taking a trip to death valley this fall, what oil

[znode]

Originally Posted By: desertrandy
I have been off-roading in Death Valley for years and have driven almost every trail out there in all types of weather including July and August where I experienced 129 degree temps in Furnace Creek back in 2005. My personal experience is that the number 1 failure is tires. You need good LT rated tires and a matching full size spare. Take a good air compressor and tire plug kit. The second most common problem is overheating. Make sure your cooling system is in good shape, The a/c condensor and radiator are clear of debris, your fans are working properly, and your system holds good pressure. Third is transmission overheating. Make sure you drive in the proper gear, use 1st and 2nd gear where needed and use 4lo for rock climbing instead of 4hi. Engine oil has never really been an issue. I always ran the recommended weight in conventional oil, usually Mobil Clean 5000 or Pennzoil Conventional 10w30 for My Jeep 4.0 engine and 5w30 in my Dodge Ram pick-up. Hopefully you are not heading out alone. If you are, rent a satellite phone, they are cheap to rent by the week and keep a list of emergency numbers on hand. Good luck. And since this is my fist post on this website, let me say Hi to everyone here.


This. I get a bit of desert driving in once in a while (Octillo and Imperial deserts), but looking on the map this guy literally lives half an hour from Death Valley.

And yes

 

[kender]

Take plenty of drinking water. Not a good place to get stuck/lost/brokedown in.
BTW, I was stationed at Nellis AFB, Las Vegas, in the early 80's. Been all around the southern Nevada area. Also went through Death Valley, Ca. Never had any problems with conventional oil then. Any SM oil in the proper visc. will be fine.

 

[yaris0128]

Well if I were going on a long road trip relatively fresh oil would be something on my checklist. Just to make sure that my engine is staying at its coolest possible temps. Other than that any oil I suppose.

 

[znode]

Oil doesn't cool an engine.

And yeah for anywhere that goes above 105F bring 3 gals of water per person per day, plus a good safety margin of days. You might even need it in the radiator later.

 

[mopar_monkey]

i'm not really worried about cooling from the oil, i'm mostly just looking for a grade/type that will be sufficient at 105 as well as 30 since i very well could be dealing with both of these temps within the matter of 24 hrs. since i will be changing the oil before i leave i can change to what ever is going to provide the best coverage on cold starts below freezing as well as crawling in low range at an ambient temp above 100 in the blazing sun.

 

[Bill in Utah]

ANY 5w30, 10w30, 5w-20, 10w-40 and so on. 100 degree plus and to single digits any oil will protect just fine.