Opinions Invited Please – metal shavings in oil

[Cameron]

I have a friend with a near new car with a GM 6 liter V8 which should be run on 5w-30 fully synthetic dexos 1 oil.

He has changed the oil 4 times in 13000 miles, the first time at 500 miles.

Instead of using the correct 5w-30 oil he used a 0-w50 fully synthetic oil in the car for 10000 miles approx before going to the correct oil because (surprise surprise) he felt the engine did not run well with that oil.

He now says he has just found fine metal shavings on the dip stick when he checked the oil level after just recently doing a 4th oil change but the engine is not experiencing any obvious issues.

He has not yet dumped the oil out again to check for further fine metal particles because he wants the dealer to examine it as the car is under warranty.

Seems to me he may have caused some possible damage himself (maybe in the top end) by using an oil that is much too high in viscosity when GM stipulates only a 5w-30 dexos 1 oil should be used.

Anyone have any comments?

Topic

[college man]

You hit the nail on the head. Wrong oil for the wrong application.
Hopefully he gets it under warranty.

[Lorrin Barth]

I know of too many owners of high performance vehicles who are running 20W-50 in their engines. They do this to keep the engine in one piece through severe abuse. I am not going to say that running the wrong viscosity in a modern engine isn’t going to have some effect but metal particles . . . I have a hard time believing it would do that. That is generally a shelled bearing.

If it is a bearing then there should also be some noise. Lacking that and depending on the amount of metal (you need to cut the oil filter open to know) I’d suspect a dirty engine from the factory – one that didn’t get all the shavings cleaned out.

[EricTheCarGuy]

Going outside of what the manufacturer calls for with their oil recommendations invites disaster. If he takes it in for a warranty claim they’ll take an oil sample and send it off. When they do, they may discover that the wrong oil was used. If that’s the case he’s SOL because they may deny the claim.

Good luck and keep us posted.

[Cameron]

Thanks for the comments all.

This may well turn out to be a very good example of why not to use an oil viscosity not mandated by the manufacturer.

I come across quite a few guys who think they know better than the engineers that designed, built and then tested the engines over many thousands of miles and stick unapproved oils in their engines. Their expertise is zero beyond reading an oil manufacturers blurb on their various oils that are not approved for the engine. Arguing with them about the inadvisability of what they do is like talking to a brick wall with some of them.

This guy’s engine currently has the correct 5w-30 syn oil in it so an oil test by GM may not show up anything unusual unless they can detect some remnants of higher viscosity oil in the samples.

[Bryan Carter]

To be honest, in all my years of messing around with cars, I’ve never actually seen metal shavings in the oil. Now granted, I have torn part a many an engine after a catastrophic failure, that had all sorts of metal debris in the pan. But when it comes to pulling the dipstick on a still-functional engine and finding metal shavings? Never seen it.

[Cameron]

[quote=”barneyb” post=108508]I know of too many owners of high performance vehicles who are running 20W-50 in their engines. They do this to keep the engine in one piece through severe abuse. I am not going to say that running the wrong viscosity in a modern engine isn’t going to have some effect but metal particles . . . I have a hard time believing it would do that. That is generally a shelled bearing.

If it is a bearing then there should also be some noise. Lacking that and depending on the amount of metal (you need to cut the oil filter open to know) I’d suspect a dirty engine from the factory – one that didn’t get all the shavings cleaned out.[/quote]

There is no bearing noise……… yet. Normally you might say there might be some particles left from the manufacturing process but the car has had 4 oil changes already and all the flotsam of that kind would have all gone by the second oil change I think – if not after the first change.

I always do an oil/oil filter change on my new engines at about 500 -600 miles for this reason and have done many cars of my own. I check the oil but am yet to find any debris particles from the manufacturing process that are visible to the naked eye in the numerous new cars I have done.

[Author]

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