I have used Amsoil on my Fiero for 12 years, between autocrossing, track days and drag racing never had an engine problem. The shop used to use it in place of gear lube on truck transmissions during the winter with no problems. On my daily driver I use Castrol but change it every 2k miles. A little excessive but I have had 2 Saturns that have survived for more than 230k miles with no engine issues.
It doesn't matter how often you change your oil on an engine that was built just before a long 3 day weekend or on that following tuesday.
Never been able to get past the cult aspect of Amsoil. The cult members are rabid, and spout the church lines about their product being better than anything at absolutely everything.
Then I turn and look at my engines, many with hundreds of thousands of miles on them. Driven hard, with turbos, etc. Regular dino juice oils. None of them have had an internal oil related failure. So why do I need some expensive miracle oil when the regular stuff works so well?
The omen came to me when a friend convinced me to try Amsoil. My '76 Corolla had 80k miles on it at the time, and running fine. So I change the oil, in my driveway as I usually do, change the filter, pour in my new Amsoil and fired it up.
4 quarts of Amsoil ended up on the driveway! Turned out the filter gasket stuck to the block and I didn't realize it when I pulled the oil filter off and screwed the new one on. Of course, the new filter didn't seat well, hence the massive leak.
This was 25 years ago and I continue to change my own oil/filter and never before, nor ever after, has a filter gasket ever stuck to the block. I think my engine was telling me something then.
pigeon
HalfDork
5/5/10 9:13 p.m.
pigeon wrote:
I'm having the oil changed (I know, I know...) on my 750 on Wednesday. I'll have a sample saved out so I can send it for oil analysis and post the results.
Thread back from the dead! Got my oil analysis today. Standard BMW synthetic 5W30, 15k miles, the additive package was used up but the oil in general was still very young:
Thanks for posting that. It reminded me to get an oil testing kit from Blackstone.
footinmouth wrote:
It doesn't matter how often you change your oil on an engine that was built just before a long 3 day weekend or on that following tuesday.
I think my car has a wire harness that was built right after that three day weekend. /end thread jack
Now back to oil; I've had several SAABs that have made it well past 200K miles with only standard Dino-Juice oil and regular oil changes. Three are still running well and one died of a hit & run at 240K miles. I Dissassembled the engine and found it nearly new inside, the only internal component that was ever replaced on that engine was the timing chain at 190k miles.
I wouldn't bother with sythinthetic oils for street driven engines unless the manufacturer specificly requires it. Racing engines are a completly different story though.
I got the answer to any oil/lubricant/etc question that you could ever have. Imagine a grm-type knowledge base for oil.
bobistheoilguy.com
For the most part, they're unbiased and there are alot of chemists the frequent the board.
pigeon
HalfDork
5/5/10 10:14 p.m.
I have an old registration at BITOG but don't have the password recovery email address anymore (yes, really old registration). New account waiting admin approval...
In the meanwhile, I'm now very concerned about the very low TBN after doing some reading. I'll probably cut the oil change down to 10k miles and retest - I'll post my test results on BITOG and also call Blackstone to see what they think of the results.
You are supposed to change the oil? How do you do that?
pigeon
HalfDork
5/5/10 11:16 p.m.
DrBoost wrote:
You are supposed to change the oil? How do you do that?
Drive car to dealer, wait 30 minutes, hand over Visa and BMWCCA card (club discount!), sign, drive away 
pigeon
HalfDork
5/5/10 11:20 p.m.
Or I heard shotgun is good for changing stuff - works for wheels, why not oil?
On LBCs I think they used the continuous top off method, only periodic filter changes needed!
DrBoost wrote:
You are supposed to change the oil? How do you do that?
Burn it or let it leak out. Top up as necessary.
Works for Harley Davidson and Pratt & Whitney, should be fine for you.
Pontiac V8's are good for that too. Thanks to the fantastic rope rear main seal, none of my Trans Ams have rusty floors.
Shawn
footinmouth wrote:
It doesn't matter how often you change your oil on an engine that was built just before a long 3 day weekend or on that following tuesday.
Ha! Every VW I ever owned was made on those days!
Trans_Maro wrote:
DrBoost wrote:
You are supposed to change the oil? How do you do that?
Burn it or let it leak out. Top up as necessary.
Works for Harley Davidson and Pratt & Whitney, should be fine for you.
Pontiac V8's are good for that too. Thanks to the fantastic rope rear main seal, none of my Trans Ams have rusty floors.
Shawn
I had a Jeep once that rust proofed the cars behind me as well.
That's just a nice service you provide. My MG provided the same service until it was repowered.
I'm convinced it must leak oil from somewhere. Somehow my steering rack (uses gear oil) and transmission decided to start leaking when I swapped the engine.
Teh E36 M3 wrote:
That's just a nice service you provide. My MG provided the same service until it was repowered.
I'm convinced it *must* leak oil from somewhere. Somehow my steering rack (uses gear oil) and transmission decided to start leaking when I swapped the engine.
Hell - I'm not sure if there is a fluid that my Jeep DOESN'T leak.
It should be noted that Amsoil puts a time limit on oil changes. Max 1 year. If you drive 25K miles in one year it will be fine. Like me, I change my oil once a year since I don't put a lot of miles on either car.
The same goes for their filters.
