" Is engine oil most important in your vehicle..Explore! "

Is engine oil most important in your vehicle..Explore!

 We all often don’t think of changing the engine oil in our car or even don’t consider engine oil as the most important part of our car. Most of you agree with me. Am I over emphasising the importance of engine oil? But i think once you go through this article you will be more vigilant in changing and using the correct engine oil in your car. Did I say correct engine oil???

Why should I be aware of engine oil?

Check this video and pictures and decide your self...

 

Video 1: Experiment without engine oil (extreme situation)

 

 

Video 2: What happens when engine oil is not changed: a look

 Maruti Swift Vxi  Valve Train Assembly  after 10000 Kms  (Engine oil Unchanged)

Piston Failure due to inadequate engine oil

Maruti 800  cylinder Head : Use of less quantity and inferior engine oil

 After analysing picture and videos, I am sure that you will be tempted to know more about the engine oil and its importance starting with what is engine oil?

What is engine oil?

It is the blood line of the vehicle and is analogous to the blood in our body. Of course, they are not the energy carriers but yes they carry deposits formed in the engine due to incomplete combustion, preignition, local high temperature conditions in suspended form once removing those deposits from the engine. Not only deposits but they are major carriers of the heat that your engine generates when you drive your car at high speed or high load conditions. Engine oil contains chemical components as their major ingredients to absorb and sustain  high temperature and remove deposits from the engine. They are called as dispersants and detergents, mainly formulations of suphonates salt of magnesium and calcium. Major chunk of engine oil consists of base stock (mineral oil group 1, 2 3), detergents, dispersants antioxidants and anitwear chemicals. Antioxidants and Anti-wear help the engine oil to maintain its viscosity at high temperature but this doesn’t mean that engine oil can sustain very high temperature even it is degraded or is less in quantity in the engine. Antiwear additives are used to reduce the wear of engine cylinder, liner and other parts of engine. Znddp is used as major anti-wear additive used in the engine oil. I have listed some very important components of the engine oil.

  Table:  Typical Composition of engine oil

Sno	Engine Oil Ingredient	Function
1	Basestock (Mineral Oil or Synthetic) (60-80 %)	Base of composition, Lubrication
2	Dispersants	Disperse the deposits
3	Detergents	Remove the deposits from cylinder, Liner, bearings
4	Antiwear	Reduces friction and improve antiwear characteristic of the engine
5	Antioxidant & Viscosity Modifier	Maintains the viscosity of engine oil at high and low temperatures.

                          Typical  distribution of an engine oil

 

Major Components of the engine oil

Interesting Query: Can I use engine oil  meant for Petol car in  CNG  version of the car?

A straight no...surprised??  I have observed that most of us are unaware of this. In the previous paragraph I explained about the composition details of the engine oil and listed important ingredients of the engine oil. But the dosages of these ingredients are different for different applications. That is important to note. We have cars in the market that run on both petrol and cng fuels under different brand names such as Maruti Wagon R, Hyundai.To explain more, a Maruti wagon R running on petrol (gasoline) will be using different engine oil than Maruti Wagon R working on Compressed Natural gas (CNG) or LPG (Liquefied petroleum gas). The car is same  but the fuel is different thus requirement of  the engine oil is different.CNG operated cars have high engine in-cylinder temperatures than petrol operated cars hence thermal loading is higher in CNG  vehicle than petrol. It means that if you measure the cylinder temperature of engine working on CNG , it will be higher than that of petrol engine. Reason behind this fact is CNG burns at higher temperature than petrol hence on combustion generates higher in cylinder temperatures.

What are implications?  An inferior engine oil or inappropriate oil will not be able to sustain higher temperatures in the long run (high KM) that in turn will increase the thickness (viscosity) of the oil .A thick oil is not able to flow properly around the engine and thus eventually there is a greater risk of high engine wear and failure. Further, CNG operated vehicle shows higher engine wear due to dry characteristics of gaseous CNG. Petrol is liquid and therefore contributes towards the protection of valve wear but on the other hand gaseous CNG is dry and thus results in higher valve wear. Valve train wear results in loss of volumetric efficiency that is , engine will  breathe less air  generating less power than the required.

In my example, the requirement of antioxidant in the gas engine oil is higher in Maruti wagon R (CNG) than Maruti Wagon R (Petrol). This implies that the engine oil designed for application in gasoline engine is less effective in CNG operated engine.Using gasoline engine oil will not be able to prevent the wear efficiently and also sustain the thermal loading in long term.So next time you go for servicing and if you are using CNG operated car , ask for engine oil specifically designed for gas engine operations and not for petrol.

In the incoming blogs I will focus on various available engine oils in the market and there meaning. This will help in understanding the application of appropriate engine oil in vehicle.In case you have queries you can  email automania2014@gmail.com  or comment.