Re: synthetic oil

[Patty and Bob Couse-Baker <c-b@pacbell.net>]

Surfacelic@aol.com wrote:
> 
> I was wondering what the groups oppinion of synthetic oil is.

I think you're going to get a lot of differing opinions on this. But
here goes.

I have only one real-world experience with synthetic oil. We used
Mobil-1 10-30w in my wife's '86 Ford Escort. Starting with the second
oil change after break in, we used Mobil-1 for the next 150,000 miles.
This period of abuse included years California urban driving, four
round-trips cross country and two winters in Michigan. It never needed
the oil topped up between changes (with filter every 5,000 to 10,000
miles) and had near perfect compression when last tested at 140,000
miles. At the end of our ownership, the creeky, used-up Ford had
malidies in every system EXCEPT the engine. From talking with Ford
specialists, our experience was quite unique -- most Escorts burn and
leak a lot of oil.

Still, I'm not sure I'll use synthetic in my stock 1600 VW engine
(planned for rebuild this winter). More than likely I will. There should
be nothing intrinsically wrong with syntetics in air-cooled engines.
Besides, Porsche has been recomending Mobil-1 for several years.

I would be interested in knowing if there have been any empirical
studies of synthetics oil use in VW engines.

-- Bob Couse-Baker
   '64 Notch (Jig-saw puzzle in resto)
   '86 Mazda RX-7 (Owner's manual says not to use syntetic oil)