Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

Castrol GTX 5w30 is a car engine oil. I am using the same in my Maruti WagonR. Cars require JASO MB spec low friction oils. The same can be used in CVT scooters too. Cars use a dry clutch and scooters use centrifugal clutch both of which are separate from engine assembly. You should not use motorcycle engine oil in scooter.

If car engine oil is used in motorcycle, the bike may become smoother but it will cause clutch slip and loss of pickup. Bikes use wet clutch and require JASO MA spec engine oils. These oils contain friction modifiers which are essential for the proper functioning of wet clutch. Hence bike engine oils are slightly costlier.

As for the grade, there's no problem in using 5w30 in Splendor as long as it's a motorcycle specific oil.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

I saw this Amazon basics engine oil on amazon.com, I don't think it's available in India, 5W-30 grade, it's targeted for car engines I believe.

Hope they launch motorcycle oils also in all grades in India also in the future.....[emoji16]

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

5w30 grade motorcycle specific oils are available in the market but really hard to find. But they are not at all necessary. 10w30 is more than enough for good cold-starts anywhere in India.

My workshop mentor is using Mobil 5w30 mineral oil in his 2004 CD Dawn. But he is very particular in draining it before 2000km. His bike revvs much faster than any normal Hero Honda. It just needs a half-kick for starting and the engine warms up in a jiffy. But yeah, the oil doesn't last that long.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

JASO MA/MA2/MB is not for cars. In fact, oil companies don't even send their car oils for getting MA/MB because it is waste of money. They may send it for JASO-DH1 type certification if they want to target Japanese Diesel car owners.

There's no harm in doing so. In the mid-2000s, HMSI had only one oil - A white bottle 20w40 for all their motorcycles/scooters. There's nothing special in a scooter engine that requires a low friction oil. We simply exploit the fact that clutch is separate and try to use an oil with additives for slightly increased fuel economy.

I think it's the other way round. Car oils have friction modifiers (molybdenum complexes, etc) to lower friction. M/C oils also have little bit of molybdenum compounds. I don't understand why bike oils are costlier but that mainly applies to mineral and the "semi" synthetic. Good FS car/motorcycle oils are almost always 0.8k-1k INR per litre. Of course there's a classification like Group III, IV, blah blah but I don't understand them fully.

Earlier they say too low the viscosity of the oil - clutch will slip and too high - it will drag; however, now HMSI itself has a 5w-30 MA oil (black bottle). Do you know any other 5w30 or 5w40 motorcycle oils in our market? I am interested to try.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

[MENTION=76502]Aswanth.[/MENTION]r, thanks for correcting. As for scooters, I have used 5w30 MGO (maruti genuine oil) in Honda Activa and there is great difference in smoothness. The particular Activa I mentioned was being used as a beater vehicle for local errands when I was working in Maruti Suzuki. It was completely abused scooter which was serviced only once an year but the engine was super smooth. Later I found that they were using 5w30 MGO. Compared to that, my friends well maintained Activa running on 20w40 MA oil never felt that smooth.

The scooter engine is similar to car engine as in the engine oil has to only lubricate the parts of engine and not the gear box. Whereas bike engine oil also has to double up as gear oil to lubricate gearbox components. You are right, earlier all OEMs used and recommended motorcycle engine oils for scooters. But then the engine oil majors like castrol /Motul came up with MB spec oils for scooters. The OEMs followed shortly and now every two wheeler maker has MB spec scooter specific oils. I have had a short training at Suzuki 2 wheelers during college and witnessed this change first hand. They were using MA spec 10w30 oil for Access & Swish but a new circular came from Suzuki and suddenly they switched to MB spec 10w30.

We have many myths surrounding engine oils. One particular one is that thinner oils like 5w30 & 10w30 are bad for engine life. While it's true that these thinner oils are not that smooth, I found that vehicles using these oils easily outlasted vehicles running on thicker oils. My workshop mentor always said that the engine oil should reach everywhere instantly while starting. And he uses 5w30 grade both in his car and bike. I never believed him until I happened to ride a 215000 km (yes 2.15 lac, not a typo) run 2015 Hero Glamour. The engine was all stock and felt like new. No unpleasant noises whatsoever. The owner rides it ~100kms daily and has only been serviced at Hero ASC. Only Hero genuine 10w30 has been used in it. Face-palm! And on the other side I know atleast 3 of my friends bikes running on castrol & motul 20w40 which have developed crankshaft bearing noise. Even my own decently maintained bike (run on 20w40 for 80% of its life) has some noise from crank. Maybe that could be a reason why all 4 & 2 wheeler manufacturers have shifted to thinner oils. Maruti uses water-thin 0w20 oil in their new K-series engines.

5w30 grade motorcycle oil is very rare. I have only seen one brand that is Mobil. And it was a mineral oil.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

other than working as the engine lubricant , gear oil & clutch oil motorcycle oils has to act as coolant . So it gets very hot during operation . As it is lubrication provided by very heated 10 base oil in our summers is marginal - right at the limit of the oil's capability . For severe service conditions in summers 20 base oil would be better imho . Cars can get away with 0 base oils because they have separate & efficient cooling systems , use synthetic 0 base oils and large oil volume because of larger oil-sump . While quick circulation provided by thinner oils matters for multi-cyclinder car engines , the oil reaches the engine head of smaller motorcycle engine in a jiffy - and difference in the circulation delay from startup between oil grades is negligible . With 0w20 or even 5w30 in our summers for longer rides you will have the risk of seizure from lubrication-film failure .

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

If you dont mind spending 1k per liter then you can get proper race spec oil from Agip, grade is 0W60.

Though I doubt that would worth it, too cheap to try myself though.

Cheers,
A.P.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

Frankly, I can't tell the difference. I felt no difference when I ran my GS on 20w50 vs. 20w40. Some are more sensitive than others.

Am perfectly okay with using a MB/MA spec 10w30 or 5w30 in my scooter or motorcycle. What concerns me is the temperature vs. viscosity chart given in all car/2-wheeler manuals. For Chennai, the 'minimum' I can use is a xW-40 according to these charts. It's funny that HMSI's chart has only 10w-30 in it - all other viscosities have vanished. The last number is important if am going to cruise at 60 (Activa) or 70-80 (GS). As a layman, am guessing that higher the outside temperature, the more difficult it is for the engine to give off it's heat; i.e., engine runs slightly hotter. All this at one side, your observation about that Glamour is correct - see below about the Shine.

Yes. We had 1 case in Xbhp where the person used 10w30 on his Shine and that too had done 2 lakhs without even clutch plate change.

Honda uses 0w16 in some of their models. As Pinaki said, the oil has one more important function in motorcycles/scooters - i.e., cooling. Unfortunately, even liquid-cooled motorcycles can't relieve the oil of this duty. In Duke 200, the CR is on the higher side and the oil still has to cool the valvetrain (not to forget the beating it gets from the clutch plates and gears). Interestingly, RR310 has a oil-coolant heat exchanger. Some car engines like the now-retired Fiat Multijet diesel had this oil-coolant heat exchanger.

Apart from cooling, there's more mechanical stress on the motorcycle's oil.

Shifting to thinner oil is for reduced emissions and better fuel efficiency, I think. Among the Jap's, Kawasaki, Yamaha and Suzuki choosed to stay with xW-40 for their M/Cs.

Another interesting point to note - Unicorn 150 that uses 10w30 here was recommended 20w50 by Honda in the Latin Americas. Most of the Youtube videos show these guys running at high speeds/close to redline. Higher viscosity = better cylinder bore protection. Bajaj also has a stricter service schedule for those countries - Valve adjustment every 2500 km in RS200 vs. every 20k kms here!

Mobil India doesn't have a 5w30 for M/Cs. May be newly introduced, am not sure.

So the take away is choose the oil based on average outside temperature and type of service (city stop-go, grocery-run vs. highway).

60 is too thick for my GS. You are recommending race-spec oil for someone who rides on the pedestrian platform at 40 kph .

I have started calculating 'running cost' these days. Running cost per km for oil when using FS every 6000 kms and a mineral every 2000 kms is almost the same (Dino works out slightly costly here). Of course, FS needs top-ups and some models don't tolerate it.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

[MENTION=29030]Pinaki[/MENTION] sir, a strange thing I noticed is that engines with cast iron engine block (splendor/CD100/CT100) sound & feel much better with thick 20w oils. 10w grade makes them louder and slightly rougher.

While engines with aluminium block (Glamour, Activa and almost every other bike) feel good on 10w oils. Maybe the material composition of the engine also matters.

I may be wrong, but it's what I feel.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

The cylinder fins of Activa *rusts* pretty badly. I think it's made of cast iron too.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

[MENTION=33190]ashwanth.r[/MENTION], both MA & MB oils are ok for scooters. MA oils won't cause any damage as these oil companies advertise. Just that MB oils make engine relatively much smoother and responsive.

As I am typing this, it's 38°c here in Kochi. We get scorching heat, heavy rains and fog almost everyday. There is no proper winter or summer in kerala. As a result, choosing a particular oil is pretty hard. 10w30 grade is fine for this kind of varying weather conditions. But you are right, higher viscosity = better bore protection at higher RPMs. The cruising speeds are always higher whenever I use 20w40.

Our sibun sir's CBZ Xtreme has also run 1 lac+ km on 10w30 grade. 5w & 10w grade mineral/SS oils for motorcycles are only good for cold-starting & medium usage. This oil grade thing sure is confusing but better cold starts do guarantee better engine life in the long run.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

Sharing what a mechanic from Singapore has to say;



I'm so done saying this that I'd be sharing this image from now.

C'mon, don't tell me you've never been curious to see what life would be on the other side

I'm strictly against top-up's and keeping any oil past the 1500~2500 km's mark, since I do my own maintenance I have seen first hand what an extended oil change does to the motor, a friend once opened up a motorcycle he bought used, the previous owner was a fan of synthetics and extended drain intervals, anyhow the inside of the case looked as though someone had taken a dump inside it, in comparison my motorcycle that had twice the mileage was gunklessly clean.

So do take my word for it, a Rs.200/Liter oil changed at 1500~2000 km's would do your motorcycle more good than a Rs.400/Litre oil changed at 3000~4000 km's.

P.S. You can run any oil you want be it motorcycle, car, truck, tractor or whatever, frequency of change makes all the difference.

Cheers,
A.P.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

@ Prasath, Stick to the mineral oil. I assume that you are in Chennai. Were you able to find Veedol easily? I tried in several places but not able to source it. Use 20w 40 mineral oil during summers and for the rest of the year use 10w 30. Replace the oil every 2500 kms. Bike will keep on running without any issues.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

This is what keeps me going. Listen to this guy [MENTION=6369]prasanth[/MENTION] bhai. Also, my Splendor Pro did 72,191kms today when I went for an emergency run. My block's compression is still intact. I'm hoping that it'll go 100K KMS atleast. Also, my exhaust is badly choked over the usage of poor quality fuel over the years. Need to do something about it.

Re: Hero Moto Splendor/Joy/CD-Dawn/Passion

IIRC, there's an authorized distributor for Veedol in Ekkattuthangal. There's no need for a 10w30 in TPY/MAS; 20w40 all around the year is just fine.

I get it, Ashwin. Either money goes down with oil, or with premature engine rebuilding/parts. It is more prestigious to make it go down with the oil. For people like me who run very less per year, it is important to choose an oil that doesn't exceed 6 months inside the engine.