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Would a synthetic oil have given me the same protection in the following situation? I recently did a head replacement from 2.0 to 2.1. During the install, I noticed that the rubber washer used for the timing chain tensioner bolt was cracked in two. Obvious that wouldn't work, so I opted to use a copper washer instead, thinking that had to be better than rubber. It worked fine for the months since the install. Then just this week I was driving up the steep canyon drive to my home when the oil warning light began flashing. So I lowered speed, turned off the music and heard the sound of the valve lifters clattering. I stopped, turned the engine off and found no oil on the dipstick, but no evidence of oil dripping under the engine. I had a spare quart of oil and poured it in. When started, then I could see a steady oil leak, but from where I couldn't determine. With just a quart filling the crank to the minimum line, my goal was to make it home (mostly downhill from that point) to figure out what went wrong, driving at 35 mph and no turbo charging up the few steep inclines remaining before parking the car. By the time I parked the car (no more than 10 minutes had gone by), the warning light was back on, and the head was clattering away. The leak source was the copper washer at the chain tensioner and only another rubber washer of the type used on the fuel lines would stop it from leaking. Now, before I was able to obtain one of those rubber washers, I did have to drive the car with that oil leak to and from my night gig. I made sure I had enough oil in the crank and still was taken by surprise a few times with the oil warning light and a clattering head. So long as oil was in the crank, the oil pressure remained constant and the head quieted down to it's normal noise. Clearly, driving without adequate oil pressure for any length of time is begging for trouble, but I'm confident that because I was aware of the problem by refilling with oil when needed and didn't tax the engine during this time, it didn't cause any harm to the engine. I'm also confident that because of the fresh dyno oil I used (10-30w mixed with some 10-40), I had protection where it was needed for the relatively short distances it did drive without oil pressure. Based on what I'm now reading about synthetic oils and engine failure, I have to wonder if I would have had the same protection if a synthetic oil was used in my engine during this incident.
posted by 207.200.11...
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