Amsoil 5W40 Euro, 8300 miles, 09 Mazdaspeed3

[CMMeadAM]

The consistently low Flash Point readings and fuel percentages reported point to fuel dilution which will affect viscosity. Many short trips without the engine warming up completely could be a cause, or an ECU/fuel system problem. That should be examined before changing oils.

The spike in iron just occurred, and as already stated, a particle many have streaked a bearing causing the spike. That hoprfully should come down with the next oil run and UOA.

The 5W40 Euro should be fine ( the Amsoil 5W30 performance looked good except for the lower flashpoints caused by fuel dilution ) but you might consider cutting back the oil change interval to 5-6K until you get a handle on whats causing the fuel dilution.

Enjoying the "boost" a lot can "boost" your fuel levels, especially without a thorough warm-up.

 

[Indydriver]

Originally Posted By: JohnVitamvas
Originally Posted By: Indydriver
Where are the fuel % #s?


At the bottom of the table.


The last thing I can see is Zinc because of the way this is posted. Would you mind itemizing the last few fuel nos?

 

[INDYMAC]

Originally Posted By: Indydriver
Originally Posted By: JohnVitamvas
Originally Posted By: Indydriver
Where are the fuel % #s?


At the bottom of the table.


The last thing I can see is Zinc because of the way this is posted. Would you mind itemizing the last few fuel nos?


If you scroll down on the right side of the coded box you will see the rest of the report.

 

[surfstar]

Originally Posted By: CMMeadAM
The consistently low Flash Point readings and fuel percentages reported point to fuel dilution which will affect viscosity. Many short trips without the engine warming up completely could be a cause, or an ECU/fuel system problem. That should be examined before changing oils.

Enjoying the "boost" a lot can "boost" your fuel levels, especially without a thorough warm-up.


Direct-injection turbo. There's no way of getting around the fuel dilution with these engines, it seems. Note they said mostly highway miles also.

 

[CMMeadAM]

Right on about the DI and turbo......but read again.....
OP stated "mixed city/highway"......and gets "a lot of highway"......doesn't necessarily mean "mostly highway."

 

[k24a4]

Most speed3 owners seem to cap the OCI at 5-6k, regardless of driving conditions and styles, for the reasons mentioned above. That said, the iron in your samples does not seem incredibly high relative to the miles on the oil and compared to other speed3 uoa's.

On a side note, I like the styling of the previous gen 3, not so much the current gen. But boy, when I get the itch to trade my 7 year old Accord, I itch for the Speed3...

 

[PZR2874]

^If you like a maintaining your car every other week, you will really enjoy it.

 

[TheRealJohnV]

Originally Posted By: PZR2874
^If you like a maintaining your car every other week, you will really enjoy it.


Ours has been really great. Only two things have gone wrong. 1, Blown shocks (common problem) which we replaced with Koni FSDs. 2, clogged EGR, which I cleaned and haven't had trouble with since. Otherwise it's just oil and gas and it just keeps chugging along at close to 80,000 miles.

 

[JohnVitamvas]

It's been more than four years, but I thought I'd follow up with this one. We still own this car and it's approaching 170,000 miles. Reliability has been excellent - it has really required very little work. The A/C compressor went out at 160,000 but other than that, just minor things like the front sway bar bushings and the rear engine mount.

I have been mostly sticking to 8,500 mile intervals with Amsoil 5W40, but some times schedules don't line up and things go a bit longer (one went to 11,000 miles - I had been on travel for a long period of time and my wife was doing a lot of driving) and some times what I have on the shelf is 5W30, so there are some fluctuations in viscosity that you can see.

At 144,000 miles I saw an increase in Silicon and eventually traced it to a split rubber seam on the air filter. I fixed this and the silicon came back down.

My last two oil analyses have shown increasing iron and the last one showed a spike in lead. The last change also had a significant deviation in the moly content of the oil - I think when I realized I was way overdue for an oil change I went to Autozone and bought whatever good synthetic oil they had on the shelf. Did this lower moly content cause the increase in lead on this sample, or is it just a particle streak or something? I'm going to change the oil this weekend, which will be a 6,000 mile run, and see what the analysis says. I have only ever used Mazda factory filters or Wix filters in this engine.

Code:


Mi/Hr on oil 8500 11000 9000 9500 8500 8000

Mi/Hr on unit 163850 155210 144000 134935 125750 117267



Aluminum 4 6 5 5 3 4

Chromium 1 1 0 0 0 0

Iron 40 34 22 17 13 18

Copper 1 1 1 1 1 1

Lead 23 5 2 1 1 1

Tin 1 2 0 0 2 0

Molybdenum 13 82 81 76 76 71

Boron 43 39 46 64 48 81

Silicon 8 25 16 8 8 6

Sodium 5 6 6 5 5 5

Calcium 1717 2442 2049 2102 1993 1978

Magnesium 7 8 10 9 8 8

Phosphorus 700 732 692 742 676 686

Zinc 849 881 820 805 801 813



Sus Visc@210F 63.2 58.4 58.5 53.2 54.9 55.0

cSt Visc@100C 11.12 9.75 9.80 8.25 8.75 8.76

Flashpoint(F) 380 380 385 385 395 400

Fuel%
Insolubles 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.4 0.4 0.4

 

[Popsy]

Are the results really with Amsoil 5W40?

If yes, then it has sheared a lot, and I'll consider another oil for this car.

 

[JohnVitamvas]

No. As I said, some of these changes are with 5W30.

 

[Popsy]

So only the last one was Amsoil? If it started its life as a 40, it has sheared too.

 

[Gasbuggy]

If you changed oils and lead went up, why is this a mystery?

 

[JohnVitamvas]

Changing oils causes lead to increase?