Actually, the reason I was looking at this oil is because it is CHEAP compared to other oils of its quality. I am sure it is way overkill as I know this stuff is designed to hold up for the long haul in turbo diesel Audis and such. I can get this oil for between $20-25 on sale in 5 quart jugs. Check your local Wal-Mart for deals on this. I have read it is a much better oil than most of the other Mobil 1 products yet it goes on sale for exactly the same price. Sometimes the parts stores will have 5 individual quarts with a filter for around $30. If the filter of the day is decent, I sometimes go this route.
The reason against me running the Mobil 1 5W30 is that I understand those who have run oil analyses on it suggest it is a Group 3 base oil as is the 10W30. Europeans wouldn’t allow this to be labeled as a synthetic by their standards. The 0W40 appears to mostly be Group 4 base oils which are considered “true” synthetic oils by some. Mobil considers their exact oil formulation to be proprietary information and will not release the ingredients list so individuals have figured out some of the details by submitting unused oil for analysis.
Any of the 5W30 oils meeting the European specs of the 0W40 above would cost at least 2.5-3x that of this Mobil 1 product so this is why I am attracted to this one. I also drive a 1994 Geo Metro as my daily driver/beater/work car due to the mileage and these tiny engines are very hard on oil. All the enthusiasts of these little cars suggest European spec oils to help prevent stuck rings and such that these engines are subject to if oil is neglected. The 0W40 is on the “approved” list of oils for these engines even though a 5W30 is specified in the manual. The engines were developed 30 years ago and oils have advanced a long way since then. I use this oil in the Metro and was thinking about just using it in everything so I only have to buy one kind of oil.