spark plugs and oil changes

[bbaer6676]

Im doing the engine rebuild on my 2.2 and am having a hard time finding platnium plugs, what plugs are you guys using with good success. also can i run full synthetic oil, i use mobile 1 in my other cars, just wanted to check before i go using the wrong stuff. thanks

[cnavarro]

I'd stick to copper core plugs- plain old bosch or ngk; if you want something a little nicer go with ngk iridiums or beru silverstones. As far as oil, after you've broken it in, sure, go for a full synthetic of your preference. Make sure it's an appropriate viscosity. 15w50 M1 or 20w50 Vtwin M1 both work fine as far as Mobil 1 are concerned.

[ischmitz]

Ah, uhhhm, why change the oil to synthetic? Search the board. There seems to be lots of anecdotal evidence that when switching to synthetic oil you might see more leaks the reason being that gaskets "used" to dyno oil might ever so slightly shrink once the synthetic oil hits.

The only real benefit of synthetic oil is its ability to endure long service intervals demanded by modern cars (15k+) and higher tolerance to extreme temperatures. As long as your car does not frequently overheat I would use the cheaper dyno oil and change it every 3000 to 5000 miles. I use dyno in my 3.6 after the rebuild.

Cheers,
Ingo

[RoninLB]

I broke my rings in with straight 30w non-detergent.

I use copper NGK

[ischmitz]

Ronin, I did the same thing for the first 100 miles. They seated instantly since I drove it like I stole it from day one. It was hard to find the non-detergent straight 3-w here in SoCal. Since I run simple Castrol 20W50 and change it every 5k

[Huh]

I have found non detergent straight 30w at Walmart. It is what I have used in my '67 Bug.

[randywebb]

"only real benefit"

- and it has better cold flow, & is less likely to break down, requires fewer VI improvers... in short, synthetic is better at virtually every performance parameter by which we meausre engine oils...

That said, these engines were run on worse quality non-synthetic than we have now in the 1970s & 80s, so moving to synthetic might merely mean that instead of needing a rebuild at 250,000 miles, you can wait until 400,000 or something...

[ischmitz]

Randy,

good points. I fully agree that modern, high-performance engines with oil change intervalls of 15.000 miles or more will need synthetic oil. And you are right that synthetic outperformes dyno in severe conditions. I sort of remember my days in Europe when my engine had to cold-start at sub-freezing temperatures on early winter mornings after a night exposed to the elements.

[RoninLB]

Originally posted by ischmitz

Ronin, I did the same thing for the first 100 miles.