Hokiefyd
Thread starter
I will say that, at least visually, the engine hasn't appeared to get cleaner or dirtier since I've owned it. There are some dark areas in the camshaft bearing towers in the crevices...little pockets of varnish it seems. I can see some of these through the oil fill hole, and have monitored it continuously since I bought the car. I was hoping that the oil I've been using would clean those little pockets of varnish, but that has not happened. I'm not saying that the engine couldn't generally be cleaner today compared with when I bought it, but it visually hasn't changed...again, at least what I can see through the oil fill hole.
Would these pockets of varnish (not even pea-sized, mind you) have formed if synthetic were used from the beginning? I don't know. Would these pockets of varnish eventually clean up if I continue with quality "cleaning" synthetic oils? I don't know the answer to that either.
This is one reason I'm moving back to conventional (PYB or VNG). I will say that the engine was noisiest on cold starts with VWB, at least of the oils that I've run in it, so if I do try Valvoline again, it'll be the NextGen variety to see if there's any difference. It seems to be the quietest on the M1 AFE. I have not used PYB in it, and look forward to that, because I previously owned a slightly noisy 4-cylinder (Nissan KA24E), and a high moly oil (Havoline) really helped to quiet that motor down. And PYB is also highly regarded as a "cleaning" oil, so maybe it'll slowly improve with consistent 5k mile OCIs.
And let me append something I wrote earlier. I didn't mean to imply that the camshaft lobes have, literally, no wear. Obviously these are metal parts with metal rollers riding on them...there will be wear. What I was looking for was scarring, grooving, pitting, stuff like that. And what I found were 12 cam lobes that were very smooth, with no wear pattern that could be felt with a fingertip. I have observed cam lobes that appeared ground down over time, scalloped, scuffed, etc. Those are the kinds of things I was looking for, not that I really expected to find them. And I was happy to not find them.
Would these pockets of varnish (not even pea-sized, mind you) have formed if synthetic were used from the beginning? I don't know. Would these pockets of varnish eventually clean up if I continue with quality "cleaning" synthetic oils? I don't know the answer to that either.
This is one reason I'm moving back to conventional (PYB or VNG). I will say that the engine was noisiest on cold starts with VWB, at least of the oils that I've run in it, so if I do try Valvoline again, it'll be the NextGen variety to see if there's any difference. It seems to be the quietest on the M1 AFE. I have not used PYB in it, and look forward to that, because I previously owned a slightly noisy 4-cylinder (Nissan KA24E), and a high moly oil (Havoline) really helped to quiet that motor down. And PYB is also highly regarded as a "cleaning" oil, so maybe it'll slowly improve with consistent 5k mile OCIs.
And let me append something I wrote earlier. I didn't mean to imply that the camshaft lobes have, literally, no wear. Obviously these are metal parts with metal rollers riding on them...there will be wear. What I was looking for was scarring, grooving, pitting, stuff like that. And what I found were 12 cam lobes that were very smooth, with no wear pattern that could be felt with a fingertip. I have observed cam lobes that appeared ground down over time, scalloped, scuffed, etc. Those are the kinds of things I was looking for, not that I really expected to find them. And I was happy to not find them.