All engine faults/repairs/maintenance Oils recommended

General

This new page (in progress) will provide a few pointers on suitable oils to use in your stock engine. Alternative engines fall outside the remit of this section and you should consult the manufacturers recommended lube chart. Engine oil serves a few purposes including lubrication, cleaning, inhibiting corrosion, sealing and cooling. It also has to work fairly hard.

Firstly there is no 'right' or even 'perfect' oil but the basic recommendations below are certainly a good starting point. Engine oil is always being developed and not everyone here agrees, some preferring monograde (though why escapes me), some using cheap multigrade (multigrade being versatile and able to cope with a wide range of conditions), and others, "Fantabidosa premium brand with added thingy" but one thing we do all agree on is no matter what oil you use - change it regularly. Regular oil changes and keeping the oil topped up matter far more than how much you actually spend on it. The VW engine isn't doing the high revolutions of most modern performance-orientated cars so will run quite happily on a budget brand (within reason) providing you change it regularly.

Many modern oils (read the label) are formulated to work in both petrol or diesel and some oil (even if not the ideal choice) is better than no oil at all. Listed below are VW recommendations followed by opinions and ideas put forward by various 80/90 club members over the years. Draw from it what you will. Additional links are provided for anyone who has time to kill and wish to explore 'oil' in more depth.

Petrols

The specified oil is SAE 15W/40 for petrol engines.

You can find good quality oil that meets VW spec from some supermarket outlets these days and often, petrol forecourts have limited offers on engine oil. GSF, which has branches over almost all of the UK stock the 'Carlube' brand. As has been pointed out by other 80/90 members, cheap oils can be fine but they are not premium brands disguised in a budget container. By the same token, it does not follow that spending £40 on a can of oil is always going to be better than the can you saw priced at £10 either. It would be wise to steer clear of containers that provide very little information, but certainly don't rule out an oil simply because it is cheap or assume that the more it costs, the longer your engine will last or the faster it will go. Read the label, and if it seems reasonably good, go by your instincts.

The concensus on 80/90 is that good old fashioned mineral oil is the best choice although some do use semi-synthetic. Mineral oils are, as the name implies, based on oil extracted from beneath our feet, and refined. Synthetic oil is manufactured from various chemicals, although by and large, most of the ingredients do in fact derive from mineral based oil. The other type is semi-synthetic - a mix of the two.

Good links

http://www.carbibles.com/engineoil_bible.html