Originally Posted by oil_film_movies
[...] However, as the paper is saying, increased attention to boundary conditions via moly or whatever, even when a higher % of surfaces are boundary as in when using lower viscosity, the overall ("forest") actually can achieve less or equal wear compared to higher viscosity oils since boundary conditions are handled better using surface active additives. Also, low temperature flow of lower viscosity oils reduce wear more than thicker oils, again part of the big picture, the overall effect.[...]
The keyword here is "can", which is of the hypothetical variety until something like a field test study shows it in a definitive way;
As for the "big picture", yes you can combine several techniques, including mechanical ones like special ring shape, liner texture, cooling parameters etc. The objections though are that:
- that was not the OP's question / thread's title; the thread is about whether the thinner oil alone can match the thicker one
- the long list of additional mechanical measures, mentioned in both the quoted article and your post, suggest that so far the thin oil can't work alone and has to be complemented with additional mechanical tweaks; and this is the reason why no one is backspeccing 0W16 into older engines. When that will happen, we'll know that the OP's question has been answered positively.
[...] However, as the paper is saying, increased attention to boundary conditions via moly or whatever, even when a higher % of surfaces are boundary as in when using lower viscosity, the overall ("forest") actually can achieve less or equal wear compared to higher viscosity oils since boundary conditions are handled better using surface active additives. Also, low temperature flow of lower viscosity oils reduce wear more than thicker oils, again part of the big picture, the overall effect.[...]
The keyword here is "can", which is of the hypothetical variety until something like a field test study shows it in a definitive way;
As for the "big picture", yes you can combine several techniques, including mechanical ones like special ring shape, liner texture, cooling parameters etc. The objections though are that:
- that was not the OP's question / thread's title; the thread is about whether the thinner oil alone can match the thicker one
- the long list of additional mechanical measures, mentioned in both the quoted article and your post, suggest that so far the thin oil can't work alone and has to be complemented with additional mechanical tweaks; and this is the reason why no one is backspeccing 0W16 into older engines. When that will happen, we'll know that the OP's question has been answered positively.
