consensus on GM 5.3 v8 oil

[TitaniumGT]

my father-in-laws '01 Tahoe is coming up for an oil change soon and i want to take over from the dealership in this dept.

what is the general consensus on a good quality oil to use in a GM 5.3 vortec v8?

i was thinking possibly M1 10w30 from the synthetics.. but im lost as to what a good dino oil would be since i have a feeling he's going to want to stray away from the synthetics intial cost.

any help is appreciated.

 

[Bill in Utah]

Hi,

I have a 4.8 ltr (same engine as the 5.3, shorter stroke) in a silverado 4x4 ext cab truck.

I ran Mobil 1 (tri-syn) and went to Pennzoil Dino and the UOAs were both excellent. In Fact, The Pennzoil's UOA was a little better.

I'm running 4-5k OC with 5w-30 in the winter and 10-30w SL oil that I get on sale at .69cents a quart.

I've checked the gas mileage and no differance in MPG.

Take care, bill

 

[Ross]

I have the GM 6.0 in my truck. M1 5w-30 all year round. Works great.

 

[Jelly]

GC!

 

[427Z06]

A good GF-4/SM in 5w30 like Motorcraft or Mobil Drive Clean Plus seems to be the "da' stuff" lately. We don't have to many UOAs of these new oils to pick a real winner just yet. But I doubt you could go to wrong with a GF-4/SM in 5w30 choice initially.

[ November 13, 2004, 05:48 AM: Message edited by: 427Z06 ]

 

[yankees1]

quote:

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Originally posted by Jelly:
GC!

---

GC 0w-30

 

[Bambam]

GC for sure....My truck looooovvvvveeesss it..

 

[heyjay]

I purchased new a 2000 GMC Sierra with Vortec 5.3, though I traded last month for a new Toyota Prius (Don't need a truck anymore). Due to my severe cold winters, I ran Mobil 1 0W-30 (As recommended in the manual) and Mobil 1 10W-30 summer, changing every fall and spring. I still had the dreaded Piston Slap and Cold Start Knock, of which GM made increasingly lame excuses for (ADBV bad in filter, carbon "deposits" on new motor, the dog ate our homework, etc etc). For summer towing, I tried Mobil 1 15W-50, which made the motor SILENT with no change in MPG that I could detect. The "piston slap" and "cold start knock" was gone. For summer, Delvac 1 5W-40 would also be a good choice, the 1 qt "Truck and SUV" is the same formula and Mobil recommends it for ALL GM truck motors. For the price though, M1 15W-50 is hard to beat. If I still had the truck, I would run M1 15W-50 summer and 0W-30 winter. If your winter temps are above 10 F, run 15W-50 year round. Since you can safely take the OCI out to the maximum, when the truck tells you to change in the Information Center, it will cost about the same as Dino 3K/3mo changes. So run the synthetic for extra protection, unless your dad-in-law trades every 3 years. In that case, never open the hood.

 

[Blue99]

For a dino oil, Chevron/Havoline 5W-30 for winter & 10W-30 for summer would be a good choice. This would either match or exceed the performance level of the bulk oil used by the dealer.

Recently posted Chev/Hav oil analysis's on the UOA forum indicate the levels of moly & boron anti-wear additives have been increased up to the 100 ppm level - very nice for a $1.29 a quart motor oil.

I have the 5.3L in my Silverado 4X4 with some cold start knock & piston slap, depending on the oil being run. Currently, the Motorcraft GF-4, 5W-30 Synthetic blend is running very well for me with no noise issues.

For filters, I think the 2001's are still the Delco PF-59. A Purolator L2588 is also a good choice.

Out of curiosity, has the dealer been using a PF-59 or the PF-46 used on the 03 & 04 models?

 

[Marlin]

I also vote for Mobil, weather that be M1 or Just the DC or DC+ 10w30

I use Mobil oils in all my customes cars/trucks, including my own.

 

[bretfraz]

I posted the UOA for my 5.3 a couple weeks ago:

http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=3;t=002030

This motor seems to like 10/30's better than 5/30's. A good friend has a Tahoe with the 5.3L and he uses M1 10/30 with a FP & LC mix and gets terrific UOA's.

So based on my experience, Chev Supreme 10/30 would be the hot tip. Of course Havoline 10/30 is a substitute as its basically the same product.

FWIW, I switched to GC for a little better winter protection and startup ease. I plan to run the GC to 6000 miles then decide whether to stay with GC or go back to Chevron Supreme.

 

[TheFuror]

quote:

---

Originally posted by TitaniumGT:
my father-in-laws '01 Tahoe is coming up for an oil change soon and i want to take over from the dealership in this dept.

what is the general consensus on a good quality oil to use in a GM 5.3 vortec v8?

i was thinking possibly M1 10w30 from the synthetics.. but im lost as to what a good dino oil would be since i have a feeling he's going to want to stray away from the synthetics intial cost.

any help is appreciated.

---

I have run Syntec (5w-30 and 10w-30); M1 (5w-30) and Kendall GT-1 synthetic 10w-30 in my Chevy 5.3.

I have no UOA to show. However, oil comsumption is less with Kendall and the engine really seems to run well with it.

Bob W.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

If these engines like the thicker 30wt oils, why not try a High Mileage oil like Pennzoil HM 5w-30? By being a bit thicker, this might help with piston slap and still be good for cold starts.

 

[kenw]

not sure how it realtes to the GM 5.3, but my Toyotas slowed or nearly stopped valve stem seal leakage by going to 10w40 from 10w30. Both have over 150k miles, I switched them at ~120k.

 

[kevm14]

How about M1 0W-40? According to a viscosity chart that someone posted a while ago:

code:

---

TEMP * M1 0W-40 * GC 0W-30 * M1 0W-30 * M1 5W-30 * M1 10W-30 * M1 0W-20 * RL 5W-20

-20 * 2661.5 * 2609.0 * 1994.8 * 2225.1 * 3424.8 * 1712.7 * 2995.8

-10 * 1197.8 * 1127.1 * 872.4 * 944.7 * 1332.9 * 730.8 * 1165.3

0 * 599.3 * 546.6 * 428.3 * 452.9 * 595.7 * 352.8 * 521.4

10 * 327.6 * 291.8 * 231.3 * 240.1 * 298.3 * 188.5 * 261.8

20 * 192.9 * 168.8 * 135.3 * 138.3 * 164.1 * 109.5 * 144.5

30 * 121.0 * 104.4 * 84.6 * 85.5 * 97.6 * 68.3 * 86.3

40 * 80.0 * 68.4 * 56.0 * 56.0 * 62.0 * 45.1 * 55.0

50 * 55.4 * 47.0 * 38.8 * 38.5 * 41.6 * 31.3 * 37.0

60 * 39.8 * 33.7 * 28.1 * 27.7 * 29.2 * 22.6 * 26.1

70 * 29.7 * 25.0 * 21.0 * 20.6 * 21.4 * 17.0 * 19.2

80 * 22.7 * 19.1 * 16.2 * 15.8 * 16.1 * 13.1 * 14.5

90 * 17.8 * 15.0 * 12.8 * 12.4 * 12.5 * 10.4 * 11.3

100 * 14.3 * 12.0 * 10.3 * 10.0 * 10.0 * 8.4 * 9.1

110 * 11.7 * 9.8 * 8.5 * 8.2 * 8.1 * 6.9 * 7.4

120 * 9.8 * 8.2 * 7.1 * 6.9 * 6.7 * 5.8 * 6.1

130 * 8.2 * 6.9 * 6.0 * 5.8 * 5.7 * 5.0 * 5.2

140 * 7.0 * 5.9 * 5.2 * 5.0 * 4.9 * 4.3 * 4.4

150 * 6.1 * 5.1 * 4.5 * 4.3 * 4.2 * 3.7 * 3.9

---

0W-40 is as thin as GC 0W-30 in cold temps, then becomes thicker than GC as temps go up. I'm probably going to give this oil a try in both of my small blocks as soon as I am done with my auto-rx treatments. And in the summer, I was thinking of 5W-40 T&SUV.