[Evil-Bee-NH]

Originally Posted by dizo702

This does include 2 trips to California and 1 trip to New Mexico (which was about 9 hours driving with only stops for food and bathroom breaks)

Ya can't wait for my 16 hour trip to Bowling Green, KY this July for CamaroFest...

[dizo702]

Originally Posted by Evil-Bee-NH

Ya can't wait for my 16 hour trip to Bowling Green, KY this July for CamaroFest...

lmao good luck sir, Bowling Green would be about 26 hour drive for me touching 7 different states.. too bad I don't have the time to do it tho

[Ashium]

This is what I suggest to people. If they actually plan to keep a car long. Pick your oil/filter combo you'll stick with. Run the car to the miles you do your oil changes (3k,5k, whatever). Order this oil kit http://www.blackstone-labs.com. Before you change your oil, do like a 15-20min drive. It will warm up the oil and cook off any fuel or water in the oil. Capture a sample in the provided bottle. Send it off and get real results.

They will tell you if you are stretching your oil too far between changes, or can actually go farther, as well as tell you other things about the oil additive levels.

I was changing my oil in my GTO at 5k, and was actually able to start stretching it out to 7k before the oil was degrading to the point of needing a change.

Just my $.02

[dizo702]

Originally Posted by Ashiu

This is what I suggest to people. If they actually plan to keep a car long. Pick your oil/filter combo you'll stick with. Run the car to the miles you do your oil changes (3k,5k, whatever). Order this oil kit http://www.blackstone-labs.com. Before you change your oil, do like a 15-20min drive. It will warm up the oil and cook off any fuel or water in the oil. Capture a sample in the provided bottle. Send it off and get real results.

They will tell you if you are stretching your oil too far between changes, or can actually go farther, as well as tell you other things about the oil additive levels.

I was changing my oil in my GTO at 5k, and was actually able to start stretching it out to 7k before the oil was degrading to the point of needing a change.

Just my $.02

What is the benefit of stretching out oil life other then to save some time/money?

[Ashium]

Originally Posted by dizo702

What is the benefit of stretching out oil life other then to save some time/money?

Would you drink 3/4 of a beer and dump the rest before grabbing your next? Basically if the additives haven't worn down past acceptable levels you are just wasting money. Maybe not a huge deal for cars that take 5 or less qts of oil. However when you need 7qts like that car does, your looking at about $60 each change doing it yourself. 13 years later it adds up to a nice amount. However I'm a full time tech, and after working on people's cars all day. The last thing I want to do is non modification maintenance to my car

[Evil-Bee-NH]

Would be interesting to see the results for our cars but i'll likely stick with my 5k oil change for pre-mentioned reasons.

[Nate...]

No reason I know of not to use seafoam. It is safe for DI engines. Might help with carbon buildup but probably not worth much at this point.

I recommend an early first oil change to get the various assembly oils and possible worn metal from parts clearance-ing themselves during break in and then following your recommended maintenance schedule.

The oil life monitor that GM provides is very intelligent and accounts for things like engine temperature, outside temperature, RPM... I trust it to tell me when my oil should be changed, (as long as I'm using a Dexos oil) I usually change it at about 20% life. If I'm not using a Dexos oil I change at a mileage based frequency.

[Elite Engineering]

To add some actual info from studies, you do NOT want to ever use a solvent based engine running upper induction cleaner on ANY DI engine due to the damage the hard crystalline deposits cause when some of the coking build up material is loosened. These engines are introducing fuel at 2,000 plus PSI and unlike past port injection engines or carbureted engines where you CAN use these products safely and benefit, we have yet to see a case where there was not scouring of the pistons and cylinder walls when used on the hard sand like abrasive make up of a GDI engines deposits are broken loose as there is always some pushed between the pistons and cylinder walls. These products are seeing their core business in jeopardy with GDI engines so are pushing more and more, but Ford will void the warranty if used on an Ecoboost GDI engine. The only safe way to use these is during a manual valve cleaning allowing it to soak into the deposits to help loosen before cleaning.


The "soft carbon" of port injection engines could safely be removed with these products, but the deposits on the backsides of the intake valves on a DI engine are a hard sand like abrasive material as they are baked at such high temps with no fuel cooling the valves like in the past. Just Google search how many GDI engines had rod bearing failures shortly after a treatment, etc.


So word of warning. Want to see pictures? Have plenty of engines we have inspected if anyone wants more details.


OEMtech has some good advice. ONLY use a full synthetic oil and contrary to the new Dexos full syn, many dealers are STILL using the cheap blend for the "free" oil changes. The biggest threat to your oil is the fuel dilution with DI engines. It is not uncommon to see fuel percentages exceed the 5% fuel level where oil is considered condemned and no longer able to protect in as little as 5k miles, so for best protection, take oil samples and have tested at different mile accumulation to see.


When you look at some DI engines they can in the winter months with cold start enrichment see levels as high as 7-12% by 5-6k miles. The reasons? much higher CR DI engines run as well as unlike 45-55 PSI of port injection at 2,000 plus PSI much more fuel is washed down past the rings causing the dilution levels were seeing.

[Michigan1LTRS]

Thank you Elite Engineering for taking the time to do that write up. Very informative. Much appreciated.

[dizo702]

Originally Posted by Ashiu

Would you drink 3/4 of a beer and dump the rest before grabbing your next? Basically if the additives haven't worn down past acceptable levels you are just wasting money. Maybe not a huge deal for cars that take 5 or less qts of oil. However when you need 7qts like that car does, your looking at about $60 each change doing it yourself. 13 years later it adds up to a nice amount. However I'm a full time tech, and after working on people's cars all day. The last thing I want to do is non modification maintenance to my car

So its essentially just time/money. That's an easy trade for me, maybe I do 1 or 2 extra oil changes every 20k miles but I never have to worry about oil life. I am ok with that

[Michigan1LTRS]

Originally Posted by dizo702

So its essentially just time/money. That's an easy trade for me, maybe I do 1 or 2 extra oil changes every 20k miles but I never have to worry about oil life. I am ok with that

Amen brother. Better safe than sorry.

[Corner carver]

Originally Posted by Michigan1LTRS

Thank you Elite Engineering for taking the time to do that write up. Very informative. Much appreciated.

+1 thank you... Was considering a seafoam treatment, but not anymore!

[Nate...]

Originally Posted by Elite Engineering

To add some actual info from studies, you do NOT want to ever use a solvent based engine running upper induction cleaner on ANY DI engine due to the damage the hard crystalline deposits cause when some of the coking build up material is loosened. These engines are introducing fuel at 2,000 plus PSI and unlike past port injection engines or carbureted engines where you CAN use these products safely and benefit, we have yet to see a case where there was not scouring of the pistons and cylinder walls when used on the hard sand like abrasive make up of a GDI engines deposits are broken loose as there is always some pushed between the pistons and cylinder walls. These products are seeing their core business in jeopardy with GDI engines so are pushing more and more, but Ford will void the warranty if used on an Ecoboost GDI engine. The only safe way to use these is during a manual valve cleaning allowing it to soak into the deposits to help loosen before cleaning.


The "soft carbon" of port injection engines could safely be removed with these products, but the deposits on the backsides of the intake valves on a DI engine are a hard sand like abrasive material as they are baked at such high temps with no fuel cooling the valves like in the past. Just Google search how many GDI engines had rod bearing failures shortly after a treatment, etc.


So word of warning. Want to see pictures? Have plenty of engines we have inspected if anyone wants more details.


OEMtech has some good advice. ONLY use a full synthetic oil and contrary to the new Dexos full syn, many dealers are STILL using the cheap blend for the "free" oil changes. The biggest threat to your oil is the fuel dilution with DI engines. It is not uncommon to see fuel percentages exceed the 5% fuel level where oil is considered condemned and no longer able to protect in as little as 5k miles, so for best protection, take oil samples and have tested at different mile accumulation to see.


When you look at some DI engines they can in the winter months with cold start enrichment see levels as high as 7-12% by 5-6k miles. The reasons? much higher CR DI engines run as well as unlike 45-55 PSI of port injection at 2,000 plus PSI much more fuel is washed down past the rings causing the dilution levels were seeing.

I would be very interested to see you post pictures from inspections that you have done and include information like mileage, vehicle usage (DD, Winter, Sunny day only...) and fuel type used including auxiliary fueling. Also it would benefit the community to see the studies that you are referring to.

After some light searching on my own it seems that what you are saying is supported. There is a common occurrence with gasoline direct injection engines of buildup on the intake valves because of the lack of "washing" that a PFI engine experiences.

Still, I am not sold that adding a treatment to the fuel system would dislodge these deposits. It seems odd that putting something in the fuel would dislodges deposits that are there specifically because fuel cannot reach them... Something seems to not add up with that one...

After my light research I now will not be running a Seafoam product through my LTG, and appreciate the quoted post. BUT! I would like to respectfully request that Elite Engineering provide some more evidence of this buildup on the intake valves and the claim that putting Seafoam in the fuel system would dislodge it. I only say this because they are obviously an oil catch can company and have something to gain by this community thinking their LTG engines are at risk.

[Giri]

Are we talking about both seafo through fuel and seafoam through the vacuum valve?