Dixie Life
Senior Member
Time to change my oil on the FL120. I'm planning on refilling with Mobil1 syn for diesels. Any advice?
Manufacturers formulate their recommendations from engineers.
.............The key thing to remember is that you cannot mix conventional and synthetic oils. And synthetic is very expensive. Our engine has approximately 4500 hours on it and just purrs along.
I asked Bob Smith himself about this last year. Bottom line is he said it was fine but use single weight SAE30. He didn't see much benefit other then the longer cycle between changes. The other experts I've spoken with are Zimmerman Marine and they say it will actually make the engine run quieter with the synthetic. As to the cost it is actually a little cheaper the conventional oil when you factor in the savings of double life of the oil and half as many filter changes.
I thought some commercial oils are just that - a blend of synthetic and "dino" oil. Am I wrong on that?
I thought some commercial oils are just that - a blend of synthetic and "dino" oil. Am I wrong on that?
Richard,
Yes.....That's one of the reasons I use the same brand but I do not use multi-vis. I think that unless we have some trouble cranking in low temps multi-vis is totally not needed. For the same reason I have a bronze Jabsco sea water pump. Any NAPA in SE has impellers.
psneeld,
I agree. Half the interval w inexpensive dino oil seems much more effective. I believe good quality dino oil like Shell or Chevron is 100% as good as synthetic if not over stressed and you could run your non-turbo'd at WOT for hours and not over stress your oil. And I'll bet you could run a turbo engine on dino oil at at least 80% load and it looks like nobody here does that. If you put straight 30W or 40W in your engine and do'nt have trouble cranking and starting you're good to go w 100% dino.
Conrad,
Mechanics are not engineers and remember that mechanics told us for decades not to put a battery on concrete? We all know that was/is total bunk now but most everybody bought into that. Not using syn for break-in comes from the belief that there is not enough engine wear properly seat the rings. I do'nt know if that's true (I suspect not) but it wont hurt to break in w dino and for that matter it wont hurt to run dino for the whole engine's life.
Phil Fill,
I agree .......30 or 40 weight oil for our boat engines. I'll talk about it again as that's what we do on TF.http://www.trawlerforum.com/forums/images/trawler/smilies/sk/dance.gif
I'm just going by what the mechanics have told me; ...............
I've been debating the multi-viscosity issue as my boat lived 22 years in South Florida and now NJ till at least freezing temps are experienced.