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Oil/fuel additives

W

wallacedw

Member
I had a overflowing carb before I got educated to turn off the fuel valve after I am done with the tractor.
Fuel apperantly gets into the oil after that so I took all the oil out today after grading my road. I have a '56 Farmall 400.
So the question is .. are fuel and oil additives recommended or can they do more damage than good? I used a "safe for diesel engines' oil additive in my Powerstroke and THAT was a mistake. The additive thickened the oil enough to clog the injectors. The injectors use oil to drive them. Anyway I am gunshy now. Except for ATF in the fuel.
I figure the gas thinned the oil out and maybe cleaned some of the years of gunk out too... the oil was thin with a blueish tint.
I was thinking of sticking a quart of Slick50 in.
 
If the oil needs the additive the oil companys would put it in there.

If the tractor needed it the manual would say to add it.

Gary
 
I have never had any luck with slick 50. I use LUCAS additives after checking w/my dealer to verify that my warranty will not be affected and have had great luck with it. I won"t use any other additives.
 
MMO or ATF can be used in either the gas and or oil. I qt to 5 gal of gas or 1 qt to the 5 qts in the oil pan. But yes its hard on and engine to run it if gas has gotten into the oil and doing so can cause the engine to blow
Hobby farm
 
Since the tractor is 52 years old I don't believe I am going to have warranty issues and they didn't have modern additives when the manual was printed.
I guess I should have asked what and if people add anything modern to old iron?
 
(quoted from post at 14:44:03 08/05/08) MMO or ATF can be used in either the gas and or oil. I qt to 5 gal of gas or 1 qt to the 5 qts in the oil pan. But yes its hard on and engine to run it if gas has gotten into the oil and doing so can cause the engine to blow
Hobby farm
Click to expand...
That blowby is what I am concerned with. Hoping to 'make it right', so to speak.
 
Well if the blow by was caused by you running it with gas in the oil the only fix will be a rebuild of the engine because you stand a good chance that the gas in the oil hurt the rings, rod and main bearings. You may even have broken rings and or scared cylinder wall from gas in the oil
 
Another thing you might do if you have a blow by problem is if you use a multi weight oil switch to a 30W or 40W or even a 50W for the summer. Decades ago I had a car that when you pulled in to a gas station you checked the gas and filled the oil. I ran a 50W or 60W oil in it and about every 5th qt. of oil I would add a qt of gear lube 90W. Funny thing was it didn't smoke all that bad but it sure did like its oil and it got about 100 mile to the qt of oil
Hobby farm
 
Most additives are sold for 1 reason, for the manufacturer and retailer to make money. I have tried quite a few differant "snake oils" and have very few that does what the can container said. Most additives are a feel good product, in other words, people think it works because they are convinced it works. The only thing I use that I know works is Powerserve to prevent gell up in my truck, and Sea Foam as a fuel stabilizer.
My .02 worth.
Jim
 
imho other than anti gel additives, occasional injector cleaner, and Stabil in my small engine gas , I consider oil and gas additives mostly a way to get more of your money, nothing more.

Just my opinion though.

If I have an old worn engine I use thicker oil in hot weather.
 

There were just as many if not more oil additives on the market 52 years ago as there are today. STP was one of them, Wynn's friction proofing was another, and there was a product called "motor honey". If I'm not mistaken, the "LUCAS" oil additives go back almost that far also. We didn't need any of them back then, and we don't need any of them today.
 
I have been helping a neighbor scrap alot of heavy equipment and we have been draining the fuel tanks trying to salvage the fuel. He treats the old fuel with power service.
 
(quoted from post at 18:00:34 08/05/08)
There were just as many if not more oil additives on the market 52 years ago as there are today. STP was one of them, Wynn's friction proofing was another, and there was a product called "motor honey". If I'm not mistaken, the "LUCAS" oil additives go back almost that far also. We didn't need any of them back then, and we don't need any of them today.
Click to expand...

Come to think of it I have seen "Motor Honey" on a shelf somewhere.

The question begging to be asked is how do I know if it is experiencing blow-by?
 
And if you look at the MSDS for the oil additives, they are mostly a high viscosity petroleum oil. Nothing more.

Gerald J.
 
Blowby is a term for leaking rings allowing compression to get
into the crankcase. It is evidenced by "smoke"coming out of the
breather or oil filler or dip stick, it is oil fumes being forced out
by pressure in the crankcase. NOT the same as a blowen
engine. When blowby is noticed it is time to do a compression
test and possibly rering. ATF "may" loosen stuck rings.
 
I understand what many of you say about additives being snake oils, and that may be true. I run a lot of miles in my Chevy 3/4 Van, about 175,000/yr. With those kind of miles I want to do all I can to keep wear on internal parts down, so I use Lucas. I have a friend that races cars, so he tears motors down often and says he can see a difference inside his engines from using Lucas, slick all over. I use it in the motor oil, tranny fluid, differential, and fuel. 300,000 very hard towing miles on my van and and not one problem, still runs like new. The transmission lasting this long surprises me the most, still has the original fluid in it and it's not burnt. Some of that may be the new Dexron 6 they've started using. Fuel pumps usually go out by now too, so I wonder if the fuel additive helps that last longer as it lubes some going through.

Plus I live in Indianapolis and Lucas put their name on our new football stadium, figured I'd pay them back a little.
 
I just picked up some some Lucas fuel additive to put in the Cherokee,. Must have Got Some bad Old gas ,, Been using high test and alcohol cleaners , with some good results ,, Thinking about adding a qt of ATF, gonna try Lucas 1st , Cant even Siphon out the gas, And I got a full tank, trying to keep from dropping tank and spending the big $$$ for the modern B/S fuel pump in the tank , Any Advice appreciatted , Wish Me Luck, Jim
 
How about this.... Every time you get the urge to buy Slick 50 or one of those other snake oil concoctions, take the money you'd spend on that and stick it in a coffee can. Keep doing that until you have enough money in the can to do a ring job and bearing roll on the old tractor. When that's done you'll have something instead of a worn out tractor.
I won't pi$s one cent into the Slick 50 pot. It's a waste of money and nothing more.

Rod
 
Friend bought a Farmall A that blew smoke rings when idling.Oil was seeping past the spark plug gaskets.A compression check showed 100 lb on all cylinders,I think so much oil was getting past the rings it gave the high readings.The oil was clean but down a pint.I added a pint of MMO to the crankcase.I used the tractor to rake some hay.It put out a steady plume of blue smoke while working and blew smoke rings at idle.It fouled spark plugs often.Oil has to be added every time it was used.Friend used it for garden work last summer.His son in law changed the oil this spring and the smoking backed off.I just put a new bail on the sediment bowl yesterday and noticed smoking had stopped.It doesnt use oil now.The engine sounds better now.I suspect the oil rings were stuck in the grooves.MMO is more solvent than oil so I wouldnt use it unless an engine was on its last legs.ATF probably would have done the same thing.MMO caused a gas shut off valve to bind up so tight that a big screw driver had to be used to open and close it in my 600.It took full year before I could operate the valve by hand.
 
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