Synthetic oil??

What exactly is snythetic oil? is it any better than regular oil?

there's no comparison.you can tell by the price.regular oil is changed at 3000 miles.synthetic is 15,000.you just change the filter at 3000 mile intervals.on hot rod t.v. i watched them dyno a car with regular oil,then drained the engine,trans and rear end and used synthetic in all and dynoed again and gained 8 h.p..you get all those benefits plas its so much better for your moving parts too.

I say if you gotta drain the oil every 3k miles, so you can change the filter, then you might as well change the oil too. That is unless there is some magic way of taking the filter off withought getting a bath, lol.

Dont remove the drain plug, just the filter.

The biggest thing is that it is a little bit "slipperier", due to uniformity in the molecular structure. Picture it like this: dump a bag full of golf balls, baseballs, tennis balls, and soccer balls on the floor and roll a sheet of plywood across them. Then roll the same sheet of plywood over a dumped out bag of marbles. It rolls easier over the marbles because they are all the same size. As for 15,000 mile intervals, I don't believe it. Oil is oil, synthetic or not. It has certain properties that break down over time, and the harder you run, the faster they break down. IMHO, you can stretch your changes to maybe 6500 miles, but I wouldn't go too much more than that. I have torn down too many engines that ran only sythetic oil on the long changes that were toasted. Amsoil used to spout that stuff here, and got slapped. Mostly for claims about their two stroke oil, being able to be mixed at over 100:1. Guys were trying it in their racing sleds, because Amsoil was supposed to be a good name, and frying very expensive engines. And then Amsoil wouldn't honor their guarantee. I see now that their advertised oil change up here is 12000 km, which is only twice the recommended. At 4x the price, you're still losing money.

The principal advantage of synthetic over "naturall" oil is the better protection against friction, especially at temperature extremes. Synthetics flow better at extreme cold temps, yet provide better breakdown protection at temperatures that would boil off regular oils. As far as extended oil change intervals, it pays to bear in mind that either type of oil is subject to fuel, particle, moisture, and other contaminants. The only way to eliminate damage from these is to change the oil and filter. I personally never go more than 3000 miles on a change (I use Mobil 1 and Amsoil).

tom

A true synthetic oil is just a man made oil with no impurities in it , as far as being better because it cost more well thats a loaded statement. IMO the reason that the syn oil's are better is due to the additive package thats in it.
I still think it should be changed at or around the 3,000 mile mark. I use just a good base oil and use a product made by BG its called MOA Its a very good additive package. I'm not sure that I can believe everything on Hot Rod TV, they don't give all info on the projects that they do so how can I (we) trust them on a product that they are being paid to advertise. I do think syn oil is a better product, just not as good as they (manufactures) say. Do I use it no! do I sell it! Yes if the customer asks for it.

Steve

synthetics last longer and provide better protection and will reduce wear over the long run
if you have a well used motor i would not recommend using them any oil consumption will increase
on the plus side power and mileage will increase too


sr66

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http://neptune.spacebears.com/cars/...s/oil-life.html
http://www.go-synthetic.com/409_000...09_000_mack.htm

Just a few interesting/entertaining reads.

I personally think Synthetic oil is the cats meow. After switching my rear, tranny, and engine fluids over to synthetic I could honestly feel the difference. With the amount of use sytnethic gets by professional automakers (comes stock in Porches, Corvettes, Hemi's, BMW's,etc) if there wasn't a large advantage these companies wouldn't bother and would probably rather cut costs.

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Bringing history and technology together.

One of the major major advantages in a performance engine is that (some) synthetic oil can withstand temps as high as 400 degrees before breakdown occurs. compare that to 250-300 for most standard oils.

Around here at the local Wally World, you get Valvoline at $15 per 5 quart jug. Or $20 for Mobil 1 full Syn. Mobil 1 being so much better the extra five bucks is worth it to me. Spending an extra 3 bucks on a Wix 51060R or 61 your oil changes now cost about 7 dollars more.

If your engine is in good operating condition you can extend your change intervals. Pull a sample and have a oil analysis done, it will let you know the wear metals, antifreeze etc. that are in your oil.
Just for fun put a quart of conventional and a quart of synthetic in the freezer for a couple of hours, then see how they pour. It will give you an idea what your engine is going through in the winter.

i personally would not go 15,000 miles myself but at the cost of full synthetic i sure as hell am not doing it at 3000 when it is so much better and designed for this.by the way the 15,000 miles is not me talking but quoting what people in the oil and motorsport industry say.some of you don't like to believe anything you see or here but if you don't want to listen to me that fine.i did a search and went to amsoil full syn. and there first syn. was 25,000 or 1 yr. full syn. 10-40.you can call them liars if you like.me,i think i'll pay attention to others expertise.do the leg work.

A quick history lesson may be in order. Synthetic oils were developed for use by the military. Primarily in jet engines that turn extremely high rpm with tremendous heat. They are capable of lubricating under very harsh conditions. Used by the military and in the aviation industry for years before finding their way into the auto industry synthetics can only be considered the best kept secret since sliced bread.

When converting from fossil oils to synthetics you need to consider a couple things. Synthetics will tend to leak in high mileage engines. This is because the molecules are smaller than fossil oils and will find their way into cracks in gaskets that normal oils can't get through. Also some people do not suggest you break in a new engine using synthetics. I'm not really sure where this comes from since several high $$$ European sports cars and some of Detroit's hottest iron come from the factory with synthetics. I've used them exclusively in every engine I've built in the last 10 years and they are all still on the road with no oil related failures. Although synthetics a little expensive, they're worth every penny IMHO anyway.

I run belray superbike synthetic in my harley engins, trans, primary and forks I have been in bumper to bumper traffic and could hear conventional oil popping and boiling in other bikes but mine was fine, I also noticed that the tranny when shifted was much smoother from a clunk to an nice click. yea its about 8 bucks a quart but I service it myself and its still cheaper than having the dealer change my oil with the Harley dinosaur sludge.
thats just my thought on it I will never go back to convetional on my bike, My daily driver hoopty, POS grocery getting car I pam cooking spray, hair oil or whatever I can get my hands on well actually run cheap *** dollar store oil at 50 to 89 cents a quart and change it every 2500 Mi. so it depends on what its going into. The key In my opinion aws mentioned in previous posts is change it often as your environment or driving style dictates.