How to accurately use automotive lubricants

How to accurately use automotive lubricants？

     Driving is a very normal and everyday thing in many people's lives, but a car is a combination of thousands of parts and components of technology crystallized products, and involves many mechanical principles, so the car will age is an inevitable fact, and how to maintain the car plays a key role in the life of a car.

When it comes to maintenance, I believe the first thing that comes to mind for many people is replacing the engine oil, but of course to maintain a car well is not just to replace the engine oil on a regular basis is enough, but this time we start with the most basic and most common, that is how to identify and choose the right engine oil for your car.The task of engine oil is not only to provide lubrication for the internal structure of the engine, but also to cool down the engine, reduce the carbon generated by high-speed friction and clean the internal structure of the engine, so the long-term use of good quality and suitable oil can indeed effectively extend the service life of the engine.If you're buying a new car with a factory warranty, this article may not be very important to you, because factory service centers often specify which grade of fluid must be used in each car, so basically you just have to choose your fluid according to the factory's rules and recommendations.What if your car is taken to an outside garage for maintenance? Since the quality of many garages on the market varies, we can't judge whether a garage master really understands lubricants based on a few words alone, so this time we'll simply explain the meaning of the various letters and numbers on the packaging of most engine lubricants on the market, so that you know exactly what kind of oil you've bought.

First of all, we can see some English words such as SAE, API and so on on the bottle when we buy engine lubricating oil, in fact, SAE stands for the International Society of Automotive Engineers, which means that this bottle of lubricating oil meets a certain standard set by SAE, and the three number words of SAE are often accompanied by some words of the number words and English single word strings into a line of words, such as 0W-30, 5W-40 or 10W-40 and so on.

The above-mentioned 0W-30, 5W-40, 10W-40 these digital combinations called the viscosity grade of the lubricant, the viscosity grade of the engine oil is usually formulated with reference to the standard of SAE J300 of the International Society of Automotive EngineersIs also an important indicator when we pick engine lubricants, in which the W represents the English word winter (Winter), the front with the number and the letter W viscosity is called low temperature power viscosity, also known as winter viscosity. Also represents the bottle of lubricating oil in low temperature conditions in the engine fluidity is good, so the smaller the number of words in front of W, on behalf of it in the low temperature environment can still play a relatively good protection and lubrication of the engine, the larger the value on behalf of it is not suitable for use in the low temperature environment.W English letter after the viscosity refers to the lubricant in 100 ° kinematic viscosity, also known as high temperature kinematic viscosity. The two numbers after W represent the consistency of the lubricant when working in a high-temperature environment, and the larger the value, the higher the consistency.

We take the 5W-40 lubricant that we often see in China as an example, according to the information, the 5W on the lubricant bottle represents the low temperature resistance of minus 30 degrees Celsius, which also means it can be used in the environment of minus 30 degrees Celsius, while 10W represents minus 25 degrees Celsius and 0W represents minus 35 degrees Celsius, basically these temperatures belong to the viscosity of the extremely cold environment, which also indicates that when the temperature is lower, the slower the flow of the lubricant is, and the worse the flow protection performance is when the engine starts in the morning. The slower the fluidity of the lubricant, the worse the flow protection performance when the engine starts in the morning. Here may be some southern owners and maintenance plant masters will have questions? In the south, the general winter temperature is not below zero, then there is a need to use 0W or 5W? If the vehicle in the climate of high temperatures in the south, the choice of 10W is enough to cope with, no need to choose 0W or 5W? The following author of the German SWD Lao Zhuang to help you to analyze the answer to why you should choose 0W or 5W, it is because of the following points:

First, most of the 10W40 viscosity lubricants seen on the market are mineral oil, not fully synthetic or semi-synthetic oil, and most of the car manufacturers at this stage require the use of fully synthetic oil products.

Second, the current stage of the car driver in the morning when the cold car start are no warm-up habits, like a start on the force horse to accelerate driving, this time the lubricant is not completely lubricated engine internal parts, dry wear and tear of the damage is great, so the start more need to use low temperature viscosity liquidity fast lubricant.

Third, the modern new engine for energy saving and environmental protection requirements are particularly high, in the case of engine precision and volume reduction, will be in the lubricant viscosity requirements have been in favor of low viscosity and fast flow coefficient of oil.

Regarding the high temperature kinematic viscosity behind the letter W, we take 5W-30 and 5W-40 two grades of lubricants as examples, 5W-40 is naturally higher in consistency than 5W-30. We all know that the car engine in the process of driving the internal will constantly produce high temperature, and with the older the car, the higher the mileage, the engine's internal working temperature will be with the engine internal loss and pollution acid material resulting in higher working temperature, so the consistency of the lubricant for can effectively lubricate and protect the engine is very important.

Many car repair masters have a saying, that is, the mileage more than 100,000 kilometers or car age more than 5 years after the old car are not suitable for the use of fully synthetic (Fully) lubricants, which in fact there is no absolute right and wrong, because most of the regular Fully lubricants on the market have a low consistency, and the low consistency of the lubricants are only suitable for use in the newer, lower mileage engines, so the formation of But that doesn't mean that all Fully lubricants are low in consistency, there are some Fully lubricants that are high in consistency and can be used in high mileage engines.

Generally, most professional car repair masters will suggest that the car age of the old car as high as possible to use thicker than 40 above the thickness of the lubricant, and even will suggest the use of 50 thick, this is because the mileage of the high old engine because of the internal parts aging, working temperature is also getting higher, thin lubricant is easy to be evaporated away, also lead to the so-called 'burn oil' in everyone's mouth ' phenomenon.

Is there any noticeable difference in the use of a thicker or thinner oil? Of course there is, the higher consistency of lubricants such as 20W-50, when driving up will certainly be obviously than the use of 5W-30 lubricants to come tedious and heavy drag, engine noise will also relatively feel rougher, this is because the low consistency of lubricants can effectively reduce the workload of the engine, so drive up will obviously feel more powerful start. But still, car owners need to choose the right consistency according to the mileage and age of their engines, so don't blindly pursue lighter starting power to make the engines wear out faster, which will not pay off in the end.

About the choice of lubricant viscosity there is a particularly important viscosity reference data, in addition to low temperature power viscosity and high temperature kinematic viscosity, there is a high temperature high shear viscosity HTHS, viscosity level is usually developed with reference to the International Society of Automotive Engineers SAE J300 standard, we will see in the oil package description of XW-20, XW-30 ....... The same high-temperature high-shear viscosity is usually also the implementation of the SAE J300 standard, take a look at this table to know, so is all the XW-30 high-temperature high-shear viscosity are the same? ACEA European Automobile Manufacturers Association and API American Petroleum Institute and OEM automotive manufacturers certification requirements for high-temperature high-shear is the same? Let's talk about these next.

 High Temperature High Shear HTHS is the full name for High Temperature High Shear, and is a measurement of the viscosity of a lubricant at 150°C under nitrogen pressure of about 300 (or so) PSI (pounds per square inch), converted by capillary viscosity testing. It is a test done under high speed shear conditions simulating engine cylinder operating temperature and reflects the thickness and strength of the oil film between the cylinder liner and piston ring, shaft and shank (so to speak). It has a very important impact on engine life and fuel economy. A proper high temperature high shear viscosity (HTHS) oil can be very  good at protecting engine friction parts and improving fuel economy, thus extending engine life and reducing energy consumption. Using the word appropriate is to clarify, not the higher or lower the value of HTHS is better, the key depends on how much HTHS the engine requires of the lubricant, for example: API XW-20 viscosity requires HTHS greater than 2.6 on OK, ACAE C5-16 20 viscosity is also greater than 2.6 on OK.

And Volvo: Volvo VCC RBS0-2AE 0W-20 requires HTHS of 2.75 to be OK, while A5/B5 5W-20 needs to reach 2.9. Then API's 5W-30 viscosity HTHS greater than 2.9 is OK, while BMW BMW Longlife-01 standard 5W-30 requires HTHS greater than 3.5, Mercedes-Benz MB 229.5, Volkswagen's VW50200 specification 30 viscosity HTHS must also be greater than 3.5 to be able to.

So contemporary engine lubricants must be precisely matched, and if the oil is not used correctly what harm will it do to the engine? Perhaps the most important question friends want to ask is this, for example, 1: BMW Longlife-01 5W-30 requires HTHS greater than 3.5, if the BMW engine with the API standard 5W-30 (HTHS greater than 2.9), it will cause the friction parts of the oil film strength is not enough, resulting in premature engine wear, burning oil and other problems. Example 2: ACEA A5/B5 5W-30 HTHS requirement between 2.9-3.5, with HTHS greater than 3.5 oil, it will cause the engine lubricant flow slow, easy to be oxidized, at the same time, because of the HTHS viscosity, the engine resistance will be large, resulting in engine power decline, fuel consumption rise.

Another example: Volkswagen VW 502 00, Mercedes MB 229.5 XW-30 viscosity engine oil, HTHS requirements greater than 3.5 can, and the repair shop to replace the XW-20 (HTHS greater than 2.6) engine oil, high temperature and high speed on the engine  impact on ......! I can not imagine, in turn, such as Subaru's Forester 2.0 naturally aspirated engine requires 0W-20 (HTHS greater than 2.6) engine oil, the repair shop to add SAE 5W-40 (HTHS greater than 3.5) engine oil, poor engine power, high fuel consumption, increased wear ....... The driving experience will be too bad! So the choice of lubricant must be based on the viscosity of the engine requirements with oil specifications to choose.

Having said that, perhaps some car enthusiasts will ask, in the end my car is suitable to use 5W-30 or 5W-40 lubricants? In fact, each car, each manufacturer produced by the engine technology and characteristics are different, so can not be a general book to read to the old, but we can say in general terms that most of the ordinary car engines on the market at present are suitable for the consistency of 30 or 40 lubricants, in addition to some special performance models or relatively rare engine technology, especially the newer Japanese engines will require the use of 20 viscosity The oil of 20 viscosity is required for the newer Japanese engines, but if the mileage exceeds 100,000 km, it is recommended to use less than 40 viscosity oil.

 Finally, we still remind everyone that there are many counterfeit engine lubricants on the market in China, and some garage owners don't even know whether the lubricants they sell are genuine or counterfeit, so if you're worried, it's best to suggest that you buy them directly from agents with a good reputation or designated by the manufacturer, and it's still advisable to follow the original factory to replace the lubricant miles and time period for maintenance, after all, lubricants inevitably age and deteriorate after long-term use, and then they can no longer play a role in protecting the engine.

 At the end of the article, the writer German SWD lubricant Taiwan Lao Zhuang here also want to remind all of you owners and maintenance masters, engine lubricant selection is not according to personal love and price to measure, but need like a professional doctor, for the patient's condition and the patient's physique to diagnose and dispensing, rather than anxiously throw medicine, so the choice of engine lubricant also need to follow the original car manufacturer's owner Use manual to recommend the choice, in line with the vehicle's use of regional climate and environment and personal driving needs to match each other, in order to play out the real effect of lubricants. The next article I will continue to discuss with all of you and car owners about how to see the certification of API and ACEA in the United States and Europe according to the precise use of oil? How to select engine oil according to the certification.

Accurate use of oil is a matter of urgency!