5w20 dino protection?

[oilchangeguy]

I am old school and am skeptical of it's wear protection. Can anybody comment on this and do I have anything to be worried about?
I still think 5w30 gives more protection especially in summer.

thanks for any comments.

 

[simple_gifts]

No problem assuming the mfg specifies its use.

 

[GMBoy]

Originally Posted By: breeves
I am old school and am skeptical of it's wear protection. Can anybody comment on this and do I have anything to be worried about?
I still think 5w30 gives more protection especially in summer.

thanks for any comments.


I tend to agree with you in that I am not sold on 20wt oil yet. I'd prefer a 5W or 10w30 synthetic oil. If your car does spec 5w20 and you're gonna use it than a good sythetic is the only safe way to go. This is just my opinion and many here on this board use 20wts with good results. I am one of many that think the manufacturers that spec 20wt oils are doing it more for gas mileage than protecting your engine.

 

[jldcol]

I have read recently about mechanical engine testing and various visc oils were used. The piston is not fully coated with oil, a thinner oil covered more of it, but with a thinner layer, the thicker oil covered less of the piston, but where coated it was thicker. 20wt. seem thin, 50wt. seems thick, a middle ground is 30/40wt. with some of the plus and minus of the extremes. This is good enough unless extremes of mpg's or longevity is wanted.

 

[bikerider]

Been running my wife's Honda Pilot on 5W-20 Pennzoil YB for 120,000 miles with 7,500 OCI's with not one single engine issue, it runs like new and does not consume a drop between changes. It will be towing our pontoon boat this summer so next oil change I am going with either PP 5W-20 or Synpower 5W-20.

As said before if your engine manufacturer recommends 5W20 I would use it without reservation.

 

[Nickdfresh]

Conventional 5w30 sheers down to a 5W-20 in relatively short order. There isn't much difference other than 5W-20 is less reliant on additives and is more reliant on better base oil technology giving rise to the unsubstantiated theory that nearly all "dino" 5W-20s are essentially synthetic blends whether they say so or not...

 

[tig1]

Although I use M1 oils, not dino, I just haven't accepted the 20 wt. oils yet. My 07 Focus calls for 5-20 But I use M1 5-30 EP in it with very good results.

 

[simple_gifts]

Ford, Honda, Mazda, Toyota, Hioondai, Chrysler etc all spec this oil; some substantial credibility there....

 

[rg200amp]

If your engine specs a 5w20, use any SM rated 5w20 with no worries!!

 

[opposite_locker]

I've been running 0w20 M1 & PP 5w20 for 45k miles, and haven't been impressed with either. The 4.7L in my Dodge makes all kinds of funny ticking sounds (though it runs well) and I think this engine would prefer a thicker oil. Also, the oil comes out DARK after a 7500 mi OCI in the Dodge, but 10k-old 0w40 on my 240k mile Mercedes still looks like maple syrup. Going to try some 0w30 GC on the Dodge next time around.

BTW, there was another thread on this forum that showed how Chrysler recommends 5w30 for all their normal engines (non-SRT) outside of this country, but have to recommend 5w20 in the US so they can show an extra couple-tenths on MPG ratings.

 

[Rob_Roy]

My Grand Marquis has had conventional 5w20 for most of its 90,000 miles. The engine is very quiet and doesn't consume any oil. Same thing with the 2004 Crown Vic we have for a parts runner, 100k of police service with cheap 5w20; still runs like a top and doesn't consume any oil.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Originally Posted By: rg200amp
If your engine specs a 5w20, use any SM rated 5w20 with no worries!!



Even if your engine doesn't spec 20 grade, it will be fine. AEHaas runs his Ferrari cars with 20 grade oils, I figured if it was good enough for such an expensive vehicle, then it's good enough on the other end of the automotive spectrum: an old 96 Saturn.

Both the Ferrari and Saturn turned in fine UOA's with 20 grade oil in the crankcase. If you can figure out the search feature, his UOA's are posted in the UOA section here.

 

[demarpaint]

If the car calls for 5W20 I would use 0W20 or 5W20 without any worries. It flows to vital parts faster when cold, and has some pretty impressive UOA's.

 

[steve20]

I've used 5-20 Castol GTX in the 05 Accord for 101K. As the cam lobes are visible through the oil fill hole, I've been keeping an eye on the wear pattern on the lobes regularly. Not looking too good, so I switched over to 5-30 last oil change. Can't believe the lack of engine noise with the thicker oil-never going back to a 20 weight unless the car is under warranty. I think the area that suffers with 20 wt is the valvetrain, cause the engine has never used any oil in between 5K changes


Steve

 

[Jaymus]

That's all a 20 weight is for, gas mileage ratings. In the long run, say you have two identical engines that call for a 5W-20. Run 5w30 in one of them, and it WILL last longer. Better protection.

 

[mechtech2]

We can almost always use a 5-30 in Summer when a 5-20 is the factory recommendation.

 

[demarpaint]

Originally Posted By: Jaymus
That's all a 20 weight is for, gas mileage ratings. In the long run, say you have two identical engines that call for a 5W-20. Run 5w30 in one of them, and it WILL last longer. Better protection.


I'd like to see the proof if it exists anywhere. Seems a lot of guys here have used the 5W20 for a long time and a lot of miles w/o issue.

 

[Bryanccfshr]

I will let the sequence IVA test tell me that the 5w20 oils protect my engines adequately.

 

[Jaymus]

Hmm, I'll let the fact that I don't know of ANY 200,000 mile engines that have ran 5W-20 ALL their life tell me. Wasn't there just another post on here about 5W-20 leaving marks on a guy's Honda, but switching to 5w30 made it quite and stopped the wear.

Thicker does = more protection. And I don't mean 100cst. 12-15cst vs 8cst.

 

[chevrofreak]

You aren't using any real information to draw your conclusion, you're using nothing but speculation.