Small engine oils

[Oildudeny]

Originally Posted by NHRATA
Is anyone using the small engine oils for their snow blowers and lawn mowers

No because its fairly expensive.

I wish that my car did not take 0w20 because I would use the leftovers in my OPE. I normally run Formula shell but wind up having to buy sae 30,10w30 and 5w30. So I just switched to Home Depot power care 5w30 full synthetic it's made by Warren distribution and should have the higher zinc levels that's good for OPE. cost around $6 for the 48oz jug.

 

[4WD]

Originally Posted by GMBoy
Originally Posted by tig1
No. I use M1 10-30 in all my OPE.


I do as well - been working great for years


I did for a long time but mopped up on semi syn Delo 10w30 stash at $1/quart …
everything purrs on that too …

 

[Doc8404]

Walmart 10w30 full synthetic

 

[Zhukov]

From what I've gathered, these engines are able to tolerate a pretty variety of oils without self-destructing. One interesting post I've read is from someone that mentioned generators dying during Hurricane Harvey due to running out of oil with 10W-30 while they slightly higher-weight oils did better. That being said, the person also mentioned that the reason the motors died is because they ran out of oil, NOT that 10W-30 is necessarily a bad choice.

I went through this conundrum myself just recently. Bought a 4KW generator from Sam's Club for $150 (AiPower). Manual calls for 30W, bright yellow tag on the oil fill cap said 10W-30. I called their customer support and a real person in tech support picked up in the first ring (!). He said that their quality/reliability testing was done with 10W-30 and to use that. Guess I'll pick up a synthetic oil in that weight and use it as recommended.

My guess is that changing your oil at recommended intervals and also making sure your oil level is correct is much more important than the exact weight of oil you use.

 

[doolah02]

Rotella 15W40 seems to work alright here in South Florida.

 

[TLAR640]

My Honda powered mower, pressure washer and aerator all call for 10W-30. I like the idea of a thicker oil for air cooled engines, but prefer to follow the manufacturer's recommendation, so I use M1 10w-30 HM. So far so good...

 

[AnthemBassMan]

When I had my Briggs or Tecumseh powered mowers, I ran either 10w30 synthetic or 15w40 oil in them. But now I use Pennzoil marine formula. Oh yeah. Because I mow with 44and 46 year old Lawn Boys!

L8R,
Matt