these engines cam factory with detergent oil. So i am not sure why any of you would want a non detergent oil.

 

I wish people would stop posting about thngs they are clueless about!

Any old sluge created from ND crap will be hard as a rock and not moveable by anything short of a nuke.
There will be a syrupy layer of goo that will become dissolved by the modern multiweights. The first thing you want to do is drop the pan and clean it and the screen. Id also check pump tolerances as that ND crap will likely have caused wear resulting in looseness and pressure reduction.

The path to and thru the rocker shafts is probably plugged also.

The first 2000-3000 miles just change the oil & filter every 500 miles or so until the oil stays clear as in normal use with good oil.

Ive asked several of the clueless on many forums to prove to me that changing from ND caused an engine failure. The BEST I ever got was 3rd hand stories all blaming their grandfather.

 

286Merc, First of all thanks again for the answer in the other thread.
I wanted to jump in and relate a first hand story about a switch to HD causing engine problems.
Please note, it was an EXTREME situation. Nothing that anyone here is likely to run into.
But it did happen, I was familiar with all the vehicles involved, still own the one that was innocently involved, and can get you signed testimonials still.
All this occurred about 1968 or 9.
My friend had a Ford 8N tractor. He might remember if I ask, but it was about a 1947 model.
I'm sure that sometime in its life it had had the oil changed, but not in at least 3 years I know of. My friend was not big on maintenance. He kept his trucks and most equipment up fairly well, but the old Ford was just a matter of benign neglect.
Despite that, it started and ran well. It used about a quart of oil every couple of months or so. It got cheap ND when it needed it.
I had ( and still own ) a 1960 model CJ5 Jeep with the 134 CI Hurricane engine. It ran on 10W30 Chevron HD. After many many thousands of miles, it went through about a quart and half between changes.
We were going to be doing some hunting at my friend's farm, so I drove the jeep up and left it. It was getting close to time for a change, so I threw a case of its oil in the back with a filter figuring I would change the oil one afternoon.
My friend had a few corn fields, which was the primary job of the 8N, but his main crop then and now was grass. NO, not that kind. He raised and sold Centipede Grass Sod. One afternoon, he was heading out to plow a corn field, so he swung by the barn to gas the tractor up. This was back in the good old days when gas would keep longer than a week, and he had a tank that the local gas distributor kept filled and billed him monthly.
He checked and noticed that the tractor was a quart or so low. He was out of his, but he remembered seeing the case in my Jeep. He knew I would not mind, so he grabbed one quart out and poured it in the tractor.
He then started out across the grass field towards the corn field. Imagine a 40 acre lawn. Close mown, tight sod. You could probably throw a dime blindfolded and just walk in that direction and find it.
I was supposed to drive over in the jeep and pick him up as he was going to leave the tractor in the field that night. I started that way and met him walking back. He said that he needed a hand with the tractor. It was sitting in about the middle of the grass field. Following the tracks, you could see some oil drops at first, getting thicker and thicker as they went along with a HUGE long splotch of oil about 50 feet behind the tractor. The tractor was sitting there covered in oil. It was obvious that all the oil had poured out at one time. Checking to see where it had come from, we found a large hole in the center of the oil pan. Wiping away the dirt, we discovered that it was the oil drain hole!. If you are familiar with an 8N, the oil drain plug is a large screw in hex headed plug about an inch or so across. ( Working from memory here, any 8N owners feel free to correct me as to the size. But it is darn big.) Plus it has a screen attached to it.
The plug was nowhere to be found. Remember this was in a mown grass field. We went to a neighbor's, and found one on a tractor he was using for parts. We put the plug back in, and refilled the tractor with the only oil we had. My HD. Probably the last straw. The tractor cranked up, but in just a few minutes, started smoking. Then knocking. Then the oil started coming out. Everywhere!
Valve cover gaskets, pan gasket, HEAD gasket. It even started leaking out around the spark plugs!
We towed it back to the barn, and tried to stem the leaks. Finally we took it to a local shop. His final report was he did not even think the block was worth trying to salvage. He said that the mains were mostly gone. Not worn down, gone. He asked how long it had been knocking, and we told him that it had not knocked at all before the meltdown.
I don't think he ever believed us about the drain plug. All I can figure is that there was so much sludge inside and dirt and oil on the outside of the engine that whenever the drain plug did fall out. Probably weeks or maybe years ago, that it did not leak until the HD oil softened what was plugging the hole. My friend did remember later that the tractor had developed a leak from underneath about a year of so before when he was disking in some really dusty weather. But, it had stopped, so he did not check to see what was wrong. I guess the dust and dirt "healed" it.

Like you have heard all the stories about switching to HD, but cannot verify them. Except for this extreme one.
I was there, and it happened as close to that as my memory can reconstruct the 38 or so ago facts. I still own the jeep, and the last time I looked, parts of the old tractor block were still where we stripped off the last usable part.

To really set the cat among the chickens, an old mechanic I trusted. ( Hes dead now, but I would still trust him if he were alive) once told me about a fleet he was head mech for that switched from one BRAND to another because it was a better deal. He said the two brands were incompatible, and caused all kinds of smoking and knocking whenever a quart was poured in.
I do not believe he was lying, however, it happened in the early 50s or so, and who knows what was really in the new oil. Don't forget it was a better deal. Plus, were the additives, such as they were, compatible back then?
This has gotten WAY too long. If you are interested, remind me to tell you about my experience with an oil change place sometime.

J.

 

Good story. I have had a 1954 Ford Model 600 tractor for 12 years. Dont know what the previous owner(s) used for oil, but except for recently it has received 30 weight detergent. I started using using 10/30 this last fall. It has done very well, not burning oil, though there is some loss due to leaks. Although it receives hard use, it hasnt seen the kind of abuse your friend's 8N saw, which was lucky to have lasted as long as it did. It sounds like the 8N was barely hanging on when the balance tipped.
An interesting note: I was looking at an e-bay add for 8 Y-block lifters. The add said they also fit Model 600 and other models of Ford tractors.

 

Back in the late 50's I worked part time at various jobs, one of which was a service station. They used to buy recycled oil in 55 gal drums for their lower grade customers (cheap ba****s was what he called them). Hand crank the oil into glass jars with a long screw on spout. I remember several stories about what that stuff did to some engines. Who knows what additive incompatibilities existed since it was a blend of everything drained out of crankcases.

These days MOST of us know better!

 

That must have been a common practice, because I can remember seeing those exact same jars at the Skelly service station when I was a kid. They looked dirty and covered with dust and grime. Thanks for the short trip back to the olden days.

 

Now it seems the concensus is that premium lubrication is important to an engine for longetivity & reliability. Having established that, is it fair to say that the best lubrication is what we are looking for to keep our engines at their best. This is where I would suggest Synthetic lubricants be considered. Synthetics have been proven superior to regular lubricants in every application. Synthetics are used on the space shuttle & in many of our high end cars today from the factory. Rusty Wallace from Nextel cup racing says that they can't afford not to use synthetics running in the 9000 RPM range, the cost of the engine is at steak. Most Nextel cup cars run synthetics. Wouldn't it make sense that we should use it in our prized classic automobile, and our daily driver as well. That is my opinion. Bill Hanson.

 

well bill.

consider that NASCAR uses oils made for race only. The oils are thin some guys use a striaght 10w or 20w. as long as the engine lasts 1 race they are good. Also they use mostly ester based GP IV oils. if you want a GP IV oil be prepared to drop 12.30 a quart for it. the typical PAO like mobil 1 starts out as a crude oil and is them processed.

did you know synthetics have a higher cold start up wear rate? also did you know that a PAO has less solvency than a dino oil. a tiny bit of ester is added to a PAO oil to make like a dino oil in terms of seal swell and desposit reduction.




the y block engines were never made to use a non detergent oil. they came factory with detergent oil. i hope no one is confusing the term "non detergent" with "single weight" which has been done here before. some seem to think a straight 30w is non detergent. not true. the only non detergent oils are SA rated. SB is also non detergent but has anti scuffing compound , mostly a tiny bit of ZDDP under 100 ppm. which is pretty bad. because most cams need 1,000 ppm to stay alive if they are flat tappet.

 

You seem to know more than I about lubricants. I do know that at -70 degrees regular oil won't pour & synthetic will. At this point the synthetic has better wear characteristics. On the upper end of the scale, I have seen the temperature of a speed reducer lower itself from 160 degrees to 140 degrees enhancing its life by months simply by adding synthetic lubricant. "Y" blocks were made to use detergent oil. That was the best in its day. Today synthetics exceed the characteristics of yesterdays detergent oils. Bill.

 

synthetics only vary in the basestock. the add packs are not anything special , they are just like dino's. most syns will cold start down to -34. the synthetic will still flow, but its add pack is coiled up in a tight molecular structure and will remain like that until it warms up so the wear rate is pretty high during this time. so the additives are not doing there job. but the oil still flows. there is always a trade off. most modern GP II/II+ dino's will start down to 0 degrees just fine. but after that a good synthetic wins.

 

Correct me if I am wrong, but I beleive that synthetics flow more freely with less internal friction. Tests have shown distinct power gains by simply changing to synthetics. This in turn will cause internal parts to wear less giving your engine more life. Bill.

 

I am happy with my Quaker State 10w-30. I run it in my Y-Block without hesitation. I think that the protection I get from it is just as good as a syn considering that my vehicles are not ran hard or used for work purposes. I will admit that if an engine is to be subjected to extreme working conditions, then the syn should be used. But for my vehicles, just cruising along, the 10w-30 is perfect. I change oil and filter about every 5000 miles or once a year, which ever comes first. And on the tractor story front, where the oil was uzzing out of every orifice, I suspect that the years of built up crud must have come loose because of the detergent oil and ended up blocking the vent ports. I have heard stories from old mechanics that oil would leak out of strange places on engines when the vent pipes would get plugged. The blow-by from the pistons creats high pressure inside the block where there should be none. I use non-detergent oil in my lawn mower. I read somewhere that it was the best way to go. Good luck, Jag

 

that sound like a good oil wish i could get in australia

 

Boy, whoever said people are more loyal about their brand and weight of motor oil than anything else is right. Probably never get a consensus on what he needs to do. We all know non-detergent is not good, but pouring in something that is going to loosen up a bunch of crud is equally bad. He doesn't want to have to drop the pan and replace a bunch of gaskets, just wants to keep driving the truck the way it is for now. While I would never use non-detergent in my vehicles, if it has been used in that truck for all this time and it's working, might as well keep using it until the engine wears out, then after a rebuild start using sythetic.

 

I'd use a good 10w30 or 15w50 diesel engine oil and not worry about it.