This seems to have become the automotive defacto forum so I’ll ask this question here.
I’ve used fuel and jet cleaner in my gas tank and found it to have a positive effect. At least it felt that way. May have been a placebo effect. But for a few dollars a shot now and then, it’s made me feel like the car runs better.
However, there are a series of motor oil additives designed to allegedly reduce engine friction. They range in price from $5 to $50 but make similar claims in helping reduce engine wear and improve power and fuel economy. I’m mostly interested in the reducing engine wear and power improvement. Does anybody here use this stuff and notice any benefits?
-Injector cleaner removes deposits that build up in the injectors that prevent proper fuel flow.
-There are countless millions of cars that have gone 200,000 miles with nothing more than proper maintenance (appropriate oil change intervals, timing belts if appropriate, etc.) and normal oil with no additives.
The fuel injector cleaner addresses a known issue, your ‘friction reducer’ does not. It preys on the mind of people who don’t really know how an engine works. Will it improve a properly maintained engine? No. Will it prevent an abused engine from dieing from neglect? I doubt it.
I’m methodical, almost meniacal about changing my oil every 5000km (3000miles), which is about twice as often as recommended by the service manual. I don’t use synthetic but I haven’t seen evidence that it’s significantly better given the frequency of my oil changes. I’m also very good to my car by staying on top of other fluid and filter changes so my cars tend to run very well and stay in good mechanical condition for a long time.
It may not be surprising to hear that I’m the kind of driver that almost immediately senses when I got a tank of bad gas or if the engine is hesitating a bit because of very high ambient humidity. I can even tell that my clutch is starting to wear (normal) a bit and it’s irritating to the point where I’m probably going to replace it for preventive maintenance. That and my tie rod joints are feeling a bit loose too.
But I digress… my question is still about engine oil friction reduction additives. So the tally so far:
If your vehicle is used for average everyday use, oil additives are a waste of money. But if you subject your engine to things it was not designed for, they can help. I built many demo derby cars and the engines in them ranged from almost new to on it’s last legs. They were all run with a 50:50 mix of Valvoline 60 wt racing oil and Slick 50 engine treatment. I never had an engine sieze up me, even after running for up to half an hour without coolant. An extreme example was a Buick 350 engine I had. I acquired a 69 Buick Skylark that I built into a figure 8 race car. Half way through the season the Skylark was totalled and the engine was put in a 67 Pontiac Catalina, I finished the season with that car. During the winter, the engine put in a 71 Chevy station wagon and ran at a couple of demo derbies held at the Tacoma Dome. In both demo’s, the engine was run without coolant after the radiator was broke. The next spring my cousin needed some wheels so we put the engine in a 66 GMC pickup and he drove the truck for 3 years. It ran perfectly till a tree fell on the truck during a windstorm. With synthetic oils becoming more popular and affordable in recent years, I haven’t been using additives any racing engines.
We’ve got some really knowledgable folks on the Corvette group I hang out with. It’s been demonstrated that synthetic oil really doesn’t ‘wear out’ in normal use. With higher quality pure synthetic (Redline) oil change intervals of 15,000 miles are not impossible, so long as the filter is changed at 5000-7500 intervals.
Using a slightly lower quality full synthetic (Mobil 1), 10,000 miles isn’t a problem, but probably IS reaching the limit of the filter’s ability to keep the oil clean.
3000 is waaaaay too short an interval for a normally drive vehicle using non-synthetic dino-juice. You’re just paying money to the oil change folks. Read (and follow) the instructions in your driver’s manual, the manufacturer knows MUCH more about your motor than Jiffie Lube does.
Besides which, when was the last time your heard about an oil related engine failure? IMHO, this is much ado about nothing. Keep oil in your car. change is once in awhile…don’t give it a whole lotta thought.
Have you observed that engines do fail under similar circumstances if pure engine oil (without Slik 50) is used? Without that additional information, your anecdotes say nothing about the effectiveness of Slik 50.
