Engine Oil Additives

Snake oil - complete waste of money.

Absolutely, try

and click on "Engine Oil Additives"

When i was into the aircooled VW sceen, they used to do an engine blow at the bigger shows, they'd take a knackered engine out of a beetle or camper van, set it up on a stand in the middle of a field, rig her up so she can be starter remotely, (battery, fuel etc so she can run) then they'd drain the oil out, leave the sump bung out so the residual oil in the system will come out when it's started (bet you didnt see a puddle of oil under the car on the one sky said they had drained the oil from when it was started?? if they put the sump bung back in, what's to have stopped them putting more oil in.. camera's are handy things.. freeze frame and all that :)

Anyway, they'd then wedge the throttle wide open, as the engine was an air cooled engine, they'd remove the fan belt that drives the cooling fan, so now then engine has no cooling system, no oil at all.. and the crank case open to let the oil in the oil cooler, pump and galleries drain, and at 12 o clock they'd startthe engine up,

she'd be sat there on the stand, with a crowd around her revving her balls off, some engines let go instiantly.. but they threw a rod or something similar.. would have happened the first time it was revved to the max and left there for more than 2 seconds,

but the last 3 shows i went to that did an engine blow, the engine just sat there revving like hell.. and revving, and revving, after 20 minutes everyone got bored and walked off, i think the last one i saw ran perfectly for 29 minutes.. no oil, no cooling remember, and finaly just gently slowed down and siezed up,

Did the sky commercial run their engine at full throttle for half an hour to prove their addetive worked? bet they jsut ran it at idle for a few seconds, or a few quick blips of the throttle,

In any engine there will be enough residual oil on the parts and in the oil ways to survive a few minutes or running with the sump empty,

But as is usual, these people who sell this stuff play on the fact that most people don't know the first thing about engines, most don't even know there's more than one type of oil available, so when they're told that to make their engine run better and safer etc, put this liquid in.. only costs

19.99 per oil change, they run out and buy it.

Think about anything you ever see that claims to improve the engine running, longevity, performance, fuel consumtion etc, and think, if this 20 quid wonder fluid or devise was so goo, why aren't they fitted by the manufacturers when they build their engines?

most people nowadays buys their new car with a little thought about fuel economy, so if the manufacturer could take a car that got 50mpg, put in a bottle of wonder oil that only cost him 20 quid, and then sell a car that could get 55mpg, he'd be able to sell the car a bit better by saying it gets

5 mpg better than their other cars.

or he could add a fuel magnet, and ecotek devise, some of this wonder oil, 4 electrode spark plugs, a broquet, one of those spark increasing thingys that go in the HT leads and a few other magical fule saving and HP increasing devises on the market,

Then he'd be able to sell you a car that not only went like shit off a shovel down the road, but had to have a second fuel tank fitted to take the excess fuel that all these fuel saving devises were producing.. if each devise reduced your mpg by 10%, then having 11 of them fitted to the car would mean the engine would be shoving more fuel back down the return line than it was taking from the tank :)

oh hang on.. i know why that dosent happen.. it's the petrol companies.. like when they killed off the hydrogen car that ran on tap water, not enough profit for them :))

This implies that 10% of the energy derived from burining your fuel is lost in friction. If this were the case:

[a] Your engine would get very hot very quickly and [b] Engines would last only a few hundred miles before needing replacement.

Alternatively, wouldn't ONE of the oil companies use it? The likes of Castrol could, and if it gave them an advantage, probably would, buy out the additives company patent the product and advertise it big style. But none of them do!!!

Snake Oil Prove it ain't

Thinking about htis a little bit, there are certian parts in the engine where fricton is needed.. like the piston ring to bore seals.... if that area had no friction then the rings wouldent seal, and you'd loose compression and burn oil,

wonder what one of the snake oil company reps would say when asked that question.. prolly say their product has chemical x, the magical chemical that knows only to let the oil cling to bearing surfaces and not the rings :)

Friction is never needed in an engine (except for items such as a clutch of course)! Piston rings seal by a combination of outward spring pressure and compression/combustion pressure acting behind the ring and pushing it outwards onto the cylinder wall. Friction is a by-product of this ring/wall interaction.

HTH

Anthony Remove eight from email to reply.