miles, this is a relatively inconsequential change to Joe Average.

Circling back to my "important to consider" statement, Ford did indeed spec the same engine for 5W-20 and 5W-50. The 5W-50 version got an oil cooler and revised programming, the 5W-20 version got neutered when oil temperature hit a certain point, to protect the engine from damage. Somebody with unlimited funds might be inclined to run the experiment of taking the 5W-50 car, filled with 5W-20, through the same conditions that would result in the 5W-20 car to go into thermal protection and "see what happens".

Great points again! Regarding the last paragraph, there's a good chance Ford did just that, which is why they spec'd 5W50 in the high performance version, and castrated the same engine calling for 5W20 oil for CAFE reasons.

 

[Bill_W]

So there is not a one size fits all…

 

[spasm3]

I'm going to agree that we don't have rows of failed engines on 20wt oils. But I don't see an advantage to using a 0/5w20 over a 0/5w30. Certainly no fuel mileage difference. I've tried x/20 ,x/30,x/40 in the same engines with no measurable fuel mileage difference.

We also do not have rows of engines spec'd for 20wt that have failed on 30wt and 40wt oils.

So why not?

 

[AJW001]

Slick 50 was old tech. Dura-Lube is where it was at. The infomercial of the engine running dry with the oil drained and water sprayed with the head off was what sold it to me at the time.

 

[Jimmy_Russells]

I think it's important to consider context here. There's a relative chasm between a Toyota or Ford Modular, validated on and spec'd for xW-20, and a Super Car engine spec'd for 10W-60 with somebody putting 0W-8 in it.

Also, and it pains me to have to point this out for what must be the thousandth time on this forum, but more wear does not amount to a stack of failed engines, no matter how many times that strawman gets trotted out. When "more wear" is mentioned, what is being said is that one can accrue the same amount of wear over say 100,000 miles on 0W-8 that the same engine would accumulate over say 200,000 miles on 0W-20. That's an increase in wear, but it isn't engine failure.

If you are the OEM and you can improve your CAFE score and reduce the (useful) engine life from 300,000 miles to 200,000 miles but the average lifetime mileage accrued is 150,000 miles, this is a relatively inconsequential change to Joe Average.

Circling back to my "important to consider" statement, Ford did indeed spec the same engine for 5W-20 and 5W-50. The 5W-50 version got an oil cooler and revised programming, the 5W-20 version got neutered when oil temperature hit a certain point, to protect the engine from damage. Somebody with unlimited funds might be inclined to run the experiment of taking the 5W-50 car, filled with 5W-20, and putting it through the same conditions that would result in the 5W-20 car to go into thermal protection and "see what happens".

I don’t know about you, but I genuinely do not care if an engine lasts 280k vs 300k, assuming of course lighter oil actually means that difference in the first place… The rest of the vehicle is falling apart around the engine anyway. I have started multiple threads on vehicles using 20 grade oils that have many hundreds of thousands of miles. A 440k mile Subaru and a 620k mile Civic are two off the top of my head.

Your example is not really an example. Anyone with half a brain understands oil gets thinner as it warms up, and if you are going to be getting the oil very hot with track use, you should probably use thicker oil. For the same reason you don’t use all season tires or street brake pads and fluid on the track. If you use anything, anything at all outside of its intended use you’re going to have a bad day. None of that changes the fact that 20 grades are absolutely more than suitable for everyday use in the vast majority of vehicles and their designed usage.

 

[SubieRubyRoo]

Slick 50 was old tech. Dura-Lube is where it was at. The infomercial of the engine running dry with the oil drained and water sprayed with the head off was what sold it to me at the time.

What about Prolong? They took the oil pan off and ran it on a stand…

 

[Bill_W]

C

I don’t know about you, but I genuinely do not care if an engine lasts 280k vs 300k, assuming of course lighter oil actually means that difference in the first place… The rest of the vehicle is falling apart around the engine anyway. I have started multiple threads on vehicles using 20 grade oils that have many hundreds of thousands of miles. A 440k mile Subaru and a 620k mile Civic are two off the top of my head.

Your example is not really an example. Anyone with half a brain understands oil gets thinner as it warms up, and if you are going to be getting the oil very hot with track use, you should probably use thicker oil. For the same reason you don’t use all season tires or street brake pads and fluid on the track. If you use anything, anything at all outside of its intended use you’re going to have a bad day. None of that changes the fact that 20 grades are absolutely more than suitable for everyday use in the vast majority of vehicles and their designed usage.

Consider the possibility that a few can follow obsession and even less few that can spark that few obsessive for money offered from an oil company. Imagine that with all these testing done no company will actually compete against each other so that there is no real winner, only different opinions on what is the best oil, so as time goes and competition drives the consumer to buy more. After all, we all know more than the car manufacturers what is best for our cars.

 

[JohnnyJohnson]

Nonsense regarding the paper. Like mentioned a lot of factors need to be considered. NASCAR teams are running 20W oils at 9K RPM without issue. Many Japanese cars at 200k+ miles. Some people just aren't ready for modern things.

Yes goodness and how many 100's of thousands of miles are they running them in NASCAR??? I don't think all the numbers are in yet.