OnTheReel

E85 $2.28. Tested at E80. Premium 93 seems frozen at $3.99 for the last year so I’m glad I don’t need it.

Should be this one, no? Like many companies it seems buying by the single quart is a great way to overpay. I don’t have a home for this stuff anyway but a VOA would be interesting.

3 pack of 5 quart jugs for ~$105 on Amazon. PAO/Ester, nice HTHS. Red Line-ish blend for less than half price? Honestly seems like great value so I’m wondering what the catch is.

Here’s some high miles that impressed me. Thing is really really clean for what it is. Based on the hours, average speed ~56.2 MPH.

It seems to me more and more that dealers simply don’t want to service their cars anymore. Dunno how else to explain this. You can walk in and drive out with a new car in an hour. But replacement radiator for the same new car? 6 months! I mean there’s just no effort to even be competitive. Maybe some people fall for it but can’t be many.

Yeah, I did a lot to my Cummins back in the day. Stupid easy to make power with those, and they just don’t care. New diesels I won’t touch. They make triple the power of mine right out of the box but far too much complexity. Same with pretty much anything today. Think that’s some of Grumps point. There aren’t any 5.9s or Vortec 5300s being sold in new cars anymore. The engines that replaced them are more complicated and typically built much worse to boot. So you have to adjust maintenance to get more longevity, or just bury your head in the sand like some here. Pretend nothing changed.

Modern engine design is like 500k miles away from that pre-emissions 160hp 5.9 Cummins. It’s gonna take a lot more care and effort to do that with anything new.

Most motors will get there but not every motor with 168k is equal. Some have very little wear and will do another 168k easily. Others are on their third cam, use a quart every 1k and are just about ready for the bin. But yeah, it made there I guess. “High mileage” on its own doesn’t impress me. I’ve rolled plenty of odometers. Now, high mileage vehicles that look and function like they aren’t? Yeah, that’s pretty cool. Takes effort.

I happen to really like the fleet I have currently. And I modify and drive them hard. Success for me is having wear rates much lower than universal averages in spite of that. Simply by paying attention to many of the same things Grump preaches. You can dislike his delivery or just not care about your vehicles as much he does. But that doesn’t change what I’ve tested and observed on my own vehicles.

Truck has a ton of cooling from factory. They just made poor decisions to use it. I’d be running 205-215 coolant, oil and ATF when stock in the same conditions. I pulled the OEM trans TBV and found it’s the same part number used on V6 Challengers and Chargers which was an odd choice. 1/2” lines and a big cooler don’t mean squat when you’re necked down to 1/4” at the outlet of the TBV. A TBV that is set to open way too late as well.

Fair. But the point was more his nonchalant reaction (or really no reaction at all) to running those temperatures. It’s normalized, and even worse some people actually think it’s BETTER. His truck still has the factory warranty using approved fluids, and stock thermostat & TBV. My truck doesn’t. Which one would you want to buy used?

A tale of two TRXs. Mine on mile 40 of a highway run in 90 deg heat. Oil: 199 (Red Line 5w50 just installed) Coolant: 185 ATF: 165 Meanwhile this is what most people think is OK: ATF: 214 Coolant: 234 Oil: 286! (Factory approved 0w40, gotta save that warranty). “The fluid temps were well within allowed range. 286 may seem high but it was for a short period and is OK with fully synthetics. TRX has safety limits, which were beyond these temps.” What’s the safety limit? Punching a rod through the oil pan to add extra ventilation? We’re getting beyond blind faith in the OEs and into pure ignorance at this point. I heard an analogy somewhere that I liked. Imagine your body had a full warranty for 40 years. Would you smoke 3 packs a day and eat only McDonalds because all your medical expenses were covered for that time? Of course not because what happens on year 41? Vehicle warranty is no different. Factory spec oil is often the McDonalds, and those operating temperatures are the chain smoking.

The blurb about ZF asking GM why the hell they were changing parts of the 6 speed (to save money) made me laugh. I can picture some irate German engineer losing his mind…watching his baby get cost cut to death by those morons.

I probably used to be in that camp. At least to some degree. I was always diligent with maintenance but the materials I used weren’t always top shelf, unless you mean the top shelf at Walmart where the cheap jugs of SuperTech sit. My thinking these days is that the warranty will be gone eventually (or immediately if I modded the truck) and I’m on the hook for all the mess left behind using their “warranty safe” oils. Ditto with the boiling hot factory thermostats and TBVs to appease the EPA. I honestly sleep better with no warranty, excellent quality lubricants (typically not API), and reasonable temps.

Only if she installs it for me.

Advance Auto has them online for $219.99 with their promo code. I got the one in my truck from them and might grab another for the Jeep. Hard to beat that deal.

I don’t always like what mine has to say, but it’s a great device. Much easier to work with than the Scan Gauge II I had.

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum from the mirage. 900+chp on E85 currently.

Yeah, I was just rattling off what I did stream of consciousness…not in order.

Mom’s 2015 Jetta 2.0 56,654 miles. Doing some internal clean up on the old girl. And in my shed. 2qts Red Line 0w40, 2qts Red Line 5w40, Fram Ultra filter, Red Line SI-1 in tank with Mobil 93, CRC intake cleaner through the vacuum port, new air filter. Also repaired exhaust leak, coupler after the cat had its clamps rusted off.

2021 Ram TRX 25,937 total miles 2,297 miles on interval M1 SuperCar 5w50 out and back in to use the rest up. Sample taken. Grumpy should appreciate how this oil is formulated. Lower detergents to maximize anti-wear tribofilm and HTHS of 4.4. Unknown how much it’ll shear but I would expect a lot. We will find out soon.

2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee 3.6 101,723 total miles 4,088 on interval Red Line 5w30 & Fram Ultra out, sample taken, Red Line 0w40 and Fram Ultra in. Using up some old oil reserves. Fram made some changes to their filter in this application. Old one was wired backed synthetic media made in USA, new one syn blend, hecho en Mexico. Overall the new one looks better as far as pleat spacing / build quality. Go figure.

End of the video, Mobil 1’s response to his question on lower viscosity oils. “In modern engines wear is not a limiting factor”. Tacit admission that reduced viscosity WILL increase wear, but not enough to matter when the rest of the car gets thrown away first. All of the arguments in favor of lower viscosity oils come from that frame of mind. It’s not about what’s actually best. It’s for that $60 per vehicle he estimates GM saves. Sorry for my pessimistic, defeatist attitude toward the entire auto industry but that’s what I’m going with.

On the other end of the spectrum, my truck also has aggressive cat overtemp protection where it dumps fuel whenever cat temperature reaches an inferred 1701*. Kills power and sends injector duty cycle to the moon. Commanded LAMBDA for WOT at .72. Happens on stock vehicles, but much more frequently for those that add boost without tuning. They don’t realize that their modification often kills power instead of increasing it.

Not having a stick option is the only thing that bugs me about the C8. I know it would be slower, blah blah blah…but it just doesn’t seem right for a Corvette.