Synthetic oil and tailgate

Anyone trying the Amazon synthetic?

 

You should watch the tests on royal purple vs other synthetics ( think they use Pennzoil and amsoil and something else) but royal purple is pretty shit.

 

I use the cheapest synthetic I can find in my 2nd gen. Run it over 10,000 miles before changing and do periodic oil analysis. Brand doesn't matter in my opinion.

 

After my Toyota Care expires I plan on using it.

 

It helps that you are only like 50 miles from us.

 

I'm in Olney, IL. says on your avatar you are in Maryland. More than 50 miles there.

 

Ah, weird. When I clicked on Olney in your profile, it opened google maps and zoomed to Olney, MD. My mistake. I guess we have pretty good shipping prices. Haha.

 

Yeah here is a screen shot. I'll say good priced shipping.

 

its not particularly the viscosity you should be worried with (new synthetics are awesome at retaining their viscosity to higher and higher temperatures for longer periods of time before breakdown occur), but rather the carbon deposits in the oil that it is carrying around in your engine..

As the oil heats it will remove some of the deposits, and as the engine cools it will drop the carbon particles, and they will be at +/- 240 degrees as they cool they tend to stick to the engines surfaces, and attach themselves.. its this buildup that oil changes help to prevent on a modern engine by flushing the carbon out.

any reputable shop will tell you no more than 10k miles between oil changes, and should be in the habit of changing your oil every 6-8k miles. just looking at oil a tech can tell if the engine is having an issue, which is why most shops carry an oil filter cutter, or the newer cartridge type filters are cut up to flatten the filter media to check for metal shavings, and debris in the oil. those deposits can rob performance, and build up so much that they can clog up the oil in the heads of an engine and become NASTY THICK SLUDGE... and actually can stain the aluminum of your engine block, and heads.. a thin film is ok, but crusty carbon like has to be scraped out of the heads, and all passages of the engine cleaned if it has not done permanent damage already (typically causing oil starvation to cam bearings/cams, VVT/V-tec/VANOS systems clog and wont function oil pressure rises, but not enough flow..... if the oil galleys have to be cleaned you might as well rebuild the engine adding much more cost..

so be nice to your truck especially after hauling a heavy load for a good distance, an intense offroad trip, or a long highway journey, check your oil level, check your mileage left before a change is due and determine if you want to get it done a bit early...

 

I got a rubber Westin tailgate mat for like 50 bucks, does the trick for now. I like the Mobtown option better, may swap it out someday.

I've never tried any of the fancy oil brands, and have mostly used Castrol. Now I just use whatever full synthetic is on sale. Over the life of your vehicle, staying on top of all maintenance (not just oil) is likely a bigger factor than what brand you use. I don't do 10K miles per year, so I just do an annual change with what is on sale and call it good.

Not that anyone will ever do it, but I would bet that a comparison between a 250K engine that had 10K mile changes with on-sale synthetic and a 250K engine that had 25K mile changes with a fancy brand would show little difference, with the 10K engine in slightly better shape.

 

I had over 250k on my 93 pathfinder and always used castrol full synth 6-7k intervals.


Question on the RF & MT tailgate plates....
Do they lap over the top of the tailgate? ....if so coukd they scratch the paint

I heard the mountain one is super slippery.