ready for a oil change on a newly aquired 2003 250 ozark and looking for info cause i didn't get a owners manual with the suzuki when i bought it.

 

Suzuki recommends 10w 40. I dont think id use 0w 40, unless the temperature was below freezing, but its your quad.
Just make sure there isnt any moly in the oil, and it should be good. If the bottle of oil has the energy conserving label...it has moly. There are lots of motorcycle specific oils out there, amzoil makes a very good 10w 40, full syn motorcycle oil.
Dont forget to change the oil filter .

 

Synthectic always works the best. not 0W -40 well u can use it if you only want to seize the thing up

 

no,i don't want to seize it up.the polaris 500 i have uses 0\40 and has no problem,i just wanted to see what suzuki wanted people to put in their ozarks.

 

well polarisis are weird to begin with so something that works on a polaris probably wont work on anythuing else. polaris's are very proprietary. but i wouldnt recomend 0-40 definatly go wid 10-40 or what the manual says or the dealer

 

No! 0W40 is to big a stretch. Lots of experts don't even recommend a 10W40, because even that is to big a stretch. To make a 0 weight oil behave as a 40 weight when hot, they have to add a HUGE amount of thickeners (even to a synthetic). The thickeners are plastic, and have no lubrication qualities whatsoever. They also tend to linearize in a bearing, so a 40 weight oil might actually behave as something like a 20 weight in the bearing.

Where you live, use 5W30 in winter, and 10W40 in summer (and 20W50 if it is really hot).

 

It is a misconception to think Mobil 1 0-40 changes 'thickness'. That’s old school dino oil thinking.

Mobil 1 0-40 meets and beats all the specifications and test criteria for a 0 weight AND a 40 weight oil, without getting 'thicker or thinner'. Why add thickening additives if your oil is good enough to pass all the tests/specs for 40weight oil and still be as thin as skunk ****[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

You get the fast oil delivery to all bearings on cold or hot starts of thin oil and have the protection of 40 weight oil at WOT. How do you beat that? Mobil 1 o-40 pours like water and carries bearing loads better than most all 40 weight oils. Go to the Mobil 1 web site, check the specs.

This is why Mobil 1 0-40 comes in all new Porsche's, MB's, Corvettes just to name a few.

All is not perfect with Mobil 1 0-40.
Some wet clutch plates do not work well with syn oils not made for wet clutch applications.
If you have an old clunker with oil leaks, syn oil will probably make it leak worse, sometimes a small seep turns into a leak.

After talking/arguing to a Mobil 1 chemical engineer for hours, I still don't really understand how Mobil 1 works....but the specs don't lie... being a mechanical engineer I never liked chemicals.

If your owners manual doesn't specify to use mobil1 0-40 then a better choice would be Mobil 1 MX4T. It is designed for bikes, bikes have multi-valve engines and use a common sump, which means the engine oil lubricates the engine, transmission and wet clutch. So unlike Mobil 1 0-40 for cars, Mobil 1 MX4T has no friction modifiers, which could lead to clutch slippage.

 

allcool, going to have to do some chemistry whether you like it or not. Look at the viscosity index (VI) of a 10W40 and compare it with a 0W40 . That difference in VI is due to the amount of THICKENERS that they have to add, to get that 0 weight up to 40, vs getting a 10 weight up to 40.

True, synthetics have a higher "natural VI" than petroleum oils, but you can only stretch it so far.

If you want the best oil available, skip the PAO synthetics (Mobil 1 and Amsoil), and get an ester synthetic like Maxima Extra or Ultra, Klotz, Motul, etc.

 

The VI of Mobil 1 0W40 is 187.

The VI of their 5W40 is 151.

The VI of 10W40 (MX4T) is 164.

Those differences between the different oils are due to the use of thickeners. The lower the viscosity you start with, the greater the amount of (non-lubricating plastic) thickeners you have to add.

For the record, Corvettes come from the factory with Mobil 1 5W30, and the
Europeans are big on 5W40. A CRF250R redlines at 12,000 rpm. and a TRX/YFZ 450 at around 10,000. That Corvette redlines at a not very impressive 5,500 rpm, about the same as your Ozark!

 

reconranger, you’re still thinking thicker /thinner, like I said that is old school. I to have argued this same point. The VI difference is minimal and does not correspond to the oil classifications and not any where near the difference you would find in conventional oils.

If I am correctly understanding what you meant, then
according to you're train of thought the VI # you posted shows no correlation to the specs of the oil, if it did wouldn't VI of the 5w40 would fall in the middle not the low end(151)?

The VI of Mobil 1 0W40 is 187.

The VI of their 5W40 is 151.

The VI of 10W40 (MX4T) is 164.


A Mobil oil engineer explained to me repeatedly the VI is from the formulation of the base stock oil, 0-40 does not get thicker, and it meets or beats all specs for 40 oil being thin as ****. It was explained to me that oil does not have to have a certain viscosity to be classified as meeting all specs, tests and regulations for a 40 'weight' oil. Hence Mobil 1 0-40 will never have the same viscosity of valvolene straight 40 weight.

A lot of high end European cars do use the 0-40. My new Porsche (redline at 7200rpm) came with Mobil 1 0-40 , and get this.....it has 20,000 mile oil change intervals [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-shocked.gif[/img] not that I would ever go that far, something just tells me it is plain wrong.
You're right ester synthetic oil are the very the best, but some of the PAO oils are very close in performance and they both have pros and cons.