What is the impact of using synthetic lubricants in my Saloon?
I have used synthetics for many years, and I have found (one) thing. If an engine has a small leak, it will leak more with synthetics. Here is my understanding: Petroleum products are made up of hydrocarbon chains. The thicker the oil the longer the chains; the thinner, including volatile petroleum products, such as fuels, are made of short chains. In crude oil, there is no uniformity of the chains. Refining crude works kind of like sorting rocks through screens, you get a a general uniformity, but you can still have some intermixing of the chain lengths. Synthetic oil is like making the rocks from scratch, so every chain is exactly the same. The varying chain lengths in refined oils are what causes refined oil to vaporize quicker at high temperatures and thicken more at lower temperatures. The varying lengths also make the oil less slippery. In fact, synthetic oil makers used to (I don’t know if they still do.) advise against using it in new engines, because the rings and things would
