I was wondering if its alright to use regular car oil opposed to motorcycle oil in my ex250 , Are there any problems that can arise from using it or no ? The bike has just over 2k miles on it now so I figure I'll be running synthetic sometime soon . Any help would be great thx

 

I use Castrol GTX-10W40 oil in both my bikes.Oil type/brandsalmost always stirs up a heated argument on the forums. I haven't found any problem using Castrol, but watch out for the energy conserving oils. They apparently don't work well with motorcycle clutches.

 

me personaly i wouldn't use it in my bike. If i was you i would use a good syntic oil for bikes. I've heard that it will mess up a bike because it's not formulated to a bikes needs. Because of the high rpms bikes have it will break down faster.

 

I have read alot of arguments and articles about this subject. The two things that I have read the most are that viscosities of car oils break down sooner than motorcycle oils and car oils contain anti foaming agents that will cause your clutch to slip. I read a study that compaired the two oils in an air cooled motorcycle where they rechecked the viscosities after 500 miles of hard riding. I wish I still had the link because some of the car oils (mobil one and castrol) maintained a higher viscosity than the motorcycle oils. Personally I would run the motorcycle oil because it is not that much more expensive and who wants to risk a $10k bikes motor to a maybe?

 

I can't remember where the article was that I read, but this article tested many automotive oils along with motorcycle oils and found only small differences between them. Different automotive oils did better than others, but I remember the best tested car oilswere on par with the motorcycle oils. I believe theoil break-down tests weren't much different either between car and motorcycle oils.

Of course for the best qualityoil, go with synthetic. It can't beat.

 

AUGH! This topic has been on every forum I've ever seen!
There's a wealth of data out there (try the Amsoil site) regarding synth's and dino's. Personally? I've run Mobil-1 for years and haven't had ANY clutch problems. I'm not just blowingblue smoke here: I've had the engines apart and they always look very clean andlike new. I've had some serious drag racing friends(as in: won the National Superbike shootouta few years back) who swear by the stuff. Just do an oil changeaccording to the amount of stress you're putting on the engine. (i.e. use your brain.) I think most top shelf synthetic is probably okay to use, I just like Mobil-1 because it works well for me.
As for oil filters, actually, if your localauto parts dealer carries WIX filters, do some homework. They make excellent filters (unlike Fram; serious horror stories)for many bike applications. TheWIX for a '95 ZX9 is part number 51358.
(And while I'm on a rant....) Spark plugs. (This is for the rookies) Don't just swap-out and switch brands without double checking the heat application. For example, don't jump from an NGK to something else and assume the heat index will be identical even if the "chart" says so! If you decide to switch, ask yourself WHY you're switching; what's the problem? Don't jump from a 9-E to a 6-E because you think it will cure your bike's "hesitation." You'll end-up hole-ing the piston(s) to match the one in your head! Also, some brands of plugs go from 1-9 cold to hot, others go 9-1 cold to hot. Make sure you know what you're asking for. This is very elemental stuff (sorry vets) but newbies---save yourself some serious grief! (No; I haven't done something this dumb.)

 

As noted, oil and filters always stir up heated debates.

It has nothing to do with viscosity difference between an auto or M/C oil. Viscosity is Viscosity...

An oil may foam due to it's additive packs orlack thereof, meaning the balance of the additives. Easy reference would be this, although not M/C, still an engine... A few years back, there was a problem with Ford/Navistar diesels with foaming. The cause was the Silicone gasket material reacted with the Siliconeused in the oil for... ANTI-Foaming... It is one of those BALANCE issues... Silicone will act as an anti-foming agent in a limited quantity, but will cause foam in a greater amount... BALANCE of Additives....

Looking at so-called studiesfor M/C oils is pretty difficult as most of them are at least 5 years old and just saw one circulating from 1991 !!! Big Deal you may say ??

The big deal is that oils have changed in the last2 years much less 5-10 or 15 years especially in M/C oil where additives have been developed that were never before available.

I prefer to stay away from automotive oil for my bikes and look for an M/C Specific Synthetic oil. I always recommend looking for a JASO Rating of at least MA, preferably MA 2, the highest available,which are Clutch Performance ratings, and if using a Synthetic, use the Viscosity recommended for your bike which with Metrics is usually 10-40 or 20-40... just worry about the 40 part....

NEVER use an oil additive in Anything..

www.amsoil.com/lit/g2156.pdf will give you 28 pages of Certified Tests on M/C oils

Doc

 

Like markmeinteil says, this subject has been beat to death on so many bike forums.

I've been using Mobil 1 15w-50 car oil in my ZRX for 56k of the 62k I have on it with no problems.
Just don't get the "engergy conserving" oils.

 

No worries Kev. I am an Amsoil user as well.

 

FYI. Japanese spark plug mfrs. count down as they get hotter: a cr9e is colder that a cr6e, and American mfrs. get hotter as they go up a rj17yc is hotter than a rj12yc. I just learned this a little while ago. when at the parts store with the "old man", and they didn't have the plug he needed. he asked if they one a range hotter the guy looked at him like he was crazy, so he explained it to him, and I learned something new.