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Synthetic VS. Cheap


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Anyone else have problems with their Pathy burnin through synthetic oil? A couple months ago I put the suggested 3.75 quarts of the castrol full syn. oil in and it all burnt up, but I put the cheap crap from O'Reilly in and it's been fine since.

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Synthetic oil has much thinner molecules than dyno oil. Poor rings, seals, gaskets, valve guides, etc will pass synthetic oil sometimes. A major reason why it isn't always a good idea to throw synthetic in an old engine with high miles.

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I use syn and have no problems :shrug:

 

Drove from Ottawa to California on the same oil and it didn't use a drop. Synthetic just exposes problems your motor already has.

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only place I've thought of using synthetic is my Diffs since I should proably change the lube in em anyway...but I am also cheap so synthetic proably won't happen anyway

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Over a full year, I add maybe an additional litre of extended performance oil to the '93 245,000 km pathfinder. The transpiration rate is higher. Fill it up with ~3.3 litres. Add another litre over the course of the year. Still have 0.7 litres left over to manually "flush" the engine pan when changing the oil.

 

Still less expensive, less time consuming and better for your engine than Dino oil. They are just like hiking shoes and running shoes. Buying the best for comfort, safety and durability usually means paying more. But over the long run, it is cost effective.

 

I monitor the oil levels on longer trips over dusty roads with a load and engine oil level seems to stay rather steady. (Not so lucky with the airbody throttle intake valve which often gets dirty.....)

 

 

 

 

All this said, if I was putting on high kilometers in hot weather or dusty roads on a regular basis, I might stick to Dino. Dino is probably much cheaper for those who should change the oil often due to driving conditions.

Edited by westslope
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I swear by synthetic. My entire driveline is synthetic. I got 320 000 km's and don't need to add anything between oil changes. I am an engine builder and the one thing i can say is that its a day and night difference when you tear down a high mileage engine that has used synthetic its entire life vs conventional oil. Dramically less wear and sludge. :itsallgood:

 

Yes, I will agree though. Switching to syn. on a tired high mileage motor doesn't always work out well.

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Yes, I will agree though. Switching to syn. on a tired high mileage motor doesn't always work out well.

 

Quite honestly my engine isn't to high on mileage, after 24 years on the road she's only got 179,xxx miles. That being said 24 years ago I'm pretty certain syn. oils weren't anything close to what they are now and i bet weren't highly popular unless you drove an exotic car, which the Pathy definitely isn't.

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I switched my 87 over to mobile one as soon as I got it. It only had 106k, no problems so far. The oil level is still the same as the day I changed it. The motor looks like it had been taken care of before I got it so that might make a difference.

I run mobile one in everything, and it did give me problems in my lawn mower. It has a kohler engine and not long after I changed it it started smoking when I would start it. Finally around the middle of the summer it was leaking so bad through the lower crank seal that I had to change the drive belt. I switched it back to regular oil and the leak stopped but it still smokes when I start it so that might be related to something else.

James

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I’ve used Amsoil for all of my vehicles and will not use anything else. When I purchased my 93 Pathfinder, I switched all of my fluids to Amsoil full synthetic (tranny, front / rear diff, etc). I use 0w30 for my motor and she runs like a Lexus, no burning or leaking of any kind.

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Ah, Amsoil, I used too sell that crap and you know what. Royal purple and the old Mobile one are Just as good, and a lot cheaper.

 

Hell any sin oil can go 15k with filter swaps, even Supertech(which is by the way a real good oil, its made and bottled by Warren Racing)

 

But the fact is, its still cheaper too change dino at 5k then it is too buy sin and swap filters every 5k.

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I have driven over 400,000 miles in a multitude of different new-to-me vehicles. Everyone one of those vehicles had dino oil in the crankcase and I did oil/filter changes at ~4000 miles. Not one of those vehicles had an engine failure due to inadequate oil protection. IMO it is better to remove contaminated oil every ~4000 miles than have it circulate for ~25,000 miles.

 

The advent of synthetic oil came from jet engines. Those engines have items that are rotating 100,000 RPM and are glowing red. Dino oil will quickly fail in those applications. Synthetic oil was engineered to survive in those conditions.

 

A car engine is not a jet engine.

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  • 2 weeks later...

ran with regular for a while and was finally convinced to try synthetic

now run synthetic oil and it does make quite a difference in how smooth the engine works and i haven't lost a drop :my2cents:

 

but prior to trying synthetic i have replaced the rear main seal and all the crank seals when doing the timing belt

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