My dad wants me to switch my car over to synthetic oil this year. Ive heard from some people that before you go to synthetic, you have to use a combination of both and get your car used to it. Is this something you can buy or do I have to mix it myself and how long should this "in-between" stage last? Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanx

 

you don't have to use a syn-blend before you switch over to synthetic. dunno where you got this from. but if your car has more than 50K miles on it and its not in emaculate condition then i wouldn't recommend synthetic, its a thinner oil and if you didn't burn/leak oil before you might after switching to syn.

 

So are you saying that you would recomend synthetic oil to a newly-rebuilt engine?

 

GM reccomends Mobil1 synthetic.Its been the stock fill in a vette for well over a decade.

 

i got a complete rebuilt motor, new pistons, rings, rods, turned crank, all new bearings...everything new....should I run synthetic? i thought about it, but thats all the further I got...would it be a good thing to do? is it any better than regular oils?

 

Synthetic oil has the advantage of withstanding high temperature without breaking down. Break your engine in with regular 10w30 oil for 500 miles and then let the Mobil1 or Royal Purple or whatever rip...

 

Actually.. shouldn't you change your *FIRST* oil (after a fresh rebuild) after about 20-50 miles due to everything grinding and first being broken in?

 

I do 500 miles regular dino oil, and then mobil 1 at 2000 miles, an every 3000 after that (or 3-6 months). I do not subscribe to the longer oil change intervals, and I run Mobil 1 in all 3 of my cars and my wifes' new Scion.... been using mobil 1 for over a decade myself!

 

There should be no grinding! If you have a hydraulic roller I suggest you fire it up, set the timimg, look for leaks, fill the radiator and drive it as soon as possible.

 

No need to "get the car used to it" with synthetic oil. It's essentially a myth. The reasoning behind it was since synthetic cleans up deposits and grime out of the engine, if you've got an oil, gunky engine that had sludge (mineral oil) running through it it's whole life, grime would pack in and deposit in places that it could potentially leak out. When you run the synthetic it will supposedly wash that crime out and start leaking again. I switched over to Synthetic in my old IROC when it was at 96xxx miles and never had a problem with it. In fact I've never known anyone who had a problem with leaks by switching to a synthetic in a higher mileage engine unless their engine was already leaking lol. If you've got a brand new roller engine, there shouldn't be any problem with running it right from the start after building it. I guess with flat tappets, where break in actually consists of 200-500 of wearing in the bottom of the lifters to the lobes of the cam the superior lubrication of a synthetic gets to be problematic, but I ran 5W-30 Mobil 1 when I finished up my heads/cam swap in my old IROC towards the end of winter and it ran great. I say switch over, get Mobil 1. It's usually better priced than Royal Purple because you can pick it up at places like Wal-Mart and Sam's Club. It's comparable in specifications and quality. If you can afford it, Redline is the best, but unless you race frequently, I wouldn't bother.

 

Even during the first few minutes of an engines life there is not grinding or excess wear going on?

Mobile 1 is cheap? I always thought that was one of the more expensive oils?

 

mobil 1 syn is about $5 a quart
royal purple is anywhere from $7-8
you regular valvoline is $2 a quart

for a break in i would prolly go as far as using the cheapest sludgiest oil i can find so i know it'll stick to whatever it hits, and then like said above after a couple hundred miles of easy driving stick syn in.

 

^Ya, that's what I'm doing. Using QuakerState 10w30 for the break in, and then after 100 miles or whatever, I am going to throw in some Mobile One Synthetic.