Track Days and Bearing Wear

[camrydriver111]

Many of the reports I've seen from track days have elevated lead.

Is it common and normal to see bearing wear after tracking your car?

 

[IndyIan]

I think its a potential problem with some cars, moments of oil starvation, excessive aeration, or extremely high oil temperatures with high loading could get bearings working in the boundary lubrication zone.

 

[maxdustington]

There's a reason why race engines are dry sump and have massive oil coolers.

 

[Johnny2Bad]

Track days should be done in cars prepped for the track.

You have a few options. Perhaps a baffled oil pan is all you need. Aside from dry sump (an expensive proposition) you can also run an Oil Accumulator which will maintain flow and pressure if the sump goes dry momentarily.

 

[IndyIan]

Some engines are fine from the factory, and for lapping on street tires, for 20 min sessions at a time, many won't have a problem. It would be prudent to google your specific car though. My poor old Neon would send coolant temps way up in 20 minutes and probably oil too, but I ran T6 5W40 and it seemed fine until it rusted out at 200k miles.
Going up a grade or two and synthetic is good idea IMO if you are running something that is commonly on a track.

 

[CT8]

The higher the load on the engine the more wear there will be.

 

[benjy]

as oil temps increase the viscosity continues to DECREASE, warm oil specs are @ 212 F past that that your oil continues to thin. an oil with higher HTHS spec thins slower + this where REAL SYNTHETICS excel, Redline + others make race specific oils with better additiver for protection + less for longer drains, of course depending on oil temps + pressure a higher viscosity oil will protect better as the heat is on. Redline race oils have over 2 thou PPM of zinc among other good things + its Ester base is BEST for heat!!