I agree that dino oils are fine for the Z, providing you are changing your oil at regular intervals. I like the synthetics for a number of reasons, one of them being that my MPG went up to 34 MPG with highway driving once I switched to RP.

 

At about 1500 miles -- first oil change -- I switched to the Mobil 1 -- on the recommendation of friends --- and started a 5,000 mile roadtrip. At around 3000 miles somewhere in Washington state at 1am in the morning -- oil pressure was dropping and valves were making a hell of a racket (but no idiot light comes on) . YES -- I KNOW -- I should've been checking along the way -- I found the nearest hotel and the next morning -- dipstick was dry.

Had the oil changed at one of those jiffy lube places -- but they didnt have Mobil 1 -- so used Castor. I stopped at the first city I came to with a Nissan dealership. They said I'd not done any damage -- told me about the potential oil useage issues -- and said to just watch it on my way home. By the time I got home -- had over 8000 miles on it --- hadnt used/or leaked any oil that I could tell. Next oil change at home -- Service manager tells me the Z doesn't handle Mobil 1 well at all. Car now has 11000 on it ... and still no noticable oil useage.

HOWEVER -- since that night when the valves started making noise -- the car has started "pinging" regadless of gas or load. It doesn't do it ALL the time (dealership claimed it never did it for them!!) but its extremely annoying.

AGAIN -- the Service Dept. claims its nothing to be worried about -- couldn't possibly be related to any oil issue --- and offer only the lamest responses regarding the pinging issue.

As Im not very mechanically inclined --- just what should I do at this point? (besides not bother you folks with my long winded story??)

 

It's a well known fact here that many of our cars do not like Mobil 1, (mine included)! My oil light has NEVER illuminated. My understanding is that the oil light comes on when you are down to 2 quarts of oil. WTF is that Nissan?

 

I have been running Mobil 1 and K&N Filter on my 03 Touring pushing 60k and did notice slight consumption but I figure this is normal since I don't change the oil until every 5k and use the Z as my daily driver putting on high mileage in short periods of time. Nothing to be worried about, I bought an oil pan spacer for added insurance. I had no problems when I did the switch my Z ran smother and more efficient. I have just installed my stillen s/c and plan to run RP for my tranny and diff fluids. Should I change the type of oil as well, I don't know what is recommended for s/c applications? any input?

 

I am running RP and i have noticed that i oil consumption. I had the same problem with Mobil 1 but now i was thinking of using Amsoil. Any good ideas??

 

You might try using a non sythetic base oil, Castrol GTX or equivalent on your next oil change to see if does or does not consume that type of oil.

 

After my second oil change with Redline, I can clearly see it doesn't burn as much oil.

When I was running RP 10W30 it would burn about 1.5-2 quarts per 3k miles. That is why I always change my oil at 2500. I now use Redline 10W40 and per 3k miles I burn maybe 1 quart if that.

I also use Redline in my transmission and rear end and it works wonders. I recommend redline over RP just because it reacts better with my driving which is WOT most of the time.

Arin

 

Now I'm wondering if many of the oil consumption problems are caused by running synthetics too early and not allowing the rings to set properly. This seems to also be a problem in numerous other engines (RSX and Corvettes).

 

I ran Mobil 1 for a while and was losing at least 1 quart by eahc oil change. I switched over to Royal Purple for a while and burned a lot less but my valvetrain got very noisy. After that I went with Turbonetics TS-1 oil and valvetrain went back to normal and I stopped burning oil. I also ran an oil analysis on my car after 13k miles of using Turbonetics oil... I'll attach it here.

 

Your understanding is incorrect.
The oil light comes on when the oil pressure switch closes contacts because of low or no oil pressure.
In 95% of the time this would occur because the oil level in the oil pan is lower than the pickup point or the the pickup screen is blocked because of poor lubrication maintainance. ( not doing regular regular oil changes)
The other 5% would be because of large clearances (wear), meaning that the oil pump is not able to create enough oil pressure at normal opperating temp's & lower revs to keep the oil pressure switch contacts apart.

 

I had a Ford Explorer that had a fact. sensor on the oil pan that would trigger the light at 1 quart low, talk about careful.

 

Good info.


It's nice to see "U.O.A." instead of "B.S."

Here's mine, 5k miles on some pennzoil from the dealer.

No real problems. Note that it is still showing initial wear even at 10k miles.

Maybe some of you guys burning synthetic simply switched too early. I will switch once I see that my engine is totally done wearing in.

 

i need to get this done !!

 

Well that's all fine and dandy. I check my oil constantly, so I always know where my oil level is at. Again, my oil light has never come on, and I have gone as low as only having 2.5 quarts of oil left in the engine after an oil change. I think it should be regulated to come on when the oil is at a considerably low level as to not allow for engine damage.

 

That makes no sense. If you always know where your oil level is, why didn't you add oil when it was low, and why did you wait till it was down to 2.5 qts? The oil pressure light comes on at low oil pressure, NOT level. You could have 2 quarts in there and still have good pressure. BUT, rev the engine, throw it around a little bit and when you uncover the pump pickup you will lose pressure. It is called an idiot light for a reason. When it comes on, something has gone terribly wrong, hopefully it's not because you didn't check the level - that's not covered by warranty.

 

2006 350z approaching first oil change and deciding "not" to use synthetic after reading this and asking what wt. castrol people are using? Also is there much notice with the k/n filter?

 

There's some oil and filter info in the top 100 questions thread, click the link in my signature.

 

OIL FILTER LIST

MOBIL 1

M-108 (smaller)
M-110 (larger)

K&N

HP-1008 (smaller)
HP-1006 (larger)

BOSCH PREMIUM

3300 (smaller)
3323 (larger)

NISSAN

15208-9E000






*NOTE: AFTER EXTENSIVE RESEARCH, I HAVE CONCLUDED THAT THE FILTERS LISTED ABOVE ARE THE ONLY ACCEPTABLE FILTERS TO USE!

 

Mobil 1(12 bucks) Bosch(6 bucks) and the cheapie 3 dollar filters from wal-mart are all the same filter ... research it if you like ... i forget the company that makes them, but it's worth a look if you want to save about 10 bucks per oil change if you are using mobil 1 filters

 

the only one I've read that sucks is Fram (check bobistheoilguy forums) And at $2 per filter I'm not surprised...

they say purolator, napa gold, wix, and a whole bunch of others are totally fine.

nissan oem is fine of course. K&N and mobil1 are fine, but as mentioned a little more expensive.