An oil thread?! You've got to be kidding me...
 

Just thought I'd share my find.
It's winter, it's really cold, and I'm still riding.
Ran the bike mostly on 10W-40 for it's life, switched to Rotella 15W-40 this past spring. Perfectly happy.
Since it's getting a little cold to turn over 15W, I thought I'd do some reading of the back of the oil containers, looking for the JASO-MA certification in a lighter oil.
Noticed a liter of Rotella 5W-40 synthetic and sure enough it's JASO-MA.
I think I found my winter oil.
I'll report back when I need to start her up on a 0-10ºF morning.

I'd bet a nickel that you'll have no problems at all. If my 400+ hp hemi can run 5W-20 in the heat of the summer, I'm sure 5W-40 for the ol' KLX in winter should be fine.

That oil is a good choice year round

I use the 5w-40 in both of my other bikes for almost 10 years now-great stuff. I would run it in the KLX but for some reason EBC doesn't want you to use synthetic on their clutch plates so it's the regular Rotella.

I just look for the JASO-MA, just because. Who really knows if it makes a difference in engine life, but I figure for me at the price of Rotella it isn't worth not running it.

Until someone (don't look for me to do it) actually does the full on test, running comparable engines on oils until they blow up or they do the Consumer's Reports type test doing a tear down and measurement to start and then to finish after a bazillion miles to see what the wear actually is, we'll never actually know. We'll just all do whatever we want... and that's fine with me.

I was running the rotella 5-40 t6 when my exhaust cam melted into the head. Certainly can't say it was the oil, but there was oil getting to the head when this happened.

also worth noting, I did not put the big bore kit in myself so I have no idea what really caused it, I'm still a little weary of running 5-40 at least in the warmer weather. Stocked up on some Kawi 10-40, fingers crossed.

Taking for granted that the oil was full level, I'd have been real curious about the oil passage to the exhaust cam and other installation/build questions related to the cams and oil starvation. One other possibility, if for some reason the cam chain tensioner was overly tight due to installation error or adjustment. Those are the things that would cause a failure you describe. No oil or a cam drive tightened so tight it would pull the cam tight enough to cause the film of oil to be broken allowing the metal to metal contact causing the seizure. Those are the kind of failures I've seen I've never seen an actual oil break down failure. All have had oil starvation due to either mechanical root cause or extremely low oil level.

One point to your comments on the oil weight - 40 is 40 within the oil industry specs, making the 5w40 perform the same as the 10w40 at full operating temperature. But I do understand the reservation when one has had problems when using some products.

Finally broke down and read an oil thread - this one.. I expected more laughs..

Oil is not a funny subject... unless you slip in a puddle of it and fall on your butt and your buddy posts a video of it on YouTube! _:eek: _:D

Maybe we need an oil dry thread! Is cat litter better? Saw dust? oil-dry? pads? left over diapers? Maybe reference a few Brit and HD forum links... :rolleyes:

That 15W40 Rotella was probably originally formulated for 500+ hp/1600-2000 ft/lbs diesels that are running on lighter oils now. Detroit Deisel recommends 10W30 in their new engines and up to 50,000 mile change intervals, depending on the application. They claim it's just as good for the engine as the 15W40, and fuel mileage will improve up to 4% (1% is more realistic). I sent our oil sales rep from work a list of what engines we are running in trucks from 2008 and up (various Cat and Detroit models), and he got back to me that not only are they all suitable to run 10W30, but they just put a 5W30 on the market that we could use as well. Idk if I'll try that one just yet. Then he asked for a list of the older trucks, because they could probably be switched to something lighter, too. I'd have a hard time changing a million mile truck to a lighter oil.

Too far off topic???

Point is, with the advancements in oils we could be running 0W5 in a few years. Who knows?

Happy new year KLXers!

Just think how it would be if they could blend in some bacon grease!

Nobody would ever replace valve seals or rings... well at least none of the men... :D

Oil?
 

I want to try some Beanol in the KDX. I hear it smells delicious.

LOL!...I'm old enough to remember the occasional bean aroma during my early enduro racing days. You knew you were fixing to overtake a bean burner when that odor would pop up before actually seeing the guy ahead. I never used the stuff. Higher tech synthetic 2S oils were becoming very prevalent when I started racing 2S race bikes that had to run premix. The good synthetics were clean and effective. Still, some holdovers continued to run castor for quite a few years but not many. My first motorcycle was a 2S road bike in '69...Suzuki 350 twin...and my later Kawasaki H2-750 triples had oil tanks and pumps. Even my first enduro bike...a '73 Kawasaki F7-175...had an oil tank...but I didn't race that bike for long.:D

Did someone mention bacon?
Mmmm, bacon...

A number of the guys racing KDX's over on the KDX forum swear by Beanol's superior lubrication qualities over the synthetics. And there is surprisingly not a lot of debate. Beanol is expensive . . . so it must be better.

I run Maxima 927 in my KDX once in a while, it smells great.

LOL!...well...that's why they call it an oil thread...LOL!:D

Up in your neck of the woods where cold is more of an issue, that's a fairly, widely, accepted negative for castor in a 2S motorcycle. Unleaded and leaded fuel issues were another debate area for synthetic vs. castor oils. In unleaded fuels, synthetics picked a small advantage IMO. There are so many factors between these two, and my fingers are not up to it. Castor oil is not bad. I just think castor does not offer the advantage level over synthetics that it had back in its heyday. Now, if you're talking about RC vehicles with certain engine designs, that's another debate.

Castor bean oil was quite common in use by flat trackers, both the two strokers and the BSA and Triumph racers. The stuff smells fantastic, but will gum up rings and foul plugs somewhat easier than the regular and synthetics. The two strokes ran premix around 20:1 or 16:1. I'm not sure how the stuff was used in the four strokers, if it was pure or if it was an additive.

One friend would occasionally dump a bit in his gas - nearly as good a smell as bacon!

On performance there was Blendzall two stroke oil that had an additive that was a power booster. I don't believe it was legal for AMA racing and I don't remember what it was, just that it was there.

The flat trackers that run methanol mix it in their fuel for some added lubrication. If you want the smell, but none of the downside, run Maxima 927. It's essentially a synthetic 2 stroke oil with some degummed castor blended in. All the good and none of the bad, and probably the best 2 stroke oil you can buy.

Oil change interval?
 

OK if we're doing an oil thread I would be interested in knowing how frequently folks change their oil.

Just to get us started, my '09 KLX250S manual says every 7500 miles (corrected on 1/5).

I think you're missing a zero...book says 7500. I usually drop the oil no later than 3000 miles, sometimes less if I've been riding hard off-road and slipping the clutch. If shifting starts to suffer, it's time to change the oil.
Back to the point for a second.
After killing the battery in 3ºF trying in vain to start the bike...I changed the oil to the synthetic 5W-40.
Went to start it today in 20ºF and the bike started in about 3 seconds. It normally takes 10-15 seconds before it catches, even at 20º. It ran after 5 seconds w/o choke, which is unprecedented.
Pleased with it so far.
Back to the bean oil. To paraphrase Col. Kilgore,"I love the smell of bean oil in the morning, it's the smell of victory!"

I noticed today that my dirt bike shop carries the 927 and also the Super M which is what I'm using in the KDX.

Thanks, I corrected it in the original post.

Wow, that is a lot of miles and hours on a small engine. Even with a paper filter (which has the same change interval).

I'm thinking I will take mine to 750 miles and send in a sample to

What is Oil Analysis

Since this (used) bike still only has <2000 miles and I am planning to keep it for many years, $35 (including "TBN") would let me know what kind of condition the oil is really in. Will post results.

We used to have a regular poster, blackheart I believe, who was quite interested in used oil analysis. You may want to search around for his posts if you're interested.

I usually go about 1000 to 1500 miles at the most on an oil change. Oil is cheap. My miles are often slow and hard so there's a lot of hours on those miles. Filter every other oil change.

I change my oil about every 1000KM. I change the filter every 2nd oil change. I use Shell Rotella Oil - which is cheap and have heard lots of good feedback about it. Since it only uses 1.5L of oil for a change, changing it often makes sense to me. Not to start (yet another) oil debate, but I believe that it matters less what oil (as long as it meets the standards required) you use, but more how often you change it. I run Rotella in my Goldwing and my Ninja 300 as well, and my son's Shadow 1100 and KLX250, and his wife's Virago 250.

Key word emphasized. No actual testing has been done that I've ever seen. The closest was the oil testing done by Consumer's Reports in their taxi cab test. They measured parts before and then after to see if there was any wear. Didn't support the short intervals.

In the mid 80s we had a customer who would change the Kendall car oil in his GL1100I every 2500 miles. The Kendall rep had samples tested from two of his oil changes - break down was evident, expected normal wear particles in the oil, but the oil was still totally serviceable. The company who stands to sell more product is telling us the oil can run more than 2500 miles easily.

No argument, just what has been published in actual use situation and what we experienced. Bearing tests are done breaking the oil film with pressure at small points of contact, but who knows what it requires to break the film in the actual engine use. The oil testing determines the amount of break down, but there is no specification for how far the oil can break down before damage occurs in actual use.

So at this point all of the interval stuff, including mine, is purely by belief, since nothing has really been tested and documented.

I get what you're saying, but some counterpoints:

Because it's a pretty cheap oil change, is it going to HURT to change the oil more often than the manufacturer recommends? I say no. Is it going to HELP to change it more often? I say maybe. So, my conclusion is that changing the oil more often isn't going to harm anything and might possibly help, and since it's only 1.5L (plus a filter every 2nd change), it's not a very expensive experiment.

One other factor - I've owned the bike for just over 1 year, but put only a little over 3,000KM on the bike (very little street riding, primarily tight woods/single track). Many manufacturers (I'm including autos here as well, since the principals are very much the same) recommend X miles or Y amount of time between oil changes, so the length of time between changes can have somewhat of an effect as well.

I'm slightly less concerned about breakdown of the oil, but more concerned about removing any contaminants that might be there, like moisture etc. If the oil looked just like it did when I put it in, I might lean more towards a longer interval, but even after 1,000KM the oil is much darker and therefore contains more contaminants.

I tend do leave a longer interval between oil changes on my Goldwing, for example, because it's a flat 6 that redlines at 5,500 RPM, and so lives a very 'lazy' life, and these engines are well known to go to 300,000 miles and beyond. On a small displacement, (somewhat) high revving engine, I'm leaning more towards regular oil changes.

No arguments with anyone's interval of changing oil, as long as they don't construe it to saying someone doing a longer interval is doing harm. That is what I'm saying. No one has done true destructive testing or measurement testing. Example of what I'm saying is with two strokes there has been significant destructive "testing" with mix ratios. Too lean on oil can cause seizures, which is well proven with stuck pistons/rings.

On key point for me when it comes to oil is how it is run. You get the short hop driver/rider, where the engine doesn't get up to full operating temperatures, the moisture and acids or whatever can and does build up in the engine. That does require some shorter interval. Some riders, like myself, do not do that short hop stuff. I will virtually always ride my bikes long enough to warm up everything. I saw way too many rusted out exhaust systems, back in the 80s, where riders would short hop and never cook off the moisture in the mufflers. A lot of the low mileage bikes had rusted mufflers, the high mileage bikes frequently didn't.

Either way, as I said we all do what we think is best.

But wouldn't it be interesting if someone just ran a bike, upping the oil as needed, but changing out nothing or nothing but oil filter. Just see what it takes to "break the oil". Or maybe measure and build an engine, then do 10,000 mile oil changes for about 100,000 miles then tear down and measure again - see what wears and how bad. Do it with a higher reving small engine like the KLX or a small twin - the engines where everyone says the revs wear them out faster, as well as with a bigger engine.

That is what I'd love to see... but I'm not going to do it. I'll continue to do the oil/filter every 3000-5000 miles.

I think we're on the same page, I'm just changing the oil more often than most - I figure it can't hurt, but might help.

I, also, would like to see some empirical evidence and research results. There's one member of the forum that has (IIRC) over 50,000KM on his KLX - I'd be interested in knowing what his maintenance schedule was, oil change intervals, oil he used, what other maintenance he did, what mods, if any, he has etc.

I have almost 58,000KM on my bike.
I changed the oil at 300, 600, 1000, and then 1500-5000 miles there after :eek: (depending on how the bike was ridden and the season - less oil changes in winter(it's cold out!) :o). And that is all year round riding (-20ºF - 100ºF) in every type of weather (I should work for USPS).
Until this past summer I used Castrol 10W-40, then switched to Rotella 15W-40.
Thus the start of this thread...
Now running the synthetic Rotella 5W-40.
It has definitely let me start the bike when it and the air temperature is 10ºF! :D:eek: It also runs better in the cold.
If it get's colder than that, I ride it up a ramp, onto my porch, and into my front room (which is unheated, but it helps).
Only mods until this fall were a 300 muffler/header and A/F screw out to get best idle.
I added a better air filter and DJ kit this fall. Runs like a raped ape but the MPG is way down (60mpg - 40+mpg). It couldn't be that I'm enjoying the extra available power, nah...passing with a 6th gear roll on the throttle. :D

All riding miles were mostly a 40-60 minute, 24 mile, one way commute, but there are also thousands of miles of trail riding and long distance highway riding at WOT. Almost every time the bike starts it is ridden and for long enough not to worry about acidic oil.

P.S. - Oddly enough, I don't get the header glow after jetting. I suspect when I tear down the engine there won't be a ton of carbon buildup thanks to the hot lean condition of the stock motor. Not that that helps my current set of rings or valve seals. We'll see this spring when I can get the Duc back on the street (snore. Totally sold on the slow bike fast over the fast bike slow debate) and give the KLX some down time for a strip down and refresh.

Thanks for the info. Good to hear from somebody with what I consider to be a lot of miles on their bike, and what they did (or didn't do) to get it there.

I'm still in favor of a bacon additive! :D

The PO of my bike says that it has synthetic oil in it. Are there any issues with going back to a conventional oil like the Rotella 15W-40? I use that in all my bikes.

Thanks

Nah...