Sea Foam Added To Oil ?

Joined
Sep 10, 2010
Messages
3,806
Location
PNW
Per the Sea Foam can instructions - adding 1 oz. Sea Foam per quart of oil capacity (i.e. 5 oz. per 5 qrt. oil sump capacity) for up to 300 miles for moderate cleaning of engine internals : *If you follow the instructions by adding Sea Foam to oil right before you plan to do an oil change ( I]be for your engine ?? I just want to do a little cleaning of oil journals , ring packs , etc. every 3rd oil change that the oil may otherwise miss - your experiences / thoughts ?
 
I've done it before. Didn't open up any valve cover etc to see if it made a difference before and after.

Does your vehicle have an engine that may need some extra cleaning?

Now I just use a good synthetic oil and don't worry about trying to keep everything clean. Let the oil do the work.
 
Personally, I would never add a solvent (IPA) to oil unless I was trying to avoid disassembly to correct a severe sludge problem. If you're referring to any of the vehicles in your signature, the most you've got is some very light varnish on that Sonata, if that. Valvoline Advanced is keeping the internals spotless.

Unless you have an issue, there's no need to add anything to your oil.
 
It's 70% pale oil with a splash of alcohol and naphtha. You're paying more for the can than the product. It also has a KV100 of just 2.6 cSt. It's unlikely to cause any major damage, but it doesn't help matters. It doesn't clean miraculously, just oxidizes the oil more than anything. Even if it did clean well, you wouldn't want to quick clean an engine anyway. Cleaning a dirty engine is something that should be done over long periods of time such as across a few OCIs, not in 300 miles. Ideally you also want the solvents doing the cleaning to also have some decent lubricating properties. IPA is not such a solvent. You want POE and AN.

The moral is, just use a better oil. M1 FS, HPL PCMO and HDMO, RL HP, and Driven LS/DT oils all contain ester and/or naphthalenes for cleaning without diluting your additives and maintaining lubricity.

EDIT: Something to add to this, the cleaning components of Seafoam (and MMO which is the same thing for half the price) is the isopropyl alcohol and light naphtha. The boiling point of IPA and naphtha is 181*F and 195*F respectively. They're going to evaporate the first time the oil gets up to normal operating temp, leaving behind just pale oil. How is that going to do anything other than oxidize the oil?
 
Last edited:
It's 70% pale oil with a splash of alcohol and naphtha. You're paying more for the can than the product. It also has a KV100 of just 2.6 cSt. It's unlikely to cause any major damage, but it doesn't help matters. It doesn't clean miraculously, just oxidizes the oil more than anything. Even if it did clean well, you wouldn't want to quick clean an engine anyway. Cleaning a dirty engine is something that should be done over long periods of time such as across a few OCIs, not in 300 miles. Ideally you also want the solvents doing the cleaning to also have some decent lubricating properties. IPA is not such a solvent. You want POE and AN.

The moral is, just use a better oil. M1 FS, HPL PCMO and HDMO, RL HP, and Driven LS/DT oils all contain ester and/or naphthalenes for cleaning without diluting your additives and maintaining lubricity.

EDIT: Something to add to this, the cleaning components of Seafoam (and MMO which is the same thing for half the price) is the isopropyl alcohol and light naphtha. The boiling point of IPA and naphtha is 181*F and 195*F respectively. They're going to evaporate the first time the oil gets up to normal operating temp, leaving behind just pale oil. How is that going to do anything other than oxidize the oil?
I agree 100%.
 
Per the Sea Foam can instructions - adding 1 oz. Sea Foam per quart of oil capacity (i.e. 5 oz. per 5 qrt. oil sump capacity) for up to 300 miles for moderate cleaning of engine internals : *If you follow the instructions by adding Sea Foam to oil right before you plan to do an oil change ( I]be for your engine ?? I just want to do a little cleaning of oil journals , ring packs , etc. every 3rd oil change that the oil may otherwise miss - your experiences / thoughts ?
Snake oil. Designed not to damage your engine if used correctly but won't perform as expected.
 
A agree there is no need to run seafoam or any other cleaner. Synthetic oil is pretty good at cleaning an engine. At minimum if you have a slightly dirty engine that is still working fine, the synthetic will not add anymore deposits to the engine.

Trying to dislodge that stuff can cause problems with blocked passages or leaks. You clean off the pile of varnish that was blockign the oil from going through a cracked seal.
 
I just added a 1/2 can to my W8 and ran it 200 miles and drained. Several in that community have said it helped free up a stuck cam adjuster that I am struggling with. So far so good. I can't see how it hurts, it was $7. I dumped the other 1/2 in the gas tank. There are better flush products than this...it's kind of a legendary product that probably is completely useless..haha
20211010_150623.jpg
 
Last edited:
It's 70% pale oil with a splash of alcohol and naphtha. You're paying more for the can than the product. It also has a KV100 of just 2.6 cSt. It's unlikely to cause any major damage, but it doesn't help matters. It doesn't clean miraculously, just oxidizes the oil more than anything. Even if it did clean well, you wouldn't want to quick clean an engine anyway. Cleaning a dirty engine is something that should be done over long periods of time such as across a few OCIs, not in 300 miles. Ideally you also want the solvents doing the cleaning to also have some decent lubricating properties. IPA is not such a solvent. You want POE and AN.

The moral is, just use a better oil. M1 FS, HPL PCMO and HDMO, RL HP, and Driven LS/DT oils all contain ester and/or naphthalenes for cleaning without diluting your additives and maintaining lubricity.

EDIT: Something to add to this, the cleaning components of Seafoam (and MMO which is the same thing for half the price) is the isopropyl alcohol and light naphtha. The boiling point of IPA and naphtha is 181*F and 195*F respectively. They're going to evaporate the first time the oil gets up to normal operating temp, leaving behind just pale oil. How is that going to do anything other than oxidize the oil?
This, this, THIS!.

If you are running a quality lubricant, you are diluting its base oils with one that is decidedly worse and introducing solvents, which negatively impact the lubricating ability. The pale oil base may in fact encourage more deposit build-up as it rapidly oxidizes and degrades.
 
FWIW....I used to get regular oil changes from the dealer, conventional (or semi) 5W-20. Honda K24 engine w/150k miles.

As the car aged during cold weather first starts, if I started the engine and then drive immediately, I'd trigger a P2647 code and the engine would go into limp mode (clogged VTEC actuator). Problem would not occur if I waited 5+ minutes for the engine to hit operating temp. (too lazy to change the actuator)

Once I switched to Mobile 1 High-Mileage Extended Performance 0W-20, I never triggered the code and noticed the difference on the first cold start with the oil. M1 really does the trick and I'm skeptical that any third-party additive can do better. imo, happy to be proven wrong.

YMMV.
 
OP here : Just curious more than anything about Seafoam in oil (I now believe OK in gas - not oil though) - my current fill is QSUD 5W30 SN+ which I run a severe duty OCI with for suburban driving (3,750 miles) . Next fill will be Valvoline Advance SN+ from the stash I have which will assist in any varnish cleaning I may have .
 
Just running Mobil 1 for 4 oil changes will clear a lot out slowly. Or as I did with my daughters new to her, used Mazda 3 Skyactive with 90,000 miles. We ran the fresh dealer oil for 1,000 miles and installed my stocking oil for my Kona, Redline Performance 5w-30 Euro (Ester). Ran it for 6,000 miles and the oil I will be using for her car will be Mobil 1 5w-30 Extended. She will be clean in a couple of changes. That's just how I would do it.
 
Back
Top