Valvoline to Mobile 1- Truck Runs better?

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I've been using Valvoline Max Life in my 2002 Chevrolet 5.3 Vortec engine since buying it from the previous owner. I bought it around 75,000 miles and that's all he ran in it. I'm not over 300,000 miles on the odometer, original engine by the way, 2nd transmission. The tranny went 3k miles ago and was rebuilt completely with a new torque converter to all new internals.

Long story short, I run a commercial business and use Mobile 1 in all my commercial engines. I buy the Mobile 1 in gallons from Walmart for $26.00 and found it was more convenient to have the same oil around all the time. So this past switch I switched over to Mobile 1 and the truck idles smoother, has much better acceleration, and better throttle response. (Same weight as Valvoline.) Can anyone explain this difference?

Another question I have, my father had several bottles of Marvel Mystery oil when I went up to their house. He gave me one and I decided to run it in the truck and few of the commercial engines. I applied it following the directions; however this is the issue I ran into...

Before changing the oil; my "Service Engine" light came on which usually tells me to inspect the oil. This oil change only had 2,100 miles on the oil change with the Marvel Mystery Oil addition. I checked the oil level, all was good. Being the maintenance freak that I am on all my equipment, I decided to go ahead and do the change to see what it looked like considering I had 5 gallons of Mobile 1 and a stock of Wix Filters on the shelf. Draining the oil, I immediately notice the oil is BLACK. Anyway, I change the oil/filter, reset the light, and the light is off to stay. Anyone have an idea if it was the MM or what would caused my oil to be black so sudden? I always do 3k oil changes needed or not, the oil is usually visibly dark golden when drained.
 
Originally Posted By: lawnsbymike
I've been using Valvoline Max Life in my 2002 Chevrolet 5.3 Vortec engine since buying it from the previous owner. I bought it around 75,000 miles and that's all he ran in it. I'm not over 300,000 miles on the odometer, original engine by the way, 2nd transmission. The tranny went 3k miles ago and was rebuilt completely with a new torque converter to all new internals.

Long story short, I run a commercial business and use Mobile 1 in all my commercial engines. I buy the Mobile 1 in gallons from Walmart for $26.00 and found it was more convenient to have the same oil around all the time. So this past switch I switched over to Mobile 1 and the truck idles smoother, has much better acceleration, and better throttle response. (Same weight as Valvoline.) Can anyone explain this difference?

Another question I have, my father had several bottles of Marvel Mystery oil when I went up to their house. He gave me one and I decided to run it in the truck and few of the commercial engines. I applied it following the directions; however this is the issue I ran into...

Before changing the oil; my "Service Engine" light came on which usually tells me to inspect the oil. This oil change only had 2,100 miles on the oil change with the Marvel Mystery Oil addition. I checked the oil level, all was good. Being the maintenance freak that I am on all my equipment, I decided to go ahead and do the change to see what it looked like considering I had 5 gallons of Mobile 1 and a stock of Wix Filters on the shelf. Draining the oil, I immediately notice the oil is BLACK. Anyway, I change the oil/filter, reset the light, and the light is off to stay. Anyone have an idea if it was the MM or what would caused my oil to be black so sudden? I always do 3k oil changes needed or not, the oil is usually visibly dark golden when drained.


K. To start 3000 mile drains on those engines is an utter waste of time and money. I've got 2 99 4x4 silverados with the 5.3. I've got 280k on one of them. I run 10000 mile drains and have since 50000 miles. At 150k miles we did a cam swap and dynotuned.
I ran Amsoil til 250k miles. Engine was spotless runs like a dream and no oil loss between changes.
So get out of yesterday's thinking and step into the 21st century. If your going to run such a short interval use a cheaper conventional.
As far as the MMO is concerned I think it's the mmo cleaning up deposits as well as burning via the rings.
The reason you got the check engine light was the oil pressure got too low because the mmo thinned it a bit. Had you run the entire interval with it the solvents would have flashed off and the oil would have thickened.
Now to address the engines new found pep I think it's because the m1 you are using is thinner at operating temp and now less parasitic loss(turning the oil pump).
We have a member here,SteveSRT. He owns a fleet of Chevy vans with the 5.3 engine. They are work vans used for carpet cleaning and the engine runs the power for the vans vacuums and so on.
They all have either 5.3 or 6.0/6.2 engines. He uses synthetic oil changed according to the oil change light and those vans run into astronomical mileages,so you can see why a 3000 mile interval is absurd in these trucks.
Think of it this way. You are draining serviceable oil and pouring in serviceable oil. The 5.3 is not hard on oil by any means and now that your using m1 they have a 10000 mile guarantee. So since you are paying for that quality why not use it.
Synthetic oil lasts longer in service which is why it's used. It's not more slick or reduces more friction etc,it lasts longer,so take advantage of that.
Anyways enjoy your truck. I've got 3 of them now and the more I beat on the, the happier I am with them. The ls engine is a winner and proven durable.
3000 miles eh.
Blasphemy.
If your going to run that kind of interval use conventional,and still follow the oil life monitor. It was programmed to run conventional.
I change it on the 10s,well 16000kms but my c3 will allow me to change the meters to miles.
 
So the thinner oil at operating temperature and less parasitic loss would explain why my oil pressure psi dropped by 10 psi? I always felt it was a bit high, now it seems to be just about right. As far as the oil changes? The 3,000 mile oil changes is something I'll never change. I guess I'm stuck to my old ways, money isn't the problem, so in other words it makes me sleep easier at night. I won't say oils aren't capable of going that long, I won't argue the fact that engines aren't capable of having oci's with such long intervals, it makes me sleep easier at night though. We have a fleet of John Deere commercial machines (12+) machines at $12,000.00 a pop. When we went into business we were doing factory recommended oil change intervals at 100 hours, along with air filters at factory recommend hours. We found the life span of those engines to last us 1,800 hours - 2,500 hours, 2,500 hours was the longest lasting engine we had. Since then we've increased our maintenance regimen, cut the oil changes in half, along with the air filter changes in half of what the factory recommends. We have three machines that started with this new regimen of maintenance just the test the waters. Two machines are over 4,000 hours (gasoline) engines, one is at 2,900. We've been using the same engine on our commercial machines for the past years for all of our fleet and never had one go over 2,500 hours without needing attention inside aside from valve adjustments.

Again, I wouldn't argue engines aren't capable of going on extended drains, nor the new oils out there aren't capable, I'm just solely biased on what I've been taught and what I've experienced for myself. Heck, I have a neighbor that hasn't changed his transmission fluid in 200,000 miles and it's still shifting. Some people are luckier then others, some are not. But biased on what I've experienced first hand with our equipment, that's the regimen I will continue on until I'm no longer in business. I can understand if the oil's and engines are capable of it and your on a budget or trying to save money, but every single one of our machines brings in $65.00 an hour after expenses, so frequent oil changes and filter changes is pocket change compared to the down time when we have to rebuild an engine or replace one. We use Drainzit hoses on all our machines, oil changes take a total of 3-5 minutes tops.
 
Originally Posted By: lawnsbymike

Before changing the oil; my "Service Engine" light came on which usually tells me to inspect the oil.


Is this the Check Engine light, or the light that tells you to change oil (Oil Life Monitor)?
 
This was the Oil Life Monitor.

As for the OCI from GM, I have no actual idea what the trucks OCI indicator is set to, I'd have to dig the manual out to check the specs of what they actually call for, I've always been 3k from day one.

Like I said it's not a money issue, we buy the Mobile 1 in bulk and order 150-200+ oil filters per order through Filter 1 for all of our equipment.
 
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Your OCI plan is grossly wasteful.

Either greatly extend the OCI for the use of syns, or just use a decent dino and run by the IOLM. If greatly extending, then also use UOAs.


BTW - I'm moving this to the proper forum ... MOD. The HDEO is really more geared towards engines that are running diesel lubes. Your gasser running PCMO is better discussed elsewhere.
 
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Quick Question for you....


What is physically wrong to the engine to change the oil at 3k miles with synthetic?


Would you be happier and healthier if you had clean constantly flushing your system or if you were drinking dirty oil. I sleep at night with 3k mile oil changes. Every single oil change I can feel and hear the difference in the idle of my engine after fresh oil is put in. I don't know about you, but the sound of an engine tells me a lot. If I was had dirty water in my stomach you would probably hear my tummy making some funny noises, not to mention my tummy wouldn't be happy.


I'm not one to argue if 5k, 10k, or 15k oil change are bad, I personally don't care. However, in my opinion, I run 3,000 mile oil changes. Never had or sold a vehicle that hasn't ran over 250,000 miles without even hick upping. Waters good for your body, water with dirt is not. Milk is good for your body, spoiled milk is not. My tummy's happier at night with clean milk in my stomach, my bodies happier with clean water in it, and my engines are happier by listening to the sound of them, with clean gold oil in them.
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There have been testing done that show MORE wear with more frequent oil changes. Fresh oil will strip the boundry layer of additives off and take upwards to 1,000 mi. to replace. So with more frequent OC's you are constantly stripping and re-applying, through UOA you can determine that most wear occurs during your first 1,000 mi. of an OC, then it will taper off throughout the duration of the fill.

I have Deere equipment and never have had a problem running out to specified maintainence intervals, whether it be my lawn equipment (100 hr.) or the large diesel engines (500 hrs.) I have one 7.6 diesel with over 12,000 hrs. without issue. Maybe your choice of lube needs to be re-examined, are you using the correct viscosity?
 
Originally Posted By: roadrunner1
There have been testing done that show MORE wear with more frequent oil changes. Fresh oil will strip the boundry layer of additives off and take upwards to 1,000 mi. to replace. So with more frequent OC's you are constantly stripping and re-applying, through UOA you can determine that most wear occurs during your first 1,000 mi. of an OC, then it will taper off throughout the duration of the fill....


I would never change synthetic (nor even quality conventional) oil at 3K intervals, I go at least 5K. It's silly and a waste of time and resources...

But that study you're referring too is largely bogus, unscientific, and it's conclusions are flawed as it seemed the authors were guilty of interpreting data to meet their preexisting beliefs. This was discussed here recently and someone posted a thread of someone that did UOA's every so many hundreds of miles during an OCI on their car, and it showed a direct pattern of wear increase that corresponded with oil aging and miles driven...
 
I was just about to say something very similar, I said it once, and I'll say it again, I have nothing against guys changing their oil every 10k miles, 15k, 25k, or however they handle it. I don't care what test or paper says this and that, I don't in my mind physically believe and won't believe that oil with fresh additives is going to wear more on any given part being fresh. Oil and additives are just like milk, they degrade over time.

That's cool that you got that many miles out of a John Deere diesel. I'm assuming you have Yanmar engines in them? We currently have four Yanmar Diesels on the Deere's at 7k hours, never ran one to 13-14,000 hours, we try and cycle them out before they hit that age. We did have a few Kubota diesels with well over 10k that we kept around and sold them still running with no blow-by, or any sort of issues other then a few repairs. On our JD gasoline engines JD recommends every 100 hours, we simply tried that for three years and it did not work for us. Never did we get over 2,500 hours on the gasoline, have several that are 3-4k hours on the gasoline's that were bought after we changed our service regimen to servicing air filters earlier and oil/filters earlier.

The simple physics never added up to me in my head with the longer service intervals. You take a oil send it in with 10,000 hours it comes back, says there's still a little life in the oil. Then you take fresh oil and send it in, they tell you "heck no, do not change this oil! The protective numbers are high." While the 10k oil might have still been good, there's no way the additives haven't degraded over that 10,000 miles, there's no way the additives haven't degraded over that time even if it's a few points, the numbers still may be good, but there not as good as fresh oil just poured in. I feel the difference in my truck physically, and my ear every time it has fresh oil in and that's what makes me sleep better, so that's what I do.

If you really opened up a can of worms with me and wanted to go into oil and long interval changes, I don't want to make this a government related topic because I hate politics, but I think it all has to do with the government. Since I've been in the industry I've seen so much change in our business strictly due to the government, or tree huggers as I call them. Our small engines have wen't down hill since all the EPA restrictions. Small two strokes are getting worse and worse by the year, becoming more and more unreliable. We have older two strokes from the 1980's, one that just had it's first top end and carburetor rebuilt. Now we're lucky to get three years out of our small two strokes without an engine problem, and if we're really lucky 1.5-2 years without carburetor trouble. When they start passing this leaf blower ban we two strokes will start getting faded out in our industry. The same thing's happening with the gasoline four stroke engines. The old FH series engines we ran, best engines we ever had. Now we can't even find FH replacements due to the EPA. If you ask me the oil changes and longer intervals all has something to do with tree huggers, "use less oil resources" type people.

Until I pass away or until I sell the business, I'll be doing oil changes at the intervals that I feel comfortable, that I know, and have seen work for us. Not saying long intervals might not work for you, as I said earlier my neighbor has a 200k mile truck that's never seen a tranny service, but that's not how I CHOOSE to run my equipment. While it may be a waste of time or money for some, the cost we charge for running our equipment has our maintenance schedules factored into the price, and our schedules have our maintenance factored into the time slots.
 
Anther thing if you read these articles; this is one thing that caught my attention "these engines do not exhibit impressive wear performance". This phrase is speaking for the 5.7 GMC engine, according to the study, this engine had higher wear numbers then the majority of all the engines tested. All numbers, test, and pen and paper set aside, the 5.7 engine was one of GM's best gasoline engines ever built in my opinion, and has proven in real life to be one of the top or longest running gasoline engines out there with a few others. But according to these "studies" it has some of the "highest wear numbers." So does that mean the tests lie, the numbers don't mean much, or the 5.7 engines were just tougher then the wear numbers on pen and paper?
 
I have used M1 and Valvoline Synpower in the same vehicles and I have always preferred the performance of Valvoline Synpower.
German Castrol was a close second in my Van.
6 to 10 k OCis.
 
I have had 3 vehicles with the 5.3 of which my current one is a 2003 GMC Yukon XL with 175,000 miles. I have always followed the OLM & never had any issues. I have also had many friends who have worked at GM tell me that synthetic can run a lot longer than dino oil. I think as long as you maintain your engine the 5.3 is proven to take care of you. In the case of underutilizing your oil I think the thoughts on Mobil 1 are bogus though because a y name brand oil I've used gave me the same results.
 
Originally Posted By: lawnsbymike
So does that mean the tests lie, the numbers don't mean much, or the 5.7 engines were just tougher then the wear numbers on pen and paper?

It means a bit of each, except I wouldn't say that the tests "lie." Trying to compare "wear numbers" from engine family to engine family or lubricant to lubricant is generally not a very good idea, and you're going to get very limited information from doing so. In fact, I'd call it misleading information.
 
Originally Posted By: lawnsbymike
...

If you really opened up a can of worms with me and wanted to go into oil and long interval changes, I don't want to make this a government related topic because I hate politics, but I think it all has to do with the government. Since I've been in the industry I've seen so much change in our business strictly due to the government, or tree huggers as I call them. Our small engines have wen't down hill since all the EPA restrictions...


Longer drain intervals have nothing to do with the guber'mint; it has to do with the advent of fuel injection over carburetors, the increasing quality of engineering/manufacturing processes, and better base oils and additive technology. Indeed Mobil 1 advertized long drain intervals initially of 25,000 miles in the early 1970's, but scaled back and based intervals on manufacturer recommendations. I personally wouldn't do extended drain intervals over 7,500-8,000 miles. But synthetics can still maintain clean engines with marginal wear for 10,000 miles and beyond in most vehicles...
 
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