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Oil weight

MSH

Drag Racing Champion
Location
Denver
Car(s)
'20 M2 Competition
.....During cold mornings, the 10w60 has a very rough idle and long cold start. So far, both oils have come back fairly clean on blackstone labs reports.

Based on this statement I take it you are just not running 10-60 at the track only? Normal everyday driving as well? Next yr I was planning to run 10-60 on the warmer HPDE days but really only for the event
 

victorofhavoc

Autocross Champion
Location
Kansas City
Based on this statement I take it you are just not running 10-60 at the track only? Normal everyday driving as well? Next yr I was planning to run 10-60 on the warmer HPDE days but really only for the event

i typically change my oil every 5k miles, or 16 -20 sessions. With the oil burn from the PCV I'm topping off every 2-4 sessions typically. I work from home, so I rarely drive anywhere, and thus I see no need to change oil between events. After 5k miles or 16 sessions, my oil is very dark and has that very noticeable used oil smell. Blackstone results show this oil to have some mild contaminants but indicate an otherwise excellent health. Typically for fall/winter I run the 5-40 or 0-40 and during the warmer months i run 10-60.

When the weather is in the 40s is when the rough idle starts to be noticeable until warm, but it's really very noticeable in the 20s. Once warm, it all seems to operate okay, but surprisingly the heavier oil doesn't seem to take long to warm up. I wonder if that's because denser oil has greater friction?

I notice you're in Denver; do you frequent High Plains? I plan to make it out to at least one event at High Plains in 2020. You should consider a drive to Topeka, KS for Heartland Park :).
 

Crild

Drag Race Newbie
Location
Florida
i typically change my oil every 5k miles, or 16 -20 sessions. With the oil burn from the PCV I'm topping off every 2-4 sessions typically. I work from home, so I rarely drive anywhere, and thus I see no need to change oil between events. After 5k miles or 16 sessions, my oil is very dark and has that very noticeable used oil smell. Blackstone results show this oil to have some mild contaminants but indicate an otherwise excellent health. Typically for fall/winter I run the 5-40 or 0-40 and during the warmer months i run 10-60.

When the weather is in the 40s is when the rough idle starts to be noticeable until warm, but it's really very noticeable in the 20s. Once warm, it all seems to operate okay, but surprisingly the heavier oil doesn't seem to take long to warm up. I wonder if that's because denser oil has greater friction?

I notice you're in Denver; do you frequent High Plains? I plan to make it out to at least one event at High Plains in 2020. You should consider a drive to Topeka, KS for Heartland Park :).

Good god thats a lot of oil burn. That certainly can't be normal/healthy. I typically do 3 full weekends and street miles as my daily and never had to top off the oil between changes. (usually do oil changes every 7-7.5k).
 

victorofhavoc

Autocross Champion
Location
Kansas City
Good god thats a lot of oil burn. That certainly can't be normal/healthy. I typically do 3 full weekends and street miles as my daily and never had to top off the oil between changes. (usually do oil changes every 7-7.5k).

My most frequented track has two medium right sweepers, one fast right, and one uphill right (where the biggest oil burn occurs). With stiffer suspension and a good 200tw tire I'm pulling a lot of G on those turns. I've gotten to know the car pretty well now, so next year I think tires will likely last two weekends, maybe 3 on cooler days, which is on par with what the TT race groups generally run. Some of the faster guys I drive with are running two events per set of brake pads. Engine health seems perfectly fine overall; car pulls strong, oiling appears good, valves looked clean last I checked, and compression was good earlier this year. On the street I get zero oil burn. No issues during winter.

Every time I check the intake after some fast sessions, everything is coated in oil and engine juice. It's about 0.6 to 0.8L top off between oil changes. On hotter days with hotter/thinner oil the burn happens faster. I talked to a guy that runs an S3 who's really fast, and he's burning a lot more than me. He went to the racingline catch can and said it helped, but he's emptying it every weekend. He recommended avoiding the pcv replacement can, since it seems the pcv actually works well for the most part and going to the pcv replacement cans caused more loss for him.

I'm not sure about other's experiences... I'm sure there are variances between cars, mileage, etc. You get what you get...
 

SouthFL_Mk7.5

Autocross Champion
Location
South Florida
Car(s)
2019 GTI S
Hello all. New to the forum. I have a 2019 GTI which I’m prepping for an HPDE at Sebring in December. Sticker on the front air dam says VW508 00 & SAE 0w20.
After reading above about going slightly heavier, should I use 5w40 instead?
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
Location
Phoenix
Car(s)
2018 SE DSG
Hello all. New to the forum. I have a 2019 GTI which I’m prepping for an HPDE at Sebring in December. Sticker on the front air dam says VW508 00 & SAE 0w20.
After reading above about going slightly heavier, should I use 5w40 instead?

For racing I would use a higher viscosity oil.
 

Crild

Drag Race Newbie
Location
Florida
Hello all. New to the forum. I have a 2019 GTI which I’m prepping for an HPDE at Sebring in December. Sticker on the front air dam says VW508 00 & SAE 0w20.
After reading above about going slightly heavier, should I use 5w40 instead?
perfectly fine. that was the standard untill the 7.5's
 

GTIfan99

Autocross Champion
Location
FL
I've been running 5w-40 in my 2019 at the direction of the dealer to solve the stalling issue and have had no issues. I get well above the advertised gas mileage even with heavier oil. I autocross and track the car, so I was going to do the heavier oil anyways.
 

morricus

Go Kart Champion
Location
Dripping Springs, TX
Car(s)
2019 GTI
I know this is older, but just trying to prepare my brand new GTI for the track beatings this spring. I'm surprised to see so many people run 10W60. I am familiar with that viscosity from running my E46 M3 in NASA GTS3. I actually moved from 10W60 to Mobil 1 15w50. I can't say it was any better, but performed equally at a far lower cost and is readily available at any autoparts store. Mobil 1 15w50 is an oddball in the Mobil 1 lineup, it actually has large amounts of zinc and phosphorus and shouldn't be used on cars with cats because of it. If you guys are having success with 10w60, 15w50 should be perfert for track day use and a catless downpipe.

For now, without a downpipe and a tune, I'm going to use Castrol 0w40, seems to be a popular choice. Unless anyone feels strongly otherwise, I'm trying to learn as much as I can about these cars and make good long-term decisions.
 

victorofhavoc

Autocross Champion
Location
Kansas City
I know this is older, but just trying to prepare my brand new GTI for the track beatings this spring. I'm surprised to see so many people run 10W60. I am familiar with that viscosity from running my E46 M3 in NASA GTS3. I actually moved from 10W60 to Mobil 1 15w50. I can't say it was any better, but performed equally at a far lower cost and is readily available at any autoparts store. Mobil 1 15w50 is an oddball in the Mobil 1 lineup, it actually has large amounts of zinc and phosphorus and shouldn't be used on cars with cats because of it. If you guys are having success with 10w60, 15w50 should be perfert for track day use and a catless downpipe.

For now, without a downpipe and a tune, I'm going to use Castrol 0w40, seems to be a popular choice. Unless anyone feels strongly otherwise, I'm trying to learn as much as I can about these cars and make good long-term decisions.

Honestly, it's all about oil temp and keeping viscosity up. The oil pump likes to work within a specific viscosity, so we have to assume vw engineers chose a specific weight because of specific operating temps. Based on that, if you're tuned or seeing very high oil temps on track, you want to move to a higher weight to keep viscosity in range of what the pump wants. When I moved to a higher viscosity my temps actually went down. I don't have hard data as to why, but my theory has to do with how efficient the pump is with correct viscosity and that it doesn't introduce air as it would with a thinner oil.

Moving to an oil cooler, I went back down in viscosity to match my new temps.

As an aside, I've used various Mobil 1 weights on my wrx and I tried a 5w40 on the gti. On the wrx I had tons of oil burn, found oil trapped in the turbo (where it had seeped out in areas), and my Blackstone results were poor. Moving to a different oil resolved everything (Rotella t6 on the wrx). On the gti my first Blackstone results were poor on Mobil 1. I can't find the sheet right now, but it was high in various contaminants and I did find some oil in the turbo. This was all with street driving on the gti. I had no issues with Castrol 0w40, no issues with amsoil euro 0w40, none with amsoil 0w50, and recently I have used 10w60 and 0w40 from liquimoly (whatever the full synthetic naming is) with "perfect" Blackstone results. All oils except the Mobil 1 were used on track with good success. I especially like the amsoil and liquimoly as a close second.
 
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