Originally Posted By: kr_bitog
So in summary.. to be safe never use oil additive except idle only flush .. I can live with that
Umm! I found out today that the dealers who I said were using an idle flush are not, what they are doing is informing sludge victims that their engine needs cleaning top and bottom and if they are not interested in paying the 500 to 1000 Euro bill from the 5 to 10 hours work involved, they just inform them which shop stocks LM idle flush and then let the owner add it just outside the dealership.
That procedure is safe for them in the legal sense because if the oil pump screen blocks and the engine is damaged, or the solvents dissolve so much varnish helping old seals and gaskets function and a big leak starts, the dealer can't be held responsible.
The Iffy lube folks are using idle flush, but some of them are not worth taking action against in the legal sense, as they are often in debt and everything they have is rented or belongs to a landlord or the senior employees.
I hope to visit some chaps in a local R&D fluid analysis lab tomorrow and will ask if they know which additives in the new generation synthoils are reacting with Moly additives and causing sludge in longer OCI's. The high tech synthetic oils concerned don't contain any Moly because it does not help improve the function of their base stock and seems to react with either the detergent or dispersant additives.
I will also ask them about the effects of the lower Zinc levels of the new DPF rated oils, as some folks experimenting with Zinc additives or changing to an HDEO or classic car oil have proved that the wear metal figures reduce with the more normal levels of Zinc. I have seen no evidence that the new DPF rated oils are as good as the previous higher Zinc content oils, regardless of all the marketing spin. Unfortuntely folks that have a DPF are stuck with using such oils, as they are not cheap to replace.