Valvoline Extended Protection Full Synthetic vs. Mobil 1 Extended Performance

Read my replies earlier in the thread. Significant dilution requires a specific set of circumstances in order to take place and not all engines are prone to it. Also, please read the links and data I've presented, fuel dilution is most definitely not being misidentified as a boogyman, it's a legitimate issue that can accelerate wear. Accelerated wear does not mean a pile of failed engines, that's the strawman that's oft trotted out when somebody mentions elevated wear rates in any context.

Let me ask you for your perspective on this thought, getting back to the OP's original point about the Honda engineers specifying 0w20 for the subject engine. If the main contributor to fuel dilution is the lack of adequate engine temperature, wouldn't it follow the a low viscosity grade oil would only serve to benefit the end of warming up the engine ASAP? I'm starting to think that putting a heavier grade oil, like an Xw30, would be counterproductive and perhaps it would actually contribute to more fuel dilution.
 
Mobil 1 EP if you plan to do extended changes, Valvoline if you don't. I don't want to make this a thick vs thin discussion but on a TGDI engine I'd be more worried about sufficient viscosity and frequent changes. No oil protects against fuel dilution and soot better than new, clean oil.
 
I've yet to see a single bad UOA because of it, so it's not really a concern of mine. I plan to do 5K oil changes, anyway. The K20C1 and K20C4 engines have been around for almost a decade, and yet to hear of one actually having an issue.
Awesome, Fellow K owner. I have a Type-R, bought new 2 years ago. 5000-7500 miles between changes using Pennzoil Platinum 0w-20 (was fram ultra filters since first change, but Fram's changing them pushed me right to Royal Purple).

My R gets driven a LOT and while not abused at all, I do enjoy a fully matted throttle on occasion. Great engine, great car, run the 20w and don't worry about it. Watch the valve cover gasket, on the rear of the engine. A number of people with Type-R's and myself had very slight leak and either changed the gasket or had it done under warranty. Mine showed signs with around 15k on it. $10 part and a couple of hours of therapy wrenching. Warranty or not, unless it's absolutely a huge task or big expense, I'm the only one to put a wrench on it other than inspections.
 
Let me ask you for your perspective on this thought, getting back to the OP's original point about the Honda engineers specifying 0w20 for the subject engine. If the main contributor to fuel dilution is the lack of adequate engine temperature, wouldn't it follow the a low viscosity grade oil would only serve to benefit the end of warming up the engine ASAP? I'm starting to think that putting a heavier grade oil, like an Xw30, would be counterproductive and perhaps it would actually contribute to more fuel dilution.
It's actually the opposite. Heavier oil creates more drag, which increases load, which would shorten the warm-up duration. By much? No, but that's the stack.

This engine, like most current engines, spec the lower viscosity oil because it's that much closer to the tested acceptable hot viscosity during the start and warm-up phase, which means reduced pumping losses and drag, which in turn improves fuel economy. This is also what is chased with the uber high VI (and ultra high VII lol) oils like TGMO. The higher the VI, the less change in viscosity over that temp range and so then you are closer to operating viscosity out of the gate, close to "ideal" viscosity for the highest fuel efficiency.

Of course the flip side of that is that operated in a manner that produces significant fuel dilution, you are driving viscosity down further as well as diluting the additives. This is going to have a negative effect on the function of the lubricant. Also, since we are already pushing the envelope on acceptable wear with lower viscosity lubricants, what is the impact of driving that viscosity even lower, while simultaneously compromising the function of the additive package? Something to ponder.

My 5.7L is running a 0w-20. But, it is regularly brought up to temperature, is port injected, and has a big old coolant/oil heat exchanger. I'm not worried about the oil getting out of grade, UOA's we've seen of the HEMI on here don't show significant fuel. If this engine was a significant diluter like some of these DI mills, it would likely cause me to take pause and reconsider my lubricant selection.

My 6.4L on the other hand, I assume it probably does dilute, due to the more performance-oriented tune. But it has a 0w-40 in it, so I don't give it a second thought. My M5 diluted for the same reason, but there was always lots of buffer there.
 
Thank you OK for the links, some more late night reading for all of us who are interested in this subject.
You are quite welcome.
More of my thought and points:

On batch or even SMPI the injection period is not always into a 'forward' moving air mass (depending on load) and partial obstruction of an opening valve will compress then expand the charge which may cause a % of droplets to condense or fall out of suspension - but I agree that running λ = 1.0 at high throttling with the injection period during the valve opening event does promote good fuel atomization with mixture swirl or tumbling depending on valve actuation. This mixture will be exposed to the full area of the cylinder wall be it cold start or fully warmed. Any condensate will be wiped on the up stroke. We have all read reported dilution issue with SMPI for those who idle the vehicle at warmup - especially with starts and coolant below freezing.
Yes, and performance-oriented SEFI engines have been known to do a bit of dilution too, but not to the degree we are seeing with these TGDI engines. Ignoring carburetors, batch fire and TBI would be the least inclined towards proper homogenous mixture formation because of course there is going to be fuel being sprayed into air masses where the column or segments aren't moving. SEFI/SMPI, there is always SOME movement, even if it is relatively slow, like at low load, low RPM, which is going to promote a better blended intake charge.
It appears side-positioned D.I is at its best at economy cruise, say λ = 1.1 were the injection pulse width is >/= 10ms
and the fuel enters when the piston is at its upper 1/3 of compression stroke travel and the piston top contour - if so employed - will deflect fuel away from the opposite wall. In this scenario there is simultaneous charge phase cooling to prevent pre-ignition and a mostly concentrated charge away from distal surfaces to prevent detonation. An issue with D.I is when the fuel must be injected during the intake stroke and if side positioned and vectored it will impinge and likely wash the opposite wall - especially with long stroke narrow bore engines.
Actually, I'm glad you brought up small bore engines, because that's one of the things touched-on in some of the above material with respect to these small displacement, highly strung TGDI applications. The bore is small, so the high pressure spray of the DI nozzle gets a lot of fuel on the walls, and if the walls are cool, those form droplets that may be forced by the rings during the remainder of the compression stroke or as part of the blow-by gas as they are already condensed at the ring-wall interface, down the side of the piston.
Now maybe 1/3 of the ring circumference will be running up along a "dry" cylinder bore.
D.I. cannot inject to great effect under high load/high rpm during exhaust and compression "off--cycle" as SMPI or Batch can,
So we see high velocity/volume injection attempted in milliseconds during un-throttled high load scenarios.
Yes, and, at extremely high pressure. I'm curious how well the metering of the DI injectors works compared to say a present advanced port injector, which has a much lower nozzle pressure.
Again this is all specific to any particular design, geometry and timing.
Absolutely, and that's the important bit. Some DI engines seem to avoid dilution quite well, like the BMW B58 for example. Not sure about their 4-popper, but it may as well. Other engines, like the Honda 1.5L, seem to be notorious for it to the point where their reputation proceeds it. As far as I know, Ford has fared reasonably well with their DI engines, as they are also mentioned (well, the Ecoboost is) in the above material.
I see some BMW with the Bosch system use a center injector near the spark plug. I wonder what other engines use this approach.
This would be optimal along with SMPI if it doesn't impact valve sizing to a great degree.
Yes, the B58 is one of those, you can see the injectors between the valves here:
1649477429706.png

My FORD uses side positioned injectors, and is likely an older, sub optimal arrangement.
But I only say that due to my current dilemma.
Couple good pictures of a Ford DI engine with the side injection here:
1649477752623.png


The top of the piston design, clearly with the intention to deflect the DI charge, as you remarked on earlier, seems well thought-out:
1649477844023.png

I see one SAE paper above was presented by engineers from Jiangling Motors Co., LTD., China
The hotbed of research and development. Looks like a discussion of an early implementation. I don't disqualify it, I will read it.
Excellent, looking forward to your feedback.
On oil sampling, I agree without a proper lab test I would not have presentable data on my Jetta D.I. Turbo
fuel dilution tendencies.

But, after initial wear-in, I experienced no increase on the dip stick, no ugly appearing oil, and no engine racket
when warmed. Maybe Fat and Happy, but you see I only fret the discordant effects I see and feel.
Or, in other words, I don't go looking for trouble, it finds me all on its own :)

Good discussion.

- Ken
Good discussion indeed. I don't recall the VW engines being huge diluters either, FWIW. But of course early VAG engines had serious issues with IVD's.
 
The problem with that logic is that there are different forms of moly. Ive read here that Mobil uses what’s called tri-nuclear moly, which is effective at the lower amounts that they use (~60 ppm).
With what logic, I asked a question, and understand there are different types of moly.

While Mobil 1 for sure uses the trimer. We don't know what's used in Valvoline. It could be solely the dimer, solely the trimer, or even a combination.
While 60ppm of the trimer is effective in combination with other friction modifiers, if it was used alone it would really be pushing the lower limit in my opinion. And this has been discussed previously with references to industry data and patent information.
I'm not here to debate the merits of one formulation vs. the other. But there is a sufficient crowd that believes higher moly is beneficial, and i'm one of them.

As far as I understand most of the majors have dropped the dimer in general, with the highest Moly being in the range of ~180ppm in the case of Quaker State (QSUD and now FS) and Shell RGT. So, Valvoline with 300ppm here is quite interesting.
 
With what logic, I asked a question, and understand there are different types of moly.

While Mobil 1 for sure uses the trimer. We don't know what's used in Valvoline. It could be solely the dimer, solely the trimer, or even a combination.
While 60ppm of the trimer is effective in combination with other friction modifiers, if it was used alone it would really be pushing the lower limit in my opinion. And this has been discussed previously with references to industry data and patent information.
I'm not here to debate the merits of one formulation vs. the other. But there is a sufficient crowd that believes higher moly is beneficial, and i'm one of them.

As far as I understand most of the majors have dropped the dimer in general, with the highest Moly being in the range of ~180ppm in the case of Quaker State (QSUD and now FS) and Shell RGT. So, Valvoline with 300ppm here is quite interesting.
The logic of deciding that Valvoline or QS, with their higher measured PPM of Mo have better anti-wear or lubrication properties than M1 with its ~ 60ppm of tri-nuclear Mo.

Chances are excellent that Valvoline is not using 300ppm of the tri-nuclear moly.
 
While 60ppm of the trimer is effective in combination with other friction modifiers, if it was used alone it would really be pushing the lower limit in my opinion. And this has been discussed previously with references to industry data and patent information.


I thought the idea behind using the trimer moly was that less could be used to achieve the same results? So 60ppm might equal 150ppm of the other. I don’t know what the conversion rate is.

I don’t get fixated on moly numbers anyway. Valvoline ran a sodium based add pack for years that produced stellar analysis reports with zero molybdenum.
 
Because of this, I just dumped half a bottle of MoS2 into our CRV and the other half into the Odyssey.

:cool::cool::cool::cool::cool::cool::cool::cool:
 
I thought the idea behind using the trimer moly was that less could be used to achieve the same results? So 60ppm might equal 150ppm of the other. I don’t know what the conversion rate is.

I don’t get fixated on moly numbers anyway. Valvoline ran a sodium based add pack for years that produced stellar analysis reports with zero molybdenum.
Yes, and both types of moly have slightly differing synergies with other AF/AW additives as well (including with each other).
 
I, too, am a moly guy. But then there is what PimTac said, Valvoline used to have zero moly but I've never once seen a bad Valvoline uoa. They're a strange one imo. I remember the early Maxlife (early 2000s) had triple digit moly, then suddenly had zero moly, and now their flagship oils have triple digit moly.

We'll never know the logistics behind this, only Valvoline knows.
 
I, too, am a moly guy. But then there is what PimTac said, Valvoline used to have zero moly but I've never once seen a bad Valvoline uoa. They're a strange one imo. I remember the early Maxlife (early 2000s) had triple digit moly, then suddenly had zero moly, and now their flagship oils have triple digit moly.

We'll never know the logistics behind this, only Valvoline knows.
Ignoring the premise for the moment that we can discern "good" and "bad" performance from a $20 Blackstone UOA, the answer is because blending is far more complicated than we like to think it is.

As I've said before, oils are a balancing act of components and characteristics to meet a broad spectrum of performance targets. There are compromises made as well of course, for cost and performance reasons as well as regulatory limits as well. The idea that we can improve these products by upsetting that balance with some 3rd party concentrated additive (or the worst, some bar oil tackifier, bright stock, and a bucket of cheap VII) seems breathtakingly naive in that context. If we don't know why Valvoline significantly changed the visible aspects of their additive package chemistry, what makes us bold enough to assume that, despite that ignorance, that increasing the level, significantly, of one component, will make that product perform better? Food for thought.
 
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Ignoring the premise for the moment that we can discern "good" and "bad" performance from a $20 Blackstone UOA, the answer is because blending is far more complicated than we like to think it is.

As I've said before, oils are a balancing act of components and characteristics to meet a broad spectrum of performance targets. There are compromises made as well of course, for cost and performance reasons as well as regulatory limits as well. The idea that we can improve these products by upsetting that balance with some 3rd party concentrated additive (or the worst, some bar oil tackifier, bright stock, and a bucket of cheap VII) seems breathtakingly naive in that context. If we don't know why Valvoline significantly changed the visible aspects of their additive package chemistry, what makes us bold enough to assume that, despite that ignorance, that increasing the level, significantly, of one component, will make that product perform better? Food for thought.
IMHO, this one sentence nailed it.

Reframed, you say and I believe, "compromises are made for cost, performance, and regulatory reasons."
 
*I call bull regarding Honda's answer. My Hyundai GDI will burn a little oil and has fuel dilution (smell) but nothing like that !

Why? At 1:28 in the video he is showing you the printed receipt from the Honda dealer, saying that it's all, "normal".

He also showed you the dipstick, and it's reading. What do you think he, or Honda making up?

Honda's answer is all bull..... If that's what you are referring to.
 
*I call bull regarding Honda's answer . My Hyundai GDI will burn a little oil and has fuel dilution (smell) but nothing like that !
Oh man…. Thats not good at all. I tell ya’, we were burned by the earth dreams mill in my ol’ ladys accord, and i will never buy another Honda after dealing with that mess. It drank oil like it was nothing, and the interior fell apart like it was a passat from 1998. After one rebuild that did nothing to stop the consumption, and the falling headliner blowing out the passenger rear window at 65 mph we dumped it at 112k. Loved it when it was brand new, but she aged like a bowling alley smoker…..
 
Oh man…. Thats not good at all. I tell ya’, we were burned by the earth dreams mill in my ol’ ladys accord, and i will never buy another Honda after dealing with that mess. It drank oil like it was nothing, and the interior fell apart like it was a passat from 1998. After one rebuild that did nothing to stop the consumption, and the falling headliner blowing out the passenger rear window at 65 mph we dumped it at 112k. Loved it when it was brand new, but she aged like a bowling alley smoker…..
That's really something.
 
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