Oil consumption cut in half after 'solvent' flush?

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Perhaps you should read this from "ToyotaOffroad.com"

Do those high priced oil additives help or hurt your engine?

Oil additives, you know the ones that almost everyone has tried and most have not seen much difference, Yea those. Let’s talk about what is really in them and what they can do to your engine.

There are hundreds of oil additives on the market. Some say that they will reduce your mileage, or reduce your wear, or reduce your oil consumption, and some even say that you can run your engine without any oil after treating your engine with their miracle cure additive.

The truth is that there are 4 types of oil additives.

1. Solvent is one and it only cleans out deposits left by using a poor oil. If you use a good oil you should not need to use a solvent in your engine. Think about it, there is many places in your engine that don’t drain all the oil out of. You know the small little valleys that hold the oil and doesn’t drain oil. That still has the solvent it them and will contaminate your new fresh oil. Solvent will clean out your engine but at what cost? Solvent is made to break down oils and I for one would never use a solvent in my engine because it would start to break down my new fresh oil and reduce the oils ability to properly lubricate my engine.

2. PTFE is another one. This additive has plugged up filters has an ability to build up on itself and affect tolerances in your engine. It only has a 500 deg F. temperature range and only holds up to 5,000 psi. Moly has a 650 deg F. temperature range and holds up to 400,000 psi. Some oils have moly in them and if you were to put the PTFE in your engine with the moly, you would be diluting the quality of an average oil.

3. Chlorinated paraffin’s is the most popular additive. They show how their oil will perform in a pressure test that has a torque wrench that puts pressure on a bearing and a round but rough surface that is turning in the test oil. They show how by adding their oil the wear is greatly reduced. This can be done with household bleach but you would not want to put any of that in your engine because it’s corrosive. The Chlorinated paraffin’s are also corrosive to the light metals in your engine. The lead in your engine bearings is subject to corrosion or acids that can build up. When the chlorinated paraffin’s come in contact with moisture or water of any kind they turn into hydrochloric acid and can become acidic to the lead in your bearings. So the reduction in wear shown by the torque wrench test is only one realm of wear that goes on inside your engine. Acidic or corrosion wear is another type and that is why I would never use an additive containing any type of chlorinated product.

4. The last type of additive is just a SAE 20 or 30 wt that has the same additives your engine oil comes with in the first place. In some cases there seems to be no thought to what might happen if there are to many additives and the oils additive balance is thrown off by throwing a bunch of everything in your oil. This is the additive type that is least harmful but I would recommend against using it also.


ToyotaOffRoad.com Note: Kevin Dinwiddie is a Certified Lubrication Specialist by the STLE (Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers)
 
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It will be interesting to see if the oil consumption stays at this level.

Hopefully did not insult any of the old original seals. I am always araid of solvents from hand cleaning of engine parts in the old safety clean tanks. I say that based on the solvent in the tanks tendancy to homeycomb the real hard deposits making them suseptable to chunking off.

I'm sticking to my original theory of vapors cleaning up the EGR or passages surrounding.
 
I will continue using Auto-Rx. I am absolutely amazed at was it has done for my engine. I have in the past used several different solvent flushes, in other engines, and none of them were anywhere near as effective as ARX.

Thank you Frank for inventing ARX.
 
Originally Posted By: Rick20
It will be interesting to see if the oil consumption stays at this level.

This is what I'm waiting to see too.

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I say that based on the solvent in the tanks tendancy to homeycomb the real hard deposits making them suseptable to chunking off.
That's with straight solvent. We're only talking about 4% in this case. But still, I was thinking about it at the time.

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I'm sticking to my original theory of vapors cleaning up the EGR or passages surrounding.
Well first, EGR has nothing to do with oil consumption. If you meant PCV (I suspect you did), an increase in gas flow rate through the PCV system in this engine means an automatic increase in oil consumption rate. It's a design flaw in the PCV baffling in the valve cover that's responsible for this. Since I saw a decrease in oil consumption rate, that means I did not see an increase in PCV flow rate. As I said before, the PCV system on this engine is purposely kept whistle-clean at all times (research the early history of the Chrysler 2.7 and you'll see why).
 
Originally Posted By: Oilgal
I will continue using Auto-Rx. I am absolutely amazed at was it has done for my engine. I have in the past used several different solvent flushes, in other engines, and none of them were anywhere near as effective as ARX.

Good for you. Nobody is suggesting that you do otherwise. I too have it in 2 other vehicles at the moment and I'm about to add it to a 3rd vehicle. But is not in the Intrepid 'test' vehicle at the moment.
 
Originally Posted By: va3ux
Originally Posted By: Oilgal
I will continue using Auto-Rx. I am absolutely amazed at was it has done for my engine. I have in the past used several different solvent flushes, in other engines, and none of them were anywhere near as effective as ARX.

Good for you. Nobody is suggesting that you do otherwise. I too have it in 2 other vehicles at the moment and I'm about to add it to a 3rd vehicle. But is not in the Intrepid 'test' vehicle at the moment.



I do not disbelieve your report at all now mind you. I do though, as I am sure you also understand, yet still have reservations about using solvents.

I also think however, as someone here said, that careful and judicious use of aromatics like MMO in the manner you report, may have had a synergistic effect with the previous ARX application, and perhaps if one is very careful your experience could be replicable.

I am just a bit concerned, that perhaps there will be those who jump to conclusions and a new "protocol" develops, which is not well thought out. I bet you know what I mean. er, um, ah, I just don't want to see anyone go AH HA! ... blah blah blah, and those of you who have worked so hard to clear the air, are then drowned out in the din of a noisy new bandwagon.

Gee, I'm sorry, I am just having a real time of it trying to express this. Hope I made some sort of sense here tonight.
 
Just my .02cents.

Since va3ux had done 3 AutoRx cycles on the engine, and ARX being a mild cleaner, isn't it very possible that the ARX softend everything around the piston rings to the point that, when adding the stronger solvent(REVIVE), the REVIVE just washed away any debris and crud???...And then theres the SEAFOAM...SO! The ARX really did it's job in softening and starting to clean. Maybe doing 2-3 more ARX's would have done the same thing as the REVIVE. But, the REVIVE just came into play and BLASTED AWAY everything in it's way that the ARX would have done more slowly and geltly. It's really hard to know the actual condition of va3ux's engine and the maintenance that the Intrepid had prior to va3ux's ownership considering that the 2.7 liter engine in the Intrepid is also known for being a sludger.
 
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Well first, EGR has nothing to do with oil consumption.

Well, there was a thread once saying how Auto-RX cleared an EGR code. Now if Auto-RX can clean a system that is completely unrelated to the oil system, then there is something worth investing into.
 
EGR malfunctions can have an indirect effect. Excessive fuel dilution can certainly result in consumption issues. My comment was that the solvent vapors may have cleansed the crankcase ventilation system on the 2.7.
 
I don't know exactly why that engine tends to sludge up. I think though it is likely caused by poor oil circulation. Maybe the journals aren't designed properly, too narrow or something, and so the REVIVE thined the oil and got it moving.

I know that ARX can clean anything, all on it's own, if the oil can circulate well enough. I wouldn't say it's mild, but safe rather, and I bet a lower visc oil and ARX would safely clean even that engine.

I would look into running a lower visc oil than the OEM recommends.
 
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EGR malfunctions can have an indirect effect. Excessive fuel dilution can certainly result in consumption issues.

Are you saying that a malfunctioning EGR will result in excessive fuel dilution?
 
Originally Posted By: ConfederateTyrant
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Well first, EGR has nothing to do with oil consumption.

Well, there was a thread once saying how Auto-RX cleared an EGR code. Now if Auto-RX can clean a system that is completely unrelated to the oil system, then there is something worth investing into.


I remember a thread like that. The original poster obviously didn't understand that the EGR System has no relation to the crank case oiling system. They're physically separate and there's no 'communication' between the two, as you well know. So the clearing of his EGR code was coincidental. I've had EGR codes come and go on mine too (a long time ago), and I didn't do anything at all. There's nothing worth investigating as far as ARX and EGR systems go.
 
Originally Posted By: Rick20
EGR malfunctions can have an indirect effect. Excessive fuel dilution can certainly result in consumption issues.


EGR malfunctions have no effect on fuel dilution. The degree of fuel dilution you're referring to - enough to reduce crankcase oil viscosity which thereby potentially increases oil consumption - comes about from a lazy or faulty O2 sensor, a bad or leaky injector, or compression ring(s) that are badly worn (ie. excessive blow-by).

Anyhow, EGR is really off-topic for this thread (except for those grasping at straws).
 
Currently at 3500 miles (5650 km), have still only added 1/2 quart, and the oil level is still just a hair above the Max line on the dip stick. At this rate, oil consumption has decreased by more than 50% !!

We'll see if it sticks.
 
Its kinda humorous reading through this thread and others on the forum. If anyone gets any good results from anything other than auto-rx, the results are questioned, this one has an agenda, had to be something else, etc..etc.. Not saying auto-rx doesn't clean an engine, but some of these folks seem to think it's a "be all, end all" product.
 
It is if you want to clean safely not pollute the enviorment or your self extend oil and engine life increase performance and has a guarantee backing it all up.

Frank Miller\Inventor

Please post some good ideas that encompass attributes in above post.
 
va3ux from your experience if you could have any one oil for the 2.7 what would it be? In other words if you were to be given several cases of oil for use in your 2.7 what would that oil be??
 
I'm in the clean phase on three cars. First time user of ARX. The ARX has added more seat of the pants pep, quited all three engines and I have the ARX in two auto-tranny's and they are running smooth as silk. All three cars have aprox. 135k miles. My wife wanted to know what I have done different to her 97 Intrepid. Shifts like new, engine quiter, more pep and the check engine light doesn't come on anymore. Dodge dealer had replaced EGR valve and checked error codes and it still came on from time to time. Not anymore. Not sure if ARX cleaned someting up or what. Bottom Line: Check engine light is off and I don't have to hear about that anymore. Using RLI Biosyn 15w40 HD in the clean phase with K&N Gold oil filter. So far this is one product that I have purchased that does what it claims. On my 96 Pathfinder the start up ticking noise and ticking I was hearing when at a stop light or at the drive thru at the bank is gone. Pathfinder is about 1300 miles into the clean phase. Intrepid is 900 miles into the clean phase. Infinity G20 is 1200 miles into clean phase. G20 probably needed the ARX more than the other two. My brother sold me this car and had only used dino oil and changed every 5k. My other two have had synthetic the entire time that I have owned them. I will use Delvac 1300 Super for the rinse phase. Will probably carry out clean phase to 3k miles. Not sure yet what filter I will use for the rinse phase. having good luck with K&N Gold. Only regret, is that I didn't use ARX sooner.
 
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