5.7L Hemi engine - Conventional or synthetic?

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Hello everyone!

This is my first post on BITOG. Great forum, lots of information, looks like a lot of assistance and advise is offered too !

My vehicle is a Jeep Grand Cherokee with the 5.7L Hemi. New vehicle, has 4500 miles on it.

These vehicles come with a 10,000 miles OCI, but I want to change the oil and filter now. (new engine, residue, break in period, etc...)
I already added 1/2 qt. of oil since the dip stick showed the oil to be low.

I'd appreciate advise on the following questions :

1. Chrysler says conventional oil works fine for the Hemi. I want to go with PU 5W20. Any benefits I can expect to see?

2. I paid $99 to the dealer for 3 oil changes when I bought the vehicle. He didn't mention it was for conventional oil only. I prefer to change the oil and filter myself. Is there a way to get the money back?

3. Has anyone used 0W20 PU for a Hemi engine instead of the 5W20 specification? I live in MI, so I'm already thinking about the cold starts during winter...

Please advise! Thanks in advance!
 
For the cold weather you might consider a synthetic 0w-20.

As for the 3 oil changes. The deal here is that the dealer wants 3 shots at you to sell other services and/or accessories. Their main business is not doing oil changes. They have way too much overhead to consider changing oil makes them a profit.

You might want to take advantage of those oil changes when it gets really cold. Just make sure that if you decide to use a synthetic 0w-20 that you pay the extra when they change your oil.
 
My dad's 2013 Grand Cherokee has the 5.7L Hemi. The 5w20 spec is fine for cold weather, especially if using a synthetic. I find that his burns a bit of oil (usually a 1/2 qt per 5000 miles) so I use 5w30 synthetic and it has stopped burning. MPG has not noticeably changed.
 
Originally Posted By: MoparMan1891
Hello everyone!

This is my first post on BITOG. Great forum, lots of information, looks like a lot of assistance and advise is offered too !

My vehicle is a Jeep Grand Cherokee with the 5.7L Hemi. New vehicle, has 4500 miles on it.

These vehicles come with a 10,000 miles OCI, but I want to change the oil and filter now. (new engine, residue, break in period, etc...)
I already added 1/2 qt. of oil since the dip stick showed the oil to be low.

I'd appreciate advise on the following questions :

1. Chrysler says conventional oil works fine for the Hemi. I want to go with PU 5W20. Any benefits I can expect to see?

2. I paid $99 to the dealer for 3 oil changes when I bought the vehicle. He didn't mention it was for conventional oil only. I prefer to change the oil and filter myself. Is there a way to get the money back?

3. Has anyone used 0W20 PU for a Hemi engine instead of the 5W20 specification? I live in MI, so I'm already thinking about the cold starts during winter...

Please advise! Thanks in advance!



5w20 PP from Walmart is fine unless it dips below -32F
 
New Gen Hemis are remarkably tolerant of oil grade. All seem to run well in them.

Here we use the 20w spec but simply buy a synthetic grade. The OLM will tell you when to change it, on my Wife's truck it works out around 8k miles or so.

No oil consumption at all here, but the truck only has 20k miles on it...
 
The Hemi isn't tough on oil, but I would at least run a synthetic blend in 5w20, or a full synthetic in 0w20. A full-syn 5w20 might be the best bang for the buck if you don't have to deal with temps below -30F, although the 0w20s do tend to have superb base stock characteristics.

I really don't buy into the speculation that 20 is "too thin for best protection and its just a compromise for fuel economy." On the one hand, empirically there are Ford Modulars hitting 300k+ miles out there on fleet-grade 5w20 blends. More thoughtfully, I think with the quality of modern base stock oils, the kind of low NOACK volatility, and good HTHS numbers they turn in, the actual oil film strength is just fine on engines that are engineered with enough oil flow volume to utilize the thinner oils. With the added benefit that the thinner oils generate less heat inside the bearing spaces due to their own internal shear friction. And some engine systems, like the timing chain oil sprayers in my Dodge 4.7, and the VCT programming in your 5.7 are at least somewhat optimized for Xw20 oil, though they'd probably survive OK with much heavier oil. There are reports of people getting VCT error codes on some Hemis when running heavier than spec oil, but the majority of people who try it don't have an issue.
 
I'm pretty sure your owner's manual calls for 5W-20 meeting the Chrysler spec.
If it were my JGC, I would be following the manual, at least while in warranty.
 
the cheapest dino 5w20 API SM/SN you can find, dont overthink and go down the alice in wonderland OCD mentality that this forum is notorious to spread.
 
Originally Posted By: MoparMan1891
These vehicles come with a 10,000 miles OCI, but I want to change the oil and filter now. (new engine, residue, break in period, etc...)
I already added 1/2 qt. of oil since the dip stick showed the oil to be low.

It's okay to change oil and filter now to remove break in metals from the engine.

Originally Posted By: MoparMan1891
1. Chrysler says conventional oil works fine for the Hemi. I want to go with PU 5W20. Any benefits I can expect to see ?

Benefits of PU or any other synthetic are extreme temperatures(below 20-30F or above 100F) and extended oil change interval to 10k miles or longer.

Originally Posted By: MoparMan1891
2. I paid $99 to the dealer for 3 oil changes when I bought the vehicle. He didn't mention it was for conventional oil only. I prefer to change the oil and filter myself. Is there a way to get the money back?

You may or may not get the pre-paid 3 oil changes from your dealer, you may ask your sale person about this. If you can't get your money back then just do 3 oil changes there with synthetic oil and pay extra.
 
Originally Posted By: CT8
This isn't the 1970s,conventional oils are wonderful.


Yeah, oils have come a long way since then.

My oil looks brown now - I'm not sure if it's due to it being on a new engine and initial wear etc.

But I have read on here that guys who used fully synthetic had their oils come out great after 7000 miles or so and have their engines run that extra bit smoother.

Thinking if I should shell out another $60 and upgrade to 3 fully synthetic oil changes at the dealership..

The drawback is... the dealership sucks
smirk.gif
 
Originally Posted By: CT8
Here is a UOA on an engine with 2 evil oil beating turbos link to uoa.


Wow! Can't wait for the analysis to be done on my oil ! How much did you pay to get the oil sample tested?

I assume your EcoBoost makes around 400 hp. Remarkable how these guys can run this engine with a 30w oil and the test shows it's in great shape.

The 2.7 EcoBoost runs on an even lighter oil - 5w20 or 0w20 if I'm not wrong.
 
Originally Posted By: CT8
That uoa is not my truck and the 2.7 ecoboost recommends a 5w-30 oil.


The only Eco-Boost engines that use 5w-20 are the little 1.0 3 cylinder and the 1.6 4 cylinder.

All the rest are spec'd for 5w-30, including the larger 4 cylinder engines and all the V6 engines.

As far as the 5.7 Hemi, though it is spec'd for conventional at 10k OCI's I personally would run a quality synthetic. As you can see in my signature, I like Castrol but pretty much any group III oil or better would do the trick.
 
Happy with the Mobil 1 EP 0w20 in it now. No ticks. Revs smooth. Good mpgs.

Switching to PUPPP 5w20 next oci. I'll have a uoa of the m1 ep 0w20 then have it compared.
 
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