Engine Oil

Mode
ern car oils are far more advanced than motorcycle oils. The reason for this is that synthetic car oils have additives that are incompatible with wet clutches. Put the oil in, if the clutch slips, take it out I guess.

 

NO.
Not suitable for wet clutches, can permanently damage them, I wouldn't risk it.
Not sure why you would want to!

 

Having the wrong oil is better than no oil
I have often in the past used car oils to top up my bikes with no adverse effect on engine or clutch but when it comes to oil and filter time I get a brand name semi synthetic bike oil

 

This argument is as old as the hills.
At the end of the day yes you can but if you start having problems get it out as quickly as possible.
I never put car oil in a bike that's my choice at the end of the day.
If I knew someone had been putting in car oil and was selling I personally would walk away from that bike.
Up to you really at the end of the day.

Meant to say it's almost as good as mentioning countersteering

 

Oil is THE most important component in your bike.
I agree with Gary, I would walk away from a bike if car oil had been used.
Can't see a great saving in price, so why bother.
I know it's a company logo, but oil really is liquid engineering. I always buy a good quality semi-synth from from Miller oils. I know I am paying for a quality product designed for the application I am using it for and not paying for advertising, just for the oil.

 

Now I understand why you bought asbo.
You get to fit car tyres to a bike and now car oil in it too!!!

 

You should see the price of the stuff I put in the KTM!!!

How much cheaper is a good semi-synth car oil compared to a bike oil?
I pay similar money for 5l for my cars, as I do for my bike. So why use car oil?
Agree with your sentiments on using fully-synth, better with a semi IMHO, especially in the big parallel twins.

 

Car oil manufacturers do put additives in that don't go into bike oils , clutch slip is a known problem even with semi syn and full sync bike oils.
Most of the time I've come across others having this problem it's because they use car oil instead of bike oil.
That's my experience, like most of us I disagree with the price hike for bike specific oils.
I would still rather pay that than suffer ( potentially) the problems others seem to have.
It does seem to be a bit of a lottery as to wether or not you will have problems.
At the end of the day it's your bike, your choice

 

He's not the only one who gave you the drama queen icon

 

Is this the ten minute argument ? Or the half hour one

 

And thank you for it. We all have views, just can't agree it's worth risking it.

 

10 minutes, bed time for me.

Nighty, night.

 

We all have different views on this one I think.
I know it was tested somewhere but the results I saw were inconclusive.
Can't even remember who it was that tested it or how subjective or objective it was.
Also I think if I remember correctly it was only done on a short term basis , which wouldn't show if the possibility for deterioration over a longer term was possible.
I just remained as skeptical after reading the results as I was before.

 

Wot? No smiley face?

 

Use only the best quality specified oil.
I am finding it difficult to understand why the original question was asked ?
Why take the risk ?

 

Hi Mick, where I used to live there was no direct access to motorcycle specific oil - indeed even the bike dealers used car engine oil. So during that time I would buy decent decent quality car oil and change it every 4000 kms. That was in my Bandit 1200 (from new) and I kept that for 7 years with no ill effects.

A couple of years ago I managed to pick up a bulk supply of Mobil 10-40 semi synth bike specific oil (7€ per 4ltr bottle from memory) and have been using that in the Tiger.

 

Availability would play a big part.
Any oil is better than none, but where possible use the recommended oils in my opinion.

 

My modern bike, tiger 800xc is run on modern bike oil because that's what the dealer puts in it at service time.

My 1984 Honda cb700 is run on car oil, Castro gtx and I run with the same oil in the gearboxes of my Yamaha RD's with no problems. I even run my lawn mower on gtx . Lets face it modern day oils are better than oils that were supplied when these bike were new.

I would never run fully synthetic car oils in any of my bikes.

Gary M, After all these years of bikes I've never heard of a semi or fully synthetic bike oils causing clutch slip. There's lots of other factors that can make a bike clutch slip, not just oil. Would be interested in knowing which oils in which bikes you are referring to.

Don't forget oils are manufactured to a standard SAE, JASO, API etc and then given a code usually letters. Just make sure your using the correct oil, car or bike.

My close friend and riding buddy fur bob has a collection of approx 30 fully restored by himself Jap classics, a few are Jap market 250cc 4 cylinder 4 stroke rocket ships. He runs those and most of his others on car semi synthetic oils, one of those 250cc 4's red lines at 21,000 rpm, not caused him any problems.

Like others I would never advise others which oil to use, you pays yours money and makes your choice.

It's a bit like putting your head in a cheapo crash helmet or an open face because it makes you look cool and your happy with it, do it.
Oops gone off track

 

It's not just a case of draining the oil and renewing the filter its most likely a fully clutch strip down to decontaminate the clutch plates