Thinner motor oil?
 

Yesterday I went on a hunt to see if I could find any of the discontinued Honda Green Oil, which is what Honda recommended and was putting into Insights, HCH's and CR-Z's in Japan. I remembered reading about it a few years ago, that it doesn't have an SAE rating but was probably thinner than 0w16, definitely a lot thinner than 0w20, but it seems it's basically all gone at this point. One source said after Green Oil was discontinued, Honda was recommending the use of Castrol Edge, and that it was thinner than most other 0w20's.

A look on Amazon showed Ravenol sells a 0w16, though it's pretty expensive at ~$40 for 4 liters, as compared with ~$25 for 5 quarts of Mobile one 0w20. However, I live in a cold climate (winters down to -40 sometimes), and I'm considering trying it.

This was a good read:

http://www.ravenol.de/fileadmin/cont..._0W-16__en.pdf

Some further googling revealed Honda has an oil called "Ultra NEXT" in Japan which is recommended for their Earth Dreams engines. It's apparently equivalent to something like an ~SAE8, but has no SAE rating on it either.

http://www.fitfreak.net/forums/3rd-g...800-miles.html

Anyone know where I might find some Ultra NEXT? Or, does anyone have any experience with Ravenol's 0w16, especially in colder climates?

Apparently you can buy NEXT oil here, but they don't ship to the US:

t-joy | Rakuten Global Market: HONDA (Honda) genuine oil ultra NEXT 4 l (08215-99974)

If no one on here knows try bitog.com
I stay away from the super thin stuff.

For what it's worth, I've only ever put 0w20 in my engine and it hasn't burned a drop of oil in the 60,000 miles I've owned it. Every 7-10,000 miles 2.6 quarts come out, and 2.6 quarts go back in. I also have dealer records to suggest that the previous owner only ever had the oil changed at the dealer, and that they used Honda-approved 0w20 or equivalent syntheic oil. Using thicker oil is not recommended by Honda, especially in colder weather, because the tight clearances in the bearings would prevent proper lubrication at typical operating temperatures, much less before the engine is fully warmed up. The 0w20 we can get in the US is a lot thicker than the oil the Japanese have access to and run in their engines.

If you have any where near 100,000 on the engine those tight bearing clearances likely don't exist any more.
On my 8L engine I got the rod and main bearing clearances right at about 0.003 inches and I plan on running 10w-30. Industry standard for bearing clearance is between 0.004 and 0.006 and never less than 0.002 inches. Less than 0.002 the engine will sieze when you first start it up.
So I don't really believe the "tight tolerance" thing because no mass produced engine is going have bearing tolerance as tight as a blue printed race motor.
Manufacturers just don't have the time or money to pay some one to stand around for hours squishing plastigauge and swapping bearing halves on each engine intended for an economy car.

Sure, but do they have equipment that will let them reliably make parts to those tolerances, so that every bearing is e.g. 0.0003 +/- 0.00001? Or even automated measuring equipment, so no one has to stand around squishing plastigauge? Certainly that's technically possible with laser measuring equipment, though I've no idea whether it's economic.

According to their respective websites:

Castrol Edge 0W-20: 8.57 cSt@100C
Mobil1 0W-20: 8.7 cSt
Vavoline Synpower 0W-20: 8.8 cSt
Pennzoil Gold (synthetic blend) 0W-20: 8.3 cSt
Pennzoil Platinum (full synthetic) 0W-20: 8.3 cSt
Quaker State Ultimate Durability 0W-20: 8.3 cSt
Honda (European) 0W-20: 8.2 cSt

Additions 11/08/2016:

Chevron Havoline synthetic 0W-20: 8.5 cSt@100C
Toyota Genuine 0W-20: 8.5 cSt
Amsoil OE Synthetic 0W-20: 8.3 cSt
Amsoil Signature Series 0W-20: 8.7 cSt

Pretty sure there are diminishing returns with going thinner right? On ft86club.com people say that 0w-20 is so thin that at track temperatures of like 260F none of the oil is being bypassed anymore as the pressure is only in the 50psi range at 7400rpm.

We're talking 8.7 vs. 8.2 cSt. I never read up on how units work but that can't be a big difference. If it drops your oil pressure 1psi, that might get you like 0.1% more mpg. A 30 weight oil is around 10-11 cSt at 100C, and the fuel economy gain from going from 30 to 20 is very hard to measure.

The gain is mostly in the thickness when cold.

The 8.* cSt was measured at 100°C.
But even the 0W20 oils have a thickness of more than 40 cSt at 40°C (104°F), that must be over 100 cSt at a cold winter start.
The first digit is more important than the latter. I'd rather use 0W50 than 5W20.

I wonder if "0w16" might not be thinner at cold temperatures than, say, 0w50, there's just no easy way to advertise it since they've already hit zero?

Anyway the gains seem to be enough that Honda and Toyota are chasing making thinner oils available.

EDIT: The Ravenol 0w16 on Amazon is rated at 7.24 / 38.36, as opposed to 8.7 / 44.8 (100c/40c). I'm going to poke around and see if I can find any numbers for green oil and NEXT.

EDIT2: Apparently Honda's Green Oil was rated for 8.154 @ 100c and 32.1 @ 40c.

EDIT3: This thread on botog has a Blackstone analysis of the NEXT oil, that claims 5.13 @ 100c and 20.844 @ 40c.

So Green Oil is more like -5W20 than 0W16...
I can confirm that Green Oil does improve cold start economy.
Winter 2014-15 was on Green Oil and showed less of a FE dip than the very soft 2013-14 winter on 'previous batch' which was supposed and explained to be 0W20 but showed up on the bill as 5W30...
Then last winter on regular 0W20 was good too, while that winter was just 'soft'.

My FE graph october 2012 to now:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/fe-graphs/graph7127.gif(Worst FE in winter 14/15 was a spirited long drive under high wind and rain.
Worst FE's in winter 15/16 were all service and recall related)

Green Oil was definitely better than Unknown Type, and probably better than 0W20.
I'm useless... ;)

Yeah I dunno about yours, but my Insight sounds like a diesel when starting at reeeeaally cold temperatures.

It is a 4-banger, so it runs like a typical 4 banger in the cold - slightly raised, actually not that bad, even at -14°C which is about the coldest I've seen with it. But no torque, it needs to rev to accelerate unlike when it is warm.

If anything, thin oil makes it rev less at idle.
It also heats up slower. It apparently regulates down the fuel injection when the engine encounters less friction.

the engine will idle slower when it's experiencing less load.

This thread inspires me to try thinner engine oil.

The low temperature kinematic viscosity isn't necessarily identical. For example, Amsoil's Signature Series oils:

0W-20: 46.6 cSt@40C
0W-30: 58.2 cSt
0W-40: 85.7 cSt

Buuut...viscosity testing for the "W" designation happens at temperatures much lower than 40C, which aren't reported on any data sheets that I've seen.

EDIT: Moving this discussion to my build thread.

http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...-29288-39.html

http://i.imgur.com/wuYYERw.png

I know this is an old-ish thread and all, but I've been searching and reading a bunch of old threads since joining recently. So, if it helps anyone following this thread or stumbling across it in the future...

The 40°C (104°F) viscosity isn't much of a low-temperature test, and is mostly a throwback to earlier days of oil standards. It does give you a glimpse of how thick the oil is along the way to being warmed up, but...

The 100°C viscosity rating is of more interest for operating temps. (And I have no doubt it was chosen in the beginning because boiling water is a really convenient way to heat up something to a stable 100°C. :D)

The temperature used for the low-temp "W" rating depends on the rating they're going for, and there are two tests, pumpability (MRV) and cranking viscosity (CCS). So, for example, a 5W is tested at -35°C for pumping, and -30°C for cranking. At least one of these is usually provided on an oil's data sheet.

http://www.widman.biz/English/Tables...iscosities.jpg

Hope this helps.

So the 5w-40 I use is just about perfect.

I like it a lot in my old VWs (I have a stash of CI-4 Rotella). Good film strength at operating temps, but flows way better at startup than the straight-30 in the operating manuals.

Just curious on the whole thinner oil subject. I k ow this seems to be more focused on the green or next oil, but if a vehicle is driven ecomodder style wouldn't it be assumed we could go with a thinner oil. I have the 1.4l turbo Cruze. I want to switch to 0w20 since my car is typical to only do short trips so cold start efficiency is a must. But I drive so lightly that I feel I could go thin regardless. Could it be detrimental to my turbo even though I rarely enter any boost.50 mpg+ typically on 13 miles commute. Just looking for a little input. Thanks

Put the highest quality oil of the manufacturers recommendation in. I would never, ever run thinner than manufacturer recommend oil on a turbo motor. What you could do is drop the w weight, but the warm viscosity I wouldn't mess with.

Example, on my Miata manufacturers recommendation is 5w-30, I went to shell Rotella T-6 which is 0w40. W rating is ok to drop a tier or two, just be conscious at cold startups not to rev to much, but the warm viscosity I would never ever go down, only up 1 tier.

So you recommend a 0w30 then vs dropping to 0w20? So even running such light load on engine you still suggest refraining from dropping to lower viscosity at temp oil yet. I assume your basing this primarily on the fact it's a turbo engine? Guessing you would also suggest no EOC as well?

You can try thinner oil, just be aware your engine was not designed for it. I would get a baseline of how your engine normally wears before testing thinner oil. Thinner oil will almost certainly wear your engine faster. How much faster is the question you need to know as the owner. To know this, you must have an oil analysis done when you change the oil.

FoMoCo retroactively approved 5w-20 for many of it's older vehicles that originally specified 5w-30. Just a few days ago I changed the 'Racer over to 5w-20. All indications so far are OK.

I think it's just hard for me to grasp that these full size trucks are running 5w20 while a little baby 1.4 needs 5w30? Makes no sense to me. Im all for thicker oil for higher demand/load but my putting around Cruze that does zero towing. Maybe a bag or 2 of Crete in the trunk every once in a blue moon. The little pop can turbo really generates that much heat even when providing virtually zero boost. I typically accelerate between 0 and 12 vaccum... typically closer to the 12. I touch boost of 1-2 going on one uphill stretch momentarily on my daily commute. Race cars heavy pulling trucks are going thinner I don't make sense of it. My old jeep I put a gallon of Lucas in it cuz it burned oil so bad. Didn't need to add oil between 3500 mile oil changes anymore, but that's a vehicle with over 250k hard miles. Sorry for the rant. Fyi wife's expedition has the twin turbo v6 which is what really got me intrigued by oil viscosity for turbo engines. Twin turbo makes a little more sense seeing as they aren't miniature.

It has to do with how the journal bearings inside the engine are designed, their bearing surface area vs the amount of torque being put through the joint. Thinner oil requires more surface area to hold the same pressure.

You'd probably* be just fine...right up until you get in a huff, stomp on the gas, and spin a bearing.

I like the idea of thinner @ cold temp oil though. That makes a lot of sense. Trying it myself, with positive results so far.

*Attempt at your own risk

Love this page. Thanks for the fast response guys. I think I will run the 0w20 at my own risk for this go around and for future just run with 0w30. I doubt I'll have any issues as I have seen a few oil analysis from others who have run 20 in theirs. Only 2 and I believe both changed at under 6k miles. Analysis we're everything in normal range for wear. Anyways can always lean toward a thin 0w30 if there seems to be any mpg improvement that's significant. Will be hard to tell as I will be switching to 91&93 octane here soon. Found after 2 months of 89 e0 that switching back to 87 e10 is night and day with this car. Boggy express. Along with 2-2.5 mpg decrese. 89 paid for itself. Only need 61 mpg for premium to pay for itself. Wish me luck ��

At the very least, I think going with a lower winter weight would be safe. Your owner's manual says 0w30 is fine.

I'm not checking the thread today to see if anyone said this but not all 0w30s and 5w30s are alike, motor oil numbers are general terms meant to describe viscosity ranges and they can vary. For one common example Pennzoil Platinum 5w30's literally thinner when cold and hot than Mobil 1 0w30, the publicly available data sheets tell this. Even oils within a brand's product line can vary, Shell T6 comes in 0w40 and 5w40 and they're both different at the same temperature; 0w40's the thinner one.

No, as long as you don't go from boost to directly turning off the engine it should be fine.

But you wanting to EOC definitely reinforces my argument that you shouldn't drop hot oil viscosity. You will cook the oil in that turbo and could potentially kill it prematurely.

Also, drop the attitude, I was just trying to help. If you wanna blow up a 3 year old car trying to save literally pennies per fill up (if even that) because you want to run thinner oil on a turbo engine, go right on ahead.

Sorry if I seemed to have any attitude. Little to objective in seeing where your view was based. My apologies and thank you for the input.

Mobil used to make plain zero weight synthetic

How did that compare?

If? You decide to EOC a turbo anything install a pyrometer and dont shut off toe coolent (oil) till it cools to 300°f for conventional oil and 4-500°f varying by brand of synthetic.
Another consideration is, if it is flat towable (aka lube is flowing with the engine off)
Coking and abuse are the normal turbo failure causes. Coking is the deposits caused by the lighter compounds evaporating leaving the heavies to become solids blocking the flow of coolent (oil).
Gumby Stay Flexible.

A gas motors EGT just about will never get below 500°F.