Engine oil

[Doddsie]

Just been to local car parts place, 10w40 semi synthetic motor oil, 5L - £19.99.  10w40 semi synthetic MOTORBIKE oil, 5L, same brand - £29.99!!!! Whats the difference???

[nick crisp]

http://www.mobiloil.com/USA-English/Moto...e_Oil.aspx
...should answer that. To my knowledge, you should never use a car oil in a motorcycle engine. I'm guessing that a major part of the price difference will be due to production costs - millions more cars than motorcycles out there.

[Slaninar]

Just been to local car parts place, 10w40 semi synthetic motor oil, 5L - £19.99.  10w40 semi synthetic MOTORBIKE oil, 5L, same brand - £29.99!!!! Whats the difference???

Aditives, composition and marketing.


Motorcycle engines as well as clutches are not the same as car ones.

Make sure it is API SG and JASO MA2 approved.

[Punkstig]

As the others said, motorbike oil has many different properties to car oil, the main one being the wet clutch.

[Tmation]

With a caveat of you have to be careful what you buy i.e. no friction modifiers and it meets the standards previously mentioned, car oil is fine.


I ran my GPZ1100 for nearly 80,000 miles on cheap Ford motor oil (my dad got big discount) changed with a new filter every 3000 miles with no problems whatsoever. When he was working my dad used to run all his bikes on he same oil (CB750,CB550,CX500,CX650) for years.


Supermarket own brands are also good value as long as they meet the spec.

[Slaninar]

With a caveat of you have to be careful what you buy i.e. no friction modifiers and it meets the standards previously mentioned, car oil is fine.


I ran my GPZ1100 for nearly 80,000 miles on cheap Ford motor oil (my dad got big discount) changed with a new filter every 3000 miles with no problems whatsoever. When he was working my dad used to run all his bikes on he same oil (CB750,CB550,CX500,CX650) for years.


Supermarket own brands are also good value as long as they meet the spec.

Motorcycle specific oil is better. Good motorcycle oil vs good car oil that is.

Differences are:

1) Revs
Motorcycle engines rev a lot higher. This asks for more anti-foaming qualities in oil. It also breaks the viscousity of oil down quicker - so it should be "tougher".

2) Power to capacity ratio
600 cc fazer engine makes almost twice the hp of a 1200 cc car petrol engine. Add a bit higher working temp, greater compression ratio. This also asks for a "tougher" oil and makes most purely mineral oils just not good enough.

3) A lot mentioned wet clutch - motorcycle oil should make good scratch protection inside the engine, witout making the clutch too slippery. If oil is JASO MA2 approved - it does just that perfectly.


Changing good motorcycle specific oil every 4000 miles is better for the motorcycle engine than changing car oil every 3000 miles.

[Jacko]

Mr Yamaha says SE , SF type or equivalent and don't put any additives in.
No mention of car or bike just the spec.

[VNA]

Often it is no more than the label.

But if you do use a car oil you need to be sure there are no friction modifiers. 

[VNA]

Mr Yamaha says SE , SF type or equivalent and don't put any additives in.
No mention of car or bike just the spec.

Often bike oils quote older lower specs than car oils.  Could be due to the cost of type approval tests.  I dunno.

Some of the latest long life car oils are very high tech.

But again the trick is being sure a friction modifier is not present.  One dose of that and you'll need a new clutch.

But basically, yes bike oil is a big rip off.

[Slaninar]

Mr Yamaha says SE , SF type or equivalent and don't put any additives in.
No mention of car or bike just the spec.

It also says 10k kilometers oil change intervals - too much.

Better is better. For a high revving fazer engine, I wouldn't risk putting anything but bike-specific semi or full synth oil.  Too much risk for a max 10e save per oil change.

[nick crisp]

Yamaha used to recommend 4000 mile oil changes for most of their range. Then, a few years ago, they changed to 6000 miles. This applied retrospectively to some models. I guess they got more confident in their engines and/or modern oils. I'd say if you thrash your bike everywhere or maybe operate it in constantly in hot climates, 4000 miles might not be unreasonable. But generally, 6000 miles should be fine with modern oils.
Fully synthetic oil is not really necessary in most road bike engines. In some engines it can cause clutch slip, although I believe Ducati recommend it for their bikes (dry clutches of course). A good semi-synthetic is all you need, even with hard usage. Or even a good quality mineral oil will probably suffice.

[chaz]

car oil comes from oil that was laid down 165 million years ago from the decomposing bodys of 4 legged dinosaurs whereas motorcycle oil comes from dinosaurs that had only two legs and that's why it's more expensive?

[nick crisp]

My guess is you've got young kids around Chaz? :lol

[chaz]

My guess is you've got young kids around Chaz? :lol

no, just talking bollocks

[nick crisp]

:lol

[Doddsie]

Soooo,we have sorted out the difference in car and bike oil, basically it all comes down to Diplodocus or Pterodactyl???    :eek


Next question..... is there any difference in Castrol and Duckhams etc or Asda`s own brand????

[nick crisp]

This is a personal preference only but it's up to you - my bike is my pride and joy so I tend to use a good quality motorcycle specific oil, semi synthetic. Silkolene Comp 4 is my preferred choice (although there are others I'll accept - Motul, Shell, Castrol etc). Yes, it's pricey, but as oil changes are possibly the single most important thing you can do to help your bike's engine last, I feel it's worth it. And let's face it, the expense isn't that much every 4-6000 miles. A good mineral oil is probably not going to be any worse. I have an inherent distrust of supermarket brands, no reason for it, that's just me. Just been looking at the manual cam chain tensioner Devilsyam has been talking about. When I've got certain other things out of the way, I'll be going for one of those too - protect my pride and joy.

[Doddsie]

A lot of people seem to distrust supermarket own brand stuff, but if its 10w40 semi synthetic bike oil, is it any different to the branded stuff??? Im guessing tesco dont have their own oil refinery so they are they not getting it from the same place?????

[nick crisp]

I think it comes from the supermarkets f****ng up other things they've tried to get into in the past. You'd think they couldn't go far wrong with motor oil. As an example of why I don't use them, if you're going to buy an expensive camera and get serious about photography, you go to a camera specialist rather than a general store. And lets face it, your bike is not cheap -especially when things go wrong. I dunno, is that a good analogy? There again, with online shopping being so prevalent these days, maybe I'm just behind the times, but I'll still stick with what I know and trust at least until someone can completely convince me otherwise.

[cfoley]

It may or may not make a mechanical difference but if you feel that way about the bike and can still afford rent and food then the branded oil sounds like it's worth it to you for peace of mind.