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Often engine oil analysis can be a helpful indicator into which preventative measures can betaken to prolong the life of your vehicle. Our Program is an easy way to assess the health of your oil, and more importantly your engine. Different metals present can be early indicators of component failures, before they become damaging.The results from an Oil analysis kit are presented in a table, broken down by metal or material type with a helpful synopsis on how to read the data.
In short, it depends. As a rule of thumb, follow the service intervals laid out in your Owners’Handbook. If your handbook suggests an oil change every 6000 miles and it takes you 3 years to do that sort of mileage.
Oils do have a shelf life. Typically, in unopened containers we expect oils to last for 5 years. If you’re in any doubt as to how long something has been standing, you can check the physical appearance of the oil as you pour it into a clear container. If the oil is cloudy to look at or smells stronger than you’d expect; if there is significant sediment build up or if the oil has separated into layers it might not perform as well in your vehicle as originally intended by the manufacturer.
Advice is free. If you have a range of vehicles, all using different oils, and want to talk about what can be done to reduce the number of products we use, we do offer our customers a service that both maximises performance and protection from their purchases whilst as small a number of products as possible.
Sometimes. But not as you might think. The weight listed on the label of any oil i.e. SAE 50 or 20W-50 describes the oil’s thickness. And looking at it, gear oil labels do have thicker weights than engine oils. However, it is important to remember that the scale that describes your engine oil as a 50 weight, for example, is not the same continuous scale that describes your gearbox oil as a 90 weight. Instead, there are two separate scales, one for the engine, and one for the gear box. There isn’t a straight-forward conversion, but 90 on the gearbox scale is roughly equivalent to 50 on the engine scale; and 80W is roughly equivalent to 20W. The top end of the gear box scale is off the end of the engine scale – in other words there is no substitute for a 250 weight gear oil
Definitely. The word ‘synthetic’ isn’t a blanket term but all oils with the word synthetic on the label can be too easily dismissed by classic car owners. With that said though, special care and attention should be taken to make sure that, if you do decide to use synthetic oils, you’re using the correct one.Fully synthetic oils are perhaps the easiest to describe. They are oils which have polymers entirely synthesised in a laboratory and do not contain any petroleum out of the ground. This means the oil behaves far more predictably, and as a result is better suited to extreme temperatures. In extreme heat, fully synthetic oils have a more robust film strength, offering better lubrication – and flow better in colder conditions. The fact that they are man made does mean that, for now, these oils remain between 2 and 4 times the cost of mineral oils. Annoyingly there is no industry standard to what Semi-synthetic should mean. Some semi-synthetics are what you’d expect and have half synthesised and half mineral polymers, while others are entirely made of mineral oils and have been refined enough and had enough additives mixed in, that they’re allowed to call themselves semi synthetic. Oils up to Group 3base oils, given the viscosity and the chemistry, are acceptable to use in historic vehicles. The important thing to watch out for if you are considering a switch to synthetic is rubber hoses. Typically these start to weep or perish if the top range additive packages found in competition synthetic oils are run through them.
The number one problem older petrol tanks face over lay up periods is caused by the ethanol present in modern fuels. When ethanol mixes with water, most commonly as moisture in the air, the ethanol is taken from the fuel, with the water, down to the bottom of the tank. Then come spring, the water and ethanol mix is fed into carburettors and won’t ignite, and leaves unignited sludge behind to cause further corrosion.The easiest and least invasive thing you can do – chemically – is fill the tank over winter. This minimises the surfaces available for condensation to form. If you get the chance to exercise the car by letting it warm up on a dry drive once every couple of weeks, this will also help.If this isn’t possible, you could use one of our fuel additives designed specifically to prolong the life of fuel. This is a cost effective way to make sure the fuel is in the best condition come the first start in the spring.If you can’t have any ethanol in your fuel tank at all, perhaps because it’s made of fibre glass, then the only thing really suitable is to use storage fuel available from our Gulf Fuels range.This has no ethanol in it, and burns very cleanly when in use.
Cars built before 1990 are designed to run on leaded petrol when this was still available at the pumps. If using unleaded petrol in places where leaded petrol is designed to be, you may notice pinking or issues with ignition timing. You may also see accelerated valve seat wear if they’re cut directly into a cast iron cylinder head.To combat this, we supply a range of lead replacement fuel additives, from Valve master to Tetra boost depending on your variables.
It depends, if you’re certain that the leak isn’t coming from cracked rubber hoses, or loose connectors we have different solutions depending on what fluid you have in there currently, and how severe the leak is. If this is something that you want to discuss, please get in touch.