I think having a choice on which oil is used in the engine would be a great addition. But before we go down the route of this we should look at how important lubrication oil is!
The Lubricant that is used in almost all internal combustion engines is Oil as it has great lubrication properties, is (relatively) cheap and can be easily refined. Without it the amount of friction and heat produced would cause an engine to simply fail and/or seize up in a very short period of time. So it is very important that you choose the correct oil and this comes down to a number of things…
-How hot the engine will run.
-How cold the ambient temperature will be when the engine is started
-The type of oil required by the engine (Mineral, Semi or fully synthetic)
The next few following paragraphs will cover the first 2 points listed above. When you yourself go to buy oil and are told for example use grade 5w30 do you understand what this actually means?
When broken down there is two bits of information here, the first being the 5w part, which is the winter temperature of the oil. The lower this number, the better the oil is at resisting cold temperatures which stops it becoming too thick to fit in the oil “veins” of the engine. In a country like the UK a 5w or 10w oil is normally ok due to our mild winters, but in a country like say Canada where the temperatures can be much lower you would require a 0w oil to prevent the oil going gloopy and blocking the veins (which would lead to oil starvation!).
The second part would be in this case the 30, this is how thick the oil is when the engine is up to temperature. The higher this number is the better the oil is at dealing with higher temperatures. In a small to medium sized petrol engine 30 grade oil is normally sufficient whereas large petrol’s, turbo’ed and diesel engines require a 40 as they operate at a higher temperature. At the top of the scale where race engine or high revving engines are concerned 50 oil is normally used to cope with the extreme temperatures endured.
So when choosing oil you need to look at what the engine normally requires (check with manufacture) then look at the surrounding environment and you’re driving style to choose the grade of oil for your car.
Here are a few examples…
2004 Ford fiesta, 1.25L petrol, on occasion full throttle with the full rev range used, Location UK. 5w30
2001 Subaru Impreza, 2.0 Boxer petrol, commonly used on full throttle with full rev range, Location Austria. 0w40
2006 Honda Jazz, 1.5 petrol, Cautious driver, Location South east Africa. 10W40/5W40
1992 Nissan Skyline, 2 Litre, commonly used on full throttle with full rev range, Location US, Performance Modified. 5W40/10W50
The next few paragraphs explain the differences with the types of oil.
-Mineral: The least refined and oldest of all the oil types, cars using mineral oil needed to have extra-large oil veins due to inconsistent particle size. Mineral Oil allows for the most friction and least heat transfer of all the types.
-Semi Synthetic: Used in late aircraft engines in WW2 and brought to the car world mid 60’s semi synthetic is large improvement on top of mineral. The particle sizes are more consistent allow better heat transfer and less friction but due to the large cost in pre 1980 years, it was only used in expensive cars.
-Fully Synthetic: The best oil you can get. Other than the particle sized being all the same size allowing the best heat transfer and reducing friction, fully synthetic oil sticks to the engine when the engine has been stopped. This means that when the engine is turning over the oil is immediately available for friction reduction whereas with the other 2 types there is a small amount of time where parts of the engine won’t have any oil coverage giving premature wear and tear.
The particle sizes as you can tell play a big part in how good the Oil is. I could spend a lot of time trying to explain it but I believe this will show it better…
-Mineral particles are of all different sizes and are not refined.
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-In Semi Synthetic the particles are normally around 70% refined, much more consistent that mineral oil.
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-In Fully synthetic the particles are all the same size and fully refined.
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Here are a few examples of the different types of Oil in use…
2004 Ford fiesta, 1.25L petrol, on occasion full throttle with the full rev range used, Location UK. 5w30 Part/Fully Synthetic
2001 Subaru Impreza, 2.0 Boxer petrol, commonly used on full throttle with full rev range, Location Austria. 0w40 Fully Synthetic
2006 Honda Jazz, 1.5 petrol, Cautious driver, Location South east Africa. 10W40/5W40 Part Synthetic/Fully Synthetic
1992 Nissan Skyline, 2 Litre, commonly used on full throttle with full rev range Location US, Performance Modified. 5W40/10W50 Fully Synthetic
Now onto the suggestion and dev question.
As you can see from above Oil has a large part in interacting with the engine.
Oil would effect MTTF, friction inside the engine leading to heat and power changes, the cost of designing the engine for certain Oil types, change in servicing costs and if added a temperature stat.
The temperature stat would be affected by friction occurring within the engine, the size of the engine, the amount of fuel used, cam profile and ignition timings. Suitable oil would need to be chosen for the engine to keep the temperature in acceptable boundarys.
For actual implementation of the idea a system based around the current fuel choice system could be used. The reason behind this is that engines can take a few different types of oil so this system would fit nicely. Another way to do this would be the way that air/fuel intake is currently done by splitting up Mineral, Semi and Fully into an single selection box and then use 2 sliders to change the grades. Actual Hud positioning I will leave up to the devs.
So to the devs how feasible would this be to include into automation?
Futher suggestions are welcome 
Regards
BiotecVirus
Futher Information can be found at…
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_oil
halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stor … yId=245348
Killrob Edit: Very informative post. Noted as an issue for the engine designer revamp.
Forum Exellence: “Oil Class 101 4p”
