Valvoline Synpower 5w-30 or Mobile 1 synthetic?

[russter29]

I'm a newbie to the forum I have a 2000 Dodge Neon
2.0L SOHC and it has 77,000 miles which oil is the best, or is there a better oil? I live in North Dakota so it gets very cold. And a brand of oil filter? Thanks!!

 

[nobadges]

I have 2 neons:

98 DOHC mtx w/ 175,000kms
2001 SOHC atx w/74,000kms

Both mine run Mobil 1 5w-30 and a K&N oil filter with OCI at 6month/12,000kms.
My preference is to running an oversize filter on both.(K&N HP-2004 / PH16)

Haven’t tried Castrol myself but from what I’ve heard here it is good stuff.

It gets VERY cold here and the Mobil 1 runs well.

 

[KJA426]

I'd go with the Mobil 1 also. For North Dakota, either a 5w-30 or 0w-30 grade. Go with a Wix or Pure One filter.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Mobil1. IMO, when paying $4+ for a quart of oil, I want only PAO in the bottle for that price.

 

[BlueBird]

FWIW - This link says that Valvoline Sypower is no longer Group III

http://theoildrop.server101.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=012812;p=2

From JAG :
Bingo! I just called and talked to a guy with a southern accent (did your guy have one too?), and he said all Valvoline Synpower versions use 100% Group IV basestocks. He even gave me NOACK volatilities:
5W-40: 11% (agrees with info I already had)
5W-30: 13% (figured why not ask for fun)
20W-50: 8% (figured why not ask for fun)

I'm taking this news as official and might even make a new thread to announce it because almost everyone thinks these oils are Group III.

 

[Moloch]

Well Id use 0W-30 , Im running 5W-30 right now and get alot of valvetrian noise while it warms up still

 

[racer12306]

that valvetrain noise seems pretty common on neons.

if the valvoline is a group IV then which ever one is easier to get or cheaper get that one. wix, purolator, or pureone filter. they are reasonably priced and are great filters. all castrol syntec, except for the german made 0w30, is a group III

i am trying to get rid of the valvetrain noise on my 04, i am going to use syntec 0w30 (aka gc, thick 30wt) and a 5w40 after that to see how the engine likes it.

bluebird do you know where the valvoline 5w40 is normally available

 

[BlueBird]

Racer ... the only suggestion i could make is the usual retail stores like Pep Boys , Auto Zones ect ect. but , i have been using Maxlife Synthetic in my 2 cars an the oil change sample both indicated a 40 wt viscosity. So , on my cars anyway , the 5-30 and 10-30 Maxlife Synthetic acted like a x-40.....

 

[JAG]

Hello everyone, yes that me and another member who separately called the Valvoline tech line and got the same answer. Perhaps even more telling were the experiments I did of Mobil 1 10W-30 vs Valvoline Synpower 10W-30 in which they both behaved nearly identical when subjected to very high temperatures for decent amounts of time (enough to degrade them both). I did multiple tests (different temps and durations) and they always came out equal. Exact same thing happened when testing Mobil 1 0W-40 against Valvoline Synpower 5W-40 multiple times. This indicates that whatever the basestock compositions are, they perform about the same between brands in the tolerance of high temperature aspect. I measured evaporative losses, viscosity change (thickening), deposit formation, color and odor change.

You may be interested to know that 5W-40 Amsoil easily outperformed the above 40 weight oils in tests I did later. I concluded then that just knowing what group number the basestocks are is not sufficent for predicting how well an oil handles high temps. This particular Amsoil is a PAO oil. Not all PAOs are created equal, nor are all esters! Testing them is the only way to know for sure.

 

[BlueBird]

Jag - good info , thanks for the update ....

.... got to love this site , where else could you get info like this

 

[Triple_Se7en]

Were those performance tests or flow tests?
There's a big difference ... you know!

 

[JAG]

777, I wasn't clear on test procedures because it would take too long to write, but I'll add some more basic info. These aren't performance tests or flow tests...I don't even know what you mean by those terms. These tests consisted of exposing equal initial volumes of different oils in individual metal cups to the same temps for the same amount of time and measuring/observing the above mentioned aspects at the end of the tests. The pre-test viscosity, color, and odor were also recorded to serve as a baseline. Many tests were conducted to insure repeatability of results, to perfect the testing methods, and to observe the effect of different temperatures and different test durations.

 

[Bighank]

Would the Mobil EP meet warranty requirements not

being API certified?

 

[Dick in Falls Church]

Somehow, I doubt that warranty requirements would be a major consideration for a Neon with 77,000 miles on it. Suspect it could well be out of warranty by now.

 

[racer12306]

yes the neon would be out of warrenty

 

[JohnnyO]

quote:

---

Bingo! I just called and talked to a guy with a southern accent (did your guy have one too?), and he said all Valvoline Synpower versions use 100% Group IV basestocks.

---

Really? Great to hear. Synpower and M1 are both real good oils, you won't go wrong with either. A 5 quart jug of M1 at Wal-Mart is usually cheaper than getting 5 bottles of Synpower (or any other syn for that matter).

 

[Tremo]

Wow, that's good news that Synpower is now PAO. But what about their Maxlife Synthetic? Is that now also PAO or is it still Group 3?

 

[Bryanccfshr]

It may have never been group III