He not only says everyone else is stupid for not seeing his looney “wisdom”, he also comes back with the answers he was given misquoted and spun to suit his agenda. I must say, I got quite a bit of amusement reading this thread.
Triedaq, you really have a good insight into where modern education has gone. I read about things that school boards do, and it makes me wonder where they find the idiots they put on these boards.
My guess is that hobieTcat has never lost a argument in his own mind. He even thinks that some of us have come to agree with him.
Triedaq, if the idea with the lawn mower works let me know I’d like to retire from mowing grass too. My riding mower is a '94 model 50" cut with a 20HP Kohler engine, it has a an oil pump and oil filter so the recommended change interval is every 50 hrs. for the oil and every 100 hours for the filter. I change both every 50 hours, it currently has over 500 hrs. operating time on it and uses less than 1/2 pint of oil every 50 hrs. If the idea doesn’t work I don’t want to try it, I don’t feel like paying $3K dollars for another mower. I have a push mower I bought back around '91 or '92 that I use for trimming around the house, trees, etc that has a recommended oil change interval of every 25 hours, I usually change it once per season even though it doesn’t get 25 hours use per season, I expect it to last another 20 years. Maybe I need to adopt the no change on it, 20 oz. of oil per year and 15 minutes changing it really puts a burden on my family!! Hey, maybe I could use shampoo or liquid soap in it. They are slippery and stay slippery, since they’re a detergent they’d be self cleaning, no need to ever change it again!!
A related story:
I used to test tires at a courier company - time sensitive package delivery. drugs, photos, company mail, and the like. They had a hundreds of vehicles spread over many locations. They had a routine oil change interval that they had been determined by oil analysis - and periodically confirmed by the same analysis. They kept the vehicles for 400K miles - about 4 years.
They experienced an economic downturn (as is prone to happen) and the operational folks didn’t buy new vehicles to replace those that got too many miles or were involved in accidents. The result was that a group of vehicles didn’t get their oil changed when they should have - basically skipping an interval.
It took awhile, but some of the engines started to fail prematurely. When they investigated, they found every one of them had skipped an oil change. The ones that had not skip the oil change went to the usual 400K.
Now the complete picture is that some of the vehicles that skipped the oil change also went 400K. But I think this points out the falacy of small numbers of samples.
What you are describing is what most astute companies are doing; oil analysis determines the most suitable oil change interval. Unfortunately, OP does not understand that it takes some money and effort to determine that optimal interval, which is affected by type of use and climate, among things.
I used to take a limousine to the airport. The driver said that even then, in the 70s they went 10,000+ miles between oil changes, since nearly all the miles were highway miles at legal speeds. They also got 150,000 miles out of a set of brakes.
When I sold my 1984 Impala V8, the engine still ran like new and it had over 300,000 miles on it. The car was 22 years old and had been given 70 oil changes over that time, at a cost of about $18 each, since I did it myself. So $1260 for oil changes over 22 years. A small price to pay to ensure that engine failure will not be the reason for the car’s demise.
Triedaq, Thank you for your service. My wife spent 35 years in the classroom-quite a grind. It was interesting that our local school system has to do some cutting again. On the list was the award winning automotive class. This class has been the impetus for several to open their own shops and go on to great careers in auto repair. To their credit, after a lot of comment, the board put it back in the budget again. I’m not saying college prep is not important, but vo tec has been losing ground for a while. I only had a few shop classes but it has certainly helped me overall. I wish I would have had home ec back in the 60’s so I could cook and sew a little.
I just changed oil in three cars and the snow blower this afternoon. One had 4000, one 2000, and the third one 10 miles since a year ago and it took 8 quarts. Couldn’t believe that’s all it got used but guess I’m set for another year on it.
I have a Craftsman lawn mower from 2002 which I have never changed the oil or added any. Best mower I’ve ever had, I check the oil regularly and it has never burned a drop in 10 years of year-round use.
Could you estimate how many hours running time are on the mower engine?
@Caddyman–I saw a device at my local Rural King store that kept track of the hours on a small engine. I thought it might be advantageous for my lawnmower until I saw the price tag–$25. For a lawnmower that I bought in 1987, I decided it wasn’t worth the price. I mow my yard or mulch my leaves about 50 times a year. Midway through the season, I resharpen the blade and change the oil. I do the same thing at the end of the season as well. My previous lawnmowers rusted out before the engine wore out. My present mower has a cast aluminum deck as opposed to a stamped steel. I understand that manufacturers no longer use a cast aluminum deck because the deck might shatter if the mower blade picks up a rock and flings it into the deck.
50-60 hours a year maybe? Most small engines recommend 50 hour oil changes…
I think I use my mower about 50 hours a year. I suppose changing the oil midseason is overkill, but for less than a pint of oil, I don’t think the extravagence will break me up. I also blow the dirt out of the air filter at midseason and replace the air filter and spark plug at the end of the season. At the end of the season, I squirt a little bit of oil into the cylinder and turn the engine over to spread the oil around. I fill the gas tank and add a fuel stabilizer. When spring rolls around again, I’m good to go. Perhaps the engine would have lasted just as long had I never changed the oil. However, for no more oil than the crankcase holds in a lawnmower, I doubt that I have spent more than $10 over 25 years.
It seems that the same people who ignore scheduled oil changes on their mowers also overlook sharpening the blade, cleaning the deck and leave litter in their yard which they run over and when the mower fails they are certain that it was a lemon.
My mower had an hour meter on it from the factory. The best I remember it now has somewhere around 510 hours on it.
@Caddyman I used (left it to new owners after I sold the house) it about 1 1/2 hours every two weeks. Maybe 30 min/ every 2 weeks during the dead of winter. I don’t have the time to figure that out, but it seems like that mower was built to last.
Maybe I can clear up a few things for the exasperated that seem to think I’m just trying to annoy you , and especially for those that post statements as if in response to someone trying to change you. From my previous development of MM systems I was approached and given the proposition to develop a system, the market already exists, the technology is lagging, as described briefly by TwinTurbo(thanks again) earlier. The clarity here might come when one considers the potential markets. It’s not for you. And it’s just a coincidence that I have been a test subject for this, but things have a funny way of working out that way.
Now pretend you are a fleet manager of say10,000 gov’t vehicles, small cars and trucks. (Can you guess how many the US gov’t alone has? How about the rest of the world?) As noted, not only can MM lead to savings in not throwing away perfectly good oil, which costs a lot to dispose of, and the time lost while the vehicle is in the shop, the other non-obvious benefit is that if somebody (like I’m sure you think I am) drives one of the cars in your fleet on the way back from the shop and does something to degrade the oil, you couldn’t possibly know about it, and the festering problem will not be addressed for ???K miles, if it gets that far, this happens in all PM type programs, so MM programs turn out to be at least as good as a PM system. Since there was some math in earlier posts, lets do some here: A typical set of data that I have seen for this type of market shows that the cars go about 300-350k(about 4-5 years is typical) before they get rid of them for scrap price, almost always for things not related to the engine, usually something like body/glass damage, bad tranny, worn interior, failed electrical systems… So if those 10,000 cars had an oil change every 5000 miles that would be about 65 oil changes per car, that’s 650,000 oil changes, and disposals, and days the car is in the shop in maybe 5 years. Say it’s $20 to change/dispose of the oil, throw in some lost time cost. - that’s $13 million dollars, to change the oil. Now we all know that non-stressed oil could go 10k miles with no problems, but we just change sooner, as cheap insurance. What if it could go 15k? That’s a savings of 66% or nearly $9 million dollars, and you saved the engines that would have failed due to premature oil degradation that the PM programs could never catch. Now sure, some of these 10000 govt cars may not go to the scrap heap with oil pans as clean as yours, but they are going to the scrap heap(some are bought from the scrap dealer because they still work, but the gov’t only gets scrap price), would you be happy to chip in your share for an extra $9 million in taxes to have cars that are sold for scrap, but the inside of the engine will be very clean? What if half of the cars made it to 20K miles or 25k/change and still made their 325k mile goal? Would the extra good feeling of knowing those cars had more frequent oil changes make you vote for higher taxes? I can see the political ad now - “It’s cheap insurance”
I think an earlier poster alluded to oil and oil changing as a religious thing for many here, and for those that need something to waste time on a Saturday - Sorry to bother you guys, I’m in it for the money.
“What does oil break down into that is not slippery?”
Sludge.
Apparently you didn’t really want to know. Why not just post your question/point of discussion? You sir, are a compete twit. So nothing has been cleared up. You have just been one of the most annoying people to come through in a long time.
Your delusions extend to the belief that for you to deal your management issues there is nothing out there but urban legend. You still want to puff your own chest. So if you want to be a professional, don’t troll the web. Go to the actual mountains and mountains of research that exist on this issue.
What if it could go 15k? That’s a savings of 66% or nearly $9 million dollars, and you saved the engines that would have failed due to premature oil degradation that the PM programs could never catch.
The problem is…“WHAT IF”…and “WHAT IF YOU CAN’T”?? Of those 10,000 vehicles…do you think ALL will be able to 10,000 miles with a 15k oil change? What percentage of engines will need to be replaced with a 15k oil change interval? What percentage of engines will need to be replaced with a 5k oil change interval? From what I’ve seen of your posts you haven’t a clue to the above questions. If you have more then a 1% failure rate over a 5 year period by just increasing the oil change interval from 5k miles to 15k miles…then you are no longer saving money…in fact you are loosing money.
What is interesting to me is to read posts from people inquiring about an extended warranty (actually a very expensive insurance policy) and then a post about never changing the oil. To me, changing the oil at least as frequently as required by the owner’s manual is pretty cheap insurance on keeping an engine healthy. In fact, when I fill the gas tank, I often open the hood and pull the dipstick and take a quick glance at the coolant reservoir. I am able to do this when I buy gas, because I don’t live in the state of Delaware (see earlier post). Checking the oil is free insurance on maintaining a vehicle.
I went seraching for analysis on the endurance of engine oils and came across the site in the link. Click on the oil bottles to see analysis of specific oils. While it wasn’t quite what I was looking for, it seemed a good resource to pass on, and it hopefull will make Hobie realize that there’s a lot more to engin eoil than just oil.
I plan to continue the search.
Some people enjoy hearing themselves speak a great deal more than their audience. Likewise it seems some people now enjoy drizzling vapid verbosity onto the www mistakenly thinking others are as impressed as themselves. Who here read beyond the 1st paragraph of the most recent posting by the OP?