Oil weight?

[Kierf - ¿§?]

Okay, I don't have an owner's manual. I searched the posts here, but couldn't find a straight answer.

I have an '87 951 and live in Las Vegas. The weather here is about 30 degrees F to about 115 F in the summer.

I want to use Mobil 1 synthetic, but I have no idea what oil weight I should use. Any suggestions?

[Blackfoot]

15-50

[divezic]

I live in Maine with warm summers and cold winters.

10W40 in the summer

0W30 in the winter

Anybody know where we can get some 0W40 Mobil 1? That would be my year round choice if I could find it.

[Lawrence Coppari]

Never have seen 0-40. Only 0-30 for Mobil 1. But I live down south. Change oil more frequently?

[Osterhouse]

If you want to use Synthetic use 5w50 Mobile one or what ever..... Castrol Syntec comes in 5w 50 and you will never have any oil related problems with that.....(in my opinion)

Howard

[Mike B]

I'm with Blackfoot... 15W-50.

[newoldguy]

Kierf - When its as hot as you experience in the summer, run the highest number (i.e. "thickest") oil you can find. I think 15-50 or 20-50 ought to be readily available just about anywhere and I'd go synthetic if my engine could take it (that is, with no leaking).

[Kierf - ¿§?]

Well, I just bought a case of Mobil 1 15-50. Now I'm having trouble finding a damn oil filter. It seems no one here in Vegas carries one. Any suggestions on where to look and what is the best? I'm partial to Fram as I used their oil filters on my previous 3 cars.

[Magnus_944]

If you want something really thick to stand hot weather and hard driving go for 10W60. It will give you easy starts in cold weather (10W) and still be thick at operating temperature (60). Watch your oil pressure, if it drops below 2 bar at idle get thicker oil. If pressure stays above 2 bar all the time with 10W40 or 0W40 or 5W50 or 15W50 or that ever viscosity you use currently there is no reason to use thicker oil.

//Magnus

[Kierf - ¿§?]

Its always at a constant 3 bar at idle. When I do my oil change (among MANY other things), I'll definately keep an eye out for it. Thanks.

[adrial]

On a related matter....I live in the northeast (NY) and am still using 20w50. Oil pressure doesn't quite peg 5 bar anymore on cold starts and takes an extremely long time to warm up the oil. Is it time to make the change to 10w30 (dino oil)?

thanks,
Adrial

P.S. 20w50 is good down to 20 degrees F, temp doesn't get down that far but it does get to 30 degrees F.

[Blackfoot]

i would go 10-40 in the winter months, and in spring, get back to 20-50.

kierf, stay away from fram filters. use oem mahle.

[scottmandue]

Originally posted by Blackfoot
kierf, stay away from fram filters. use oem mahle.

True - I don't know if fram even makes a filter for the 944, I use fram on everything else I drive. Have you tried calling a Porsche dealer? I have a dealer here that sells them for about six bucks, pretty resonable (about the same price as a fram).

[mike944]

here's an excerpt from something i posted a few months ago.

Read the websites, i uised to think fram were good until i started researching them. You'll probably never buy a fram filter again.

Mike


There are several sites out there that review oil filters. I would like to see one that compares actual particle filtering ability, but i haven't found a good one yet.

Here's a good page that covers all three of the filters you are talking about.
http://www.frankhunt.com/FRANK/corvette/articles/oilfilterstudy/oilfilterstudy-german.html

Here's another one from the same site, but doesn't cover the mahle filter. BUT, it does have pictures of what they all look like inside.

http://www.frankhunt.com/FRANK/corvette/articles/oilfilterstudy/oilfilterstudy-mopar.html

After reading all that, i'd never buy a fram filter. The build quality is terrible.

Mike

[newoldguy]

Adrial - I'd definitely drop down to 10-40 or 10-30 in the winter. You want to have the best opportunity for "flow" at start up as you can get.

Personally, for my regular cars (I don't drive the 944 in winter here) I put in 5W-30 in the winters, 10W-30 in spring and fall, and 20W50 in summer. Yes, I do change every 3 months regardless of mileage. Like the ad says, "pay me now or pay me later". For what its worth, there is an '86 Mazda B2000 over in Portland Oregon that had this treatment with 220,000+ miles on it and never had the valve cover off.

And, yes, get a good oil filter. There is a difference in quality and construction. The price difference is minimal if you consider the long run. In the future, watch the magazine or internet ads and buy half a dozen or so. Sometimes you can get a discount on 10 or 12. What the heck, if you keep the car you'll be needing them!

One final note - oil changes are definitely not the glamorous part of car ownership. It would be a LOT more fun to be installing something that would give you more horsepower. However, there is really nothing more important to insure long engine life than oil changes.
Curtis

[adrial]

Oil is draining out of the car now, gettin ready to put 10w30 in it.

Last oil change was less than 500 miles ago, but then I didn't really think about the temperature. Now, after seeing the car take so long to bring the oil pressure down...I decided I'd better ask.

Should I bother doing the oil filter too? Does a little 20w50 mixed in there really make a difference?

thanks,
Adrial

[newoldguy]

Yes, I WOULD change the oil filter. Its not that a little bit of 20W-50 is in there as much as just wanting to keep things as clean as possible. The idea is to get rid of the dirty filter media, the dirty oil in the filter, and the dirty oil in the pan. Keep it as clean as possible---thus change filters each time you change oil.

Oh, and you're into it already this time but its "best" to warm up the engine first before draining. That way, the "flush" when you open the oil drain will pull as much of the crud out of the bottom of the pan as is possible. Be careful not to get scalded on hot oil in this process.
Curtis

[adrial]

yup, I always warm up the oil before changing it.

Well, I didn't change the filter, but I guess I'll just do the next oil change at 2700 miles instead of 3000.
I didn't think it was worth it to spill oil all over the car (when unscrewing oil filter) for 300 miles worth of dirt.

I did decide tonight that I'm going to hold off on the test pipe and instead flush the brake fluid and coolant, change the sway bar bushings and replace all vacumn lines. Maybe even the intercooler pipes..

[divezic]

Quick update. I recently filled my 944 with Mobil1 0W30. So far I'm impressed. With morning temps in the teens/20's, starts are easy; no chugging from the starter. It runs more smoothly when cold and warms up noticeably quicker than 10W40 with no tendency for overheating. When hot, the oil press still reads around 3 bar at idle and 4-5 bar while driving.

It also works great in the Subaru. No more noisy lifters in the morning.