The title is somewhat misleading,; my 3rd oil change will be due in a few months. Car: Ford 2.5L hybrid, 6K miles. The manual requirement is 0W-20 with no printed exceptions. Since I live on the edge of the desert, a real cold start in the winter might be at 40° F so I'm not worried about the temps. However the majority of my driving is highway at 75-80 mph, and the real question is whether Ford will have heartburn if I use 0W or 5W-30? Oil changes at 4500-5000 miles.
Another X-20 vs X-30 Thread (sigh)
- Thread starter srfdude
- Start date
In that case, use your best judgement with the information available on this and other sites.
Anyone at a dealer will just refer to one of the viscosity charts we have or the OASIS maintenance specifications which say 0W20.
I’m sure it will be fine with 30’s. But if you’re worried about a warranty or something you could get a higher kv100 0w20. Pennzoil Ultra is 8.8.
Do you prefer skim, 1%, 2%, or Whole Milk?
Or we could go to more extreme differences...
Do you prefer cow, goat, soy, rice, coconut, or almond milk?
Believe it or not, some of these^^^ options will have more negative impact overall than differences between 20/30/40/50 SAE grades.
That engine of yours has been ran on everything from 0W20 to 15W40 fleet oils. It won't care. Plus as a hybrid - there is much less load on the engine itself. Buy whatever tickles your fancy. As the Duratec 2.5L won't care.
My fancy is tickled by EURO or HDEO oils, so that's the route I go with all my vehicles.
Or we could go to more extreme differences...
Do you prefer cow, goat, soy, rice, coconut, or almond milk?
Believe it or not, some of these^^^ options will have more negative impact overall than differences between 20/30/40/50 SAE grades.
That engine of yours has been ran on everything from 0W20 to 15W40 fleet oils. It won't care. Plus as a hybrid - there is much less load on the engine itself. Buy whatever tickles your fancy. As the Duratec 2.5L won't care.
My fancy is tickled by EURO or HDEO oils, so that's the route I go with all my vehicles.
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The stop/start nature of a hybrid would make 0W20 actually make a lot of sense-be sure to buy a good one, can‘t imagine it causing any problems.
Car is Maverick hybrid. Don't see any out of country advice on oil. For sure 0W-20 is a good grade to use under normal hybrid usage, only running half the time. Not my case, thus the question. Actually I'm not asking which to use, as I have no doubt either 20 or 30 will work. The question was, does anyone have any experience with Ford when it comes to warranty items such as this?
First they have to suspect the oil to be the reason for a failure. Then they have to prove that it was. If you got receipts for oil purchases - you're golden and it's up to them to prove that oil wasn't good enough. They simply won't be able to.
All of this is speculation though, and unless your oil looks like Jell-o or molasses, or unless you walk around screaming "I don't use 0W-20!!!" - they realistically won't have anything to put against you. Act natural and don't self-incriminate.
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30 weight is the same viscosity of not-quite-warmed up-20 weight. The chances of it causing issues in any 20-spec’d vehicle are small.
And that Z (along with its Q cousin) keep munching through turbos quite often. Probably just a coincidence.
I’m a bit of a thickie fan, running 5w30 in a 2005 Taurus requiring 5W20 oil. Ford has specified 5W20 oil in normally aspirated engines for over 20 years. For the life of me, I cannot imagine anything a 5w30 would do to cause a warranty covered failure in the first place. Secondly, I don’t believe they do an investigation, draining some oil from the pan to see if maybe they can catch the customer using 5W30 as if this was the X-Files forensic lab. Paranoia will destroy ya. Carry on with 5W30. 
Deny, Deny, Deny.
Shel_B
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How often does a hybrid, or more specifically the OP's hybrid, stop and start while driving on the highway at 75-mph? In the more than 10 years that I've been driving Toyota hybrids, I've never had the experience. Is the Ford different? Are other makes different? I doubt it, but ...
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