[drummertom]

What oil do you guys use in your bikes and where do you get it? I am doing an oil change and need to make sure I use the right oil.

[Blindstitch]

10-40 cheap dinosaur oil or 15-40 Rotella.

[morrow]

Yep...the Shell Rotella 15w-40 is pretty common and inexpensive.

[drummertom]

morrow, on 03 August 2010 - 10:41 AM, said:

Yep...the Shell Rotella 15w-40 is pretty common and inexpensive.

Thanx guys. Going to get some today!

[wmw]

wow, first oil thread on the new forum...that didn't take long.

[Steve in Wa]

Blindstitch,

It will be nice if we can get your sticky from the old forum with all of the answers to the most common questions.

[Blindstitch]

Wouldn't that be nice. Actually it's floating around in the general section and I also have it at the bottom in my signature. Well not all but what I saved over to Sheps forum for good luck.

[marshallf3]

drummertom, on 03 August 2010 - 08:33 AM, said:

What oil do you guys use in your bikes and where do you get it? I am doing an oil change and need to make sure I use the right oil.

There's little doubt that most of us are in agreement that you can't go wrong with Shell Rotella 15W-40, some even use their 5W-40 synthetic. Mobil Delvac is also a super heavy duty diesel oil that would be the equivalent.

There are several reasons for suggesting this oil in addition to it being approved by JASO as acceptable for use in wet clutch bikes. It's a heavy duty diesel oil with an outstanding history of protection and longevity (over half the semi trucks on the road use it) and part of the reason is that it still contains a decent level of zinc - an anti-shear additive that is essential in our bikes since the clutch and transmission gears share the same oil as the engine. Gears meshing/mashing against each other is very hard on oil; it breaks down the additive package and viscosity in short order thus the reason most of us use inexpensive oil and change it often.

Modern automotive oils (especially anything that states "Energy Conserving" on the label) have replaced the time proven additives with all sorts of other things, many of which can result in clutch slippage. They've done this for two reasons - the new additives are less harmful to catalytic converters and the "more slippery" factor results in a tiny increase in mpg.

Oddly enough this is one case in which the less expensive product is the better one for our uses.

[Floaterdave]

drummertom, on 03 August 2010 - 06:33 AM, said:

What oil do you guys use in your bikes and where do you get it? I am doing an oil change and need to make sure I use the right oil.

Extra Virgin Olive Oil From Italy...........Just kidding.


Rotella 15-40

About $10 a gallon at my local Walmart.

[buddygunzz]

So the 15-40 has all of the additives that is needed for the engines and clutch? just got the bike @2 months ago and used honda oil but a little pricey

[Blindstitch]

Floaterdave, on 03 August 2010 - 07:43 PM, said:

Extra Virgin Olive Oil From Italy...........Just kidding.


Rotella 15-40

About $10 a gallon at my local Walmart.

Does the extra virgin help or just stand and watch?

[marshallf3]

Yes, it does. There's nothing special about the Honda oil, it's just approved for wet clutch bikes thus doesn't have the aforementioned differences.

Shoot, when I was at Atwood's (a farm/country supply store) during the weekend they even had Rotella in 2.5 gallon jugs.

Same thing with antifreeze. You want silicate free, really matters not if it says Honda, Toyota or Dexcool on it.

[Jay Hanig]

Blindstitch, on 03 August 2010 - 09:06 PM, said:

Does the extra virgin help or just stand and watch?

I like Crisco, the lighter, more delectable oil.

[morrow]

marshallf3, on 03 August 2010 - 05:26 PM, said:

Shoot, when I was at Atwood's (a farm/country supply store) during the weekend they even had Rotella in 2.5 gallon jugs.

I hate Wal-Mart with a passion, but I'm forced to go there because they have the best selection of oil by far, especially in the 'jugs' rather than the individual quarts, which are much more expensive. I was suprised to see they had the 2.5 gal jugs of Shell Rotella when I went there last weekend --- i've never seen them before. They were on sale for $24 if I recall so I picked one up. So...if anyone is looking for one...check evil wally world!

[marshallf3]

2-1/2 gallons, all I'd need is a funnel and I could refill 10 quart empties. I use the same thing in my car, about half Rotella 15W-40 and half Rotella 5W-40 synthetic.

[Steve in Wa]

I usually buy three of the 2-1/2 gallon jugs at a time for the easy fact it is exactly how much it takes to do all of my vehicles and have a little left over for the lawn mower. One trip to wally's mart twice a year is quite enough for me.

[morrow]

Steve in Wa, on 04 August 2010 - 01:28 PM, said:

One trip to wally's mart twice a year is quite enough for me.

You can say that again!

[Cobram]

marshallf3, on 03 August 2010 - 09:26 PM, said:

Same thing with antifreeze. You want silicate free, really matters not if it says Honda, Toyota or Dexcool on it.

No, NEVER Dexcool.

Sometimes the coolant tends to turn to a thick, gooey, sticky, muddy, gritty, orange corrosive gel that fouls the radiator, plugs coolant passages in the heads, and many times starves the water pump, resulting in overheating, and leaking. Mounting evidence suggests that Dex-cool reacts with plastic sealing surfaces, allowing leakage at some gaskets (the cause it seems of the all too common GM manifold leaks.)

As they say, Google it if you haven't lived it.

[buddygunzz]

How many miles do you go before changing the engine oil?

[Tex]

Shell Rotela 15w 40.

[Steve in Wa]

I go 5000 miles on all of my vehicles (including the diesel PU) between changes. The oil coming out of the gas engines is a middle of the road clear brown only slightly darker than new. I had my GL engine apart this spring to put new gaskets in and the inside was perfectly clean. I have no plans on changing the scheduled maintenance any time soon.

[Abes_CW]

Blindstitch, on 03 August 2010 - 08:31 AM, said:

10-40 cheap dinosaur oil.....

I can't speak for all brands, but in my recent experience in a trip to Canadian Tire, I checked out their entire wall of oil products. EVERY gasoline brand was SM rated. Even the cheap house brand was SM rated.

SM rated has very little ZDDP, Zinc Dialkyl Dithio Phosphate, the stuff stated above that could foul emission systems. If you run a hi-po pushrod engine without roller cams (hello CX500) you should run an SJ oil or add a zddp additive. So IMO make sure it's a MC or diesel oil, and if not check the label.

[Randman in Denver]

Blindstitch, on 03 August 2010 - 07:06 PM, said:

Does the extra virgin help or just stand and watch?

I was a virgin once....or twice !!

[Sidecar Bob]

Re oil:

Oil preference is a vague & mysterious thing and there's probably a lot less to it than most of us will admit. (Warning: representatives of several oil religions may try to refute this. read what they say carefully and note that none of it is substantiated by a shred of actual hard research.) Before you read anything else about oil, read this page: http://www.nightride...ch/oiltest1.htm

P. 29 of the '81 GL1100 manual says:
"USE HONDA 4-STROKE OIL OR AN EQUIVALENT"
"Use only high detergent, premium quality motor oil certified to meet or exceed U.S. automobile manufacturer's requirements for Service Classification SE. Motor oils intended for service SE will show this designation on the container. The use of special oil additives is unnecessary and will only increase operating expenses."
They go on to recommend SAE 10W40, but provide a graph that indicates that it is OK to use:
20W40 or 20W50 at temperatures over -10c/14f
10W40 at temperatures over -20c/-4f
10W30 between -20c/-4f and 30c/86f

This information is repeated exactly in many Honda manuals, including a GL500 manual that I no longer have. It specifically recommends SE because that was the highest SAE rating at the time. I have used 10W40 at temperatures from -40c/-40f to 35c/95f and can verify that it works but a block heater is advisable at temperatures below -20c.

Just about any brand of oil you can get, whether synthetic or dino, labeled for motorcycles or not will work fine in your engine as long as the oil's viscosity (SAE classification, eg. 10W40) & service category (API classification, eg. SJ) fall within what the manual's recommendations. The brand or type of oil is less important than how often you change it.

I used Penzoil in my bikes for years because I could get it by the case for a good price & it was decent quality.
When the place with cases of Penzoil closed I switched to GTX - I couldn't get it by the case, but the price was good & it was available everywhere.
A few years ago Canadian Tire dropped the price of their 4 stroke motorcycle oil (made by Shell) to about the same as the GTX. It is often on sale for even less so I buy that now.

BTW: I wouldn't ask a dealer to suggest an oil. To start with, they can't possibly know what every manufacturer recommends for every bike under every condition. I have heard of several cases of dealers passing on myth as fact & steering someone to a product (that they happen to sell - what a coincidence!) that is at best a more expensive (but not better) product, and in some cases is not close to what the manufacturer recommends & could actually lead to premature wear.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

A friend of mine bought a new '83 Seca 650 in '85, mounted his sidecar on it & drove it year round. After 3 years the odometer read somewhere over 90,000 Km (56,000 miles) but it should have read higher - the speedo cable broke in the middle of one winter and he waited for warmer weather to fix it.
He always used Nugold (Canadian Tire's house brand re-manufactured oil - just about the cheapest stuff you can get) but any time he was doing any other work on it he changed the oil.
Just when the engine needed some work he came across an engine at a wrecker with only a few hundred Km on it for a good price, so he decided to change the engine.

The work needed?

Well, it was oil related....


Sort of...



The oil seal at the output shaft had failed.

[Sidecar Bob]

Re silicate free coolant:

The more I learn the less I tend to believe that there is a need for silicate free coolants in these bikes. No-one has been able to find any mention of this in any Honda manual. It does, apparently, appear on the label of Honda coolant, but there is no evidence that it wasn't put there by someone in marketing (whose job is to sell people more than they need) as opposed to someone in engineering (whose job is to provide the information needed to keep things running properly).

When I first read on the forums that I should be using silicate free coolant (maybe 2001?) I had been using ordinary inexpensive green coolant that made no mention of silicates on the label in my GL1000 engine for 7 or 8 years with no ill effects but I assumed that those who were promoting the use of silicate free coolant had done their homework and I had just been lucky. At that time I contacted Canadian Tire tech support about their Motomaster Long Life coolant and was assured that it was safe for yellow metals so I started using it (that was a long time ago and they may have changed supplier or their supplier may have changed the formula since then).

Some Silicate free coolants are not compatible with "yellow metals" (like the brass in our rads) and could potentially do a lot of harm. Some long life (silicate free) coolants will, over time, dissolve the solder used to hold brass radiators together. Captain Jerry (who some of you may remember from the old MSN group) contacted Prestone at the time and was advised not to use it in a brass or copper rad.

A number of people have had water pumps fail shortly after the first time they changed the coolant and have been told that silicates in the coolant were to blame. I could claim the opposite: After all those years with cheap coolant, my 'Wing's original water pump failed a couple of years after I changed over to silicate free!! Should I blame silicates or the lack of silicates? The answer is neither - the bearing on the oil side let go. It was just plain old age - how many 25 year old cars do you know of that still have their original water pumps?

On the other hand, Joe-the-Bike (who lives in Queensland Australia and has owned his bike from new) put well over 210,000 Km on his CX500EC with no mechanical seal problems using regular bargain priced ethylene glycol coolant. He did replace the seal when he had the engine apart for a general rebuild in 2008 but it had not begun to leak.

I don't buy into the silicate free coolant myth any more and I no longer worry about whether I the coolant I buy has silicates (although almost all of it is either silicate free or low silicate these days).

I have since started using Nascar Advantage colour changing coolant because I like the fact that it tells me when it needs replacing (pink when new, replace when it turns amber). I can't remember if the label says anything about silicates.

[marshallf3]

Silicates are what they used to destroy the engines on that Obama trade in program.

Some is boud to separate from solution over time adding abrasive particles to the mix.

Oh, and if I recall the DexCool problem was solved and not found to be a problem with the coolant itself. Too many people had air leaks in their system, or would let the overflow tank run dry and that ruins the stuff. There was also a habit at the time of adding "coolant sealing tabs" when servicing or adding antifreeze - in fact the new engines even came with the same stuff in there. These were also found to be the source of a lot of the gummy stuff that developed.

I actually wouldn't buy it by the brand name but the Prestone equivalent. This of course is probably better than anything else:
http://www.shellusse.../RotellaELC.pdf

[Sidecar Bob]

marshallf3, on 07 August 2010 - 10:40 PM, said:

Silicates are what they used to destroy the engines on that Obama trade in program.

You will have to fill me in on that one. I'm not up on foreign politics.

Quote

Some is boud to separate from solution over time adding abrasive particles to the mix.

As I said, my water pump failed shortly after I switched from cheap coolant to silicate free, but Joe's went more than 210,000 Km with silicates in the coolant with no problems. You figure it out.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that the silicates were supposed to help prevent deposits in the cooling system or scour them away or something like that.

But it probably doesn't matter much these days because almost every coolant in the market has no silicates.

Compatibility with "yellow metals" is far more important.

[RxRC]

morrow, on 03 August 2010 - 08:55 PM, said:

I hate Wal-Mart with a passion, but I'm forced to go there

Someone have a gun to your head? I think 1997 was the last time I set foot in ours.

[Shep]

Ever since I promoted my in-bike mech seal replacement I don't think it's much of an issue as it's so easy to fix the mech seals now.I use any old car coolant but I like the idea of that colour changing stuff as a warning but I change my coolant every two years anyway as per the bottle or before.


PS
Orange Advanced coolant still in one of my Overflow bottles and green coolant in the main system and Orange Advanced coolant in the other overflow bottle and Blue coolant in the main system.Still never mixed

[Trickster]

I love oil/coolant threads......so many different "opinions".

Now who to believe?

I am so confused.