I am with FourStrokeFan on this one Mobil One Synthetic 15w-50 does not contain fiction modifiers. Chet

 

Regardless of what any institute of "scientific data" you read. You do not want to run a car oil in a motorcycle or an atv. The reason is not as much related to the clutch. It has to do with the fact that a car oil regardless of brand was never meant to run inside of an engine in which the engine itself shared the same oil bath as the transmission. I've seen guys come in with clutch problems and prematurely worn gears due to running car oils in teir engines. I also have customers who have run car oils in their three wheelers since new and have never had any engine problems. The manufacturers don't recommend a particular oil just to sell you a more expensive oil. If anything, they would want to sell you a cheaper oil just to get your business. It's not like they make the stuff anyway. Honda's oil is made by Mobil 1. Suzuki's oil is made by Shell. When I go in tomorrow I'll check the material data safety sheet on the Yamalube because I can't remember right now.{By the way, what dealer is selling you oil for $4.00? We sell ours at $2.90 for all brands.}

 

I have to agree with KNOWSALOT on this one.I am a mechanic also and do not reccommend running regular auto oil in a wet clutch type engine it is just not designed for it.Although I have seen people run it in there Motorcycles/Atv's for years with no problems. It also depends on how you use the machine also if you baby it alot and never really abuse the engine you might get away with useing auto oil.But to be on the safe side And also extend engine life motorcycle specific oil is your best bet.Also I do beieve Honda GN4 and Yamalube are both made by Mobil I know the GN4 .Someone also said that there is a Lawnmower specific oil well that's true Brigg's and Straton reccommends straight 30wt in there engines to prevent oil consumption unless the temp is to low for it and so do other small engine maker's.

 

If you change your oil at the manufacturers recommended change interval you might save a whopping twenty five bucks over the course of a quad's life by using automotive oil instead of the motorcycle stuff that's recommended. Considering that most of us have paid well over five grand for our quads then trying to save a few pennies by using cheaper oil seems to be pretty stupid. Just use the stuff that's made for the job, heck, just the peace of mind is worth the extra few bucks to me.

 

Hunter32, Thank you, good post. Took the words out of my mouth.

 

I have used automobile oil in ATVs for over twenty years with no problems. Tazzgrizz wrote a letter to Castrol about this issue. Their reply stated that if his quad ever had amechanical failure that was directly related to the use of their oil, they would pay for the repair. They acted as if they would just love for a dealer to put on paper that their oil was responsible for and engine failure. As far as the clutches go, I have never ad a problem with one that was related to the oil I used... I have only burnt one set of clutches and it was back in 81 or 82 towing a Honda 200 ATC 8 miles through muck and mud with a Honda ATC 110... (Low range was awesome on that little machine) lol

Greg

 

It's good to see some discussion on this. I disagree with the "$25 over the life of the quad" argument (I'd say about 10 times that figure in just one year at 10 hours per week of riding for fully synthetic motorcycle oil vs. fully synthetic automotive oil), but I understand the point on not being cheap when it comes to maintenance. My point is that we're probably just throwing away money due to the fears that we've learned through marketing.

I decided to research some more and found another discussion with some good numbers concerning the new "SJ" rated automotive oils that have come out since the original article was written. It focuses on Harley brand oil vs. the competition, but that doesn't make it any less meaningful here. It basically says that the older "SG" oils that were around when the article was written WERE good and that the newer 20W50 automotive oils haven't changed since then. The 10W30 and 5W30 oils have changed for the worse, but these aren't the oils we're using in our machines. Check it out:

http://www.hdcycles.com/sjoil.htm

 

I don't bother to check if the oil is "SG" or "SF" or anything else. I used to just use Yamalube only in my 4-wheelers until I got tired of paying the high price. I too did my home work and researched the auto vs motorcycle oil delema. After I talked to a tech at Pennzoil about this question he confirmed what I had concluded. Don't use any oil with friction modifiers in it. These oils are the 5-30 and 10-30 oils. The back of the bottle will say energy conserving in the small circle if there are friction modifiers. If the oil is not energy conserving this will be missing in the circle and there won't be any friction modifiers in the oil. I like Pennzoil so I just use good old 10-40 and it doesn't have any friction modifiers in it and its $1.49 a quart. The tech from Pennzoil did say a few bottles of 10-40 were miss marked in the circle energy conserving but they don't have friction modifiers. I did see a few of these bottles marked this way but I don't see them anymore. The moral here is if the bottle of oil says energy conserving on the back in the circle don't use it. If the energy conserving is missing in the bottom of the circle pour it in! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-cool.gif[/img]

 

Let see, I have a 197? atc 90. Original motor, original clutch, always used automotive oil. Recently split the cases to replace sprocket (yes, you have to split the cases to chain the countershaft sprocket) and the gears were like new. This bike has thousands and thousands of miles on it. It runs awesome even though I constantly have it floored to the max.

I've always used auto oil in all my other vehicles too. Never had an engine, tranny, or clutch failure. I'll stick with my $1.19 mobil oil and pass on the $3-4 dealer oil.

 

The Harley engines are seperate from the transmissions.