If "cold to warm produces moisture" as you say is a bad thing, why would you want to aggravate that by introducing even greater disparity between cold and warm every time you start your engine and superheat your exhaust system in comparison to colder winter air?
|
|
|
Oil change before or after winter ?????
- Thread starter afaltu
- Start date
If "cold to warm produces moisture" as you say is a bad thing, why would you want to aggravate that by introducing even greater disparity between cold and warm every time you start your engine and superheat your exhaust system in comparison to colder winter air?
^^ This.
Starting the bike once a week during the winter storage period is a terrible idea.
mike100
Well-known member
Ask a tribologist they should be able to give you any depth specifics you want.
There are some conflicting responses to this in this thread... The acids are not formed by oil oxidation, nor is it directly related to oil consumption within the combustion chamber.
Combustion by-products include Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2) and water (H20) among others. At elevated temperatures (hot blowby gas will suffice) NO2 will react with H20 to form Nitric Acid.
3 NO2 + H2O → 2 HNO3 + NO
Sulfur content in fuel will also form sulfuric acid following a similar process described above.
Look up the chemical properties of these acids - they aren't good for most metals. Nitric acid is used to etch metal for example.
The acids are neutralized by the engine oil. Engine oils have a high pH value (i.e. basic) for this reason. Engine oil has a finite amount of "acid neutralization ability" so continued cold starting and extended warm up/idling/short trips are detrimental to the lube oil.
The correct answer is
1. Fill the crankcase all the way to the top with oil.
2. Then pull the plugs and fog the cylinders down, after that you should lift the bike of the ground and change the summer air out of the tires and put in winter air.
3. Then drain your gas tank and put in fresh race fuel and moth balls because it lasts longer. But you should still put in stab....
4. Pull the battery and keep it warn and safe while on a charger. I suggest putting it by your bed so you can keep an eye on it. Just be carefully of the dangerous vapors that it released as it can explode your house.
5. Wash, polish and wax the bike twice and put a 600 count comforter on her to stay warm.
Thats it man I don't think I'm forgetting anything. O and you can even go as far as spraying down the entire bike with WD40 so it won't rust over the winter.
1. Fill the crankcase all the way to the top with oil.
2. Then pull the plugs and fog the cylinders down, after that you should lift the bike of the ground and change the summer air out of the tires and put in winter air.
3. Then drain your gas tank and put in fresh race fuel and moth balls because it lasts longer. But you should still put in stab....
4. Pull the battery and keep it warn and safe while on a charger. I suggest putting it by your bed so you can keep an eye on it. Just be carefully of the dangerous vapors that it released as it can explode your house.
5. Wash, polish and wax the bike twice and put a 600 count comforter on her to stay warm.
Thats it man I don't think I'm forgetting anything. O and you can even go as far as spraying down the entire bike with WD40 so it won't rust over the winter.
Last edited:
insert
Well-known member
i do this. but this is only because i am too lazy to pull out battery and throw it on a trickle charger. by starting it for 30 mins as i shovel driveway, or am doing something around the house it lets the bike warm up, and allows the alternator to work on the battery, it doesnt charge as well as if you were to ride it, but it does charge it. but i dont start it every week, i do it every couple weeks, or whenever i remember.
87m6chris
Well-known member
It's your bike to start up whenever you want. But as stated a few times above you are not doing the engine any favor. An engine is made to work, idling is not work. It takes along time for an idling engine to come up to a working temp. and all that time blow by gases are building up and contaminating the oil. Even if the fan comes on all that tells you is the coolant is up to temp., engine oil takes much longer to heat up. The engine has to be worked for the oil to heat.
Put fresh oil in, take the bike out for a run on a dry day, let it cool and seal off the intake and exhaust, moisture is not going to get in.
The other way to seal the engine is just as time tested, fill it to the gunnels with cheap engine oil, but what is cheap these days. "The Note" on the engine has always been a problem but filling the engine to the top with oil ( and I mean remove the valve cover and fill to the top) has usually been done on engines that aren't going to be used for a year or more, 4 months down time is hard to justify all that work when sealing intake and exhaust is so simple.
Put fresh oil in, take the bike out for a run on a dry day, let it cool and seal off the intake and exhaust, moisture is not going to get in.
The other way to seal the engine is just as time tested, fill it to the gunnels with cheap engine oil, but what is cheap these days. "The Note" on the engine has always been a problem but filling the engine to the top with oil ( and I mean remove the valve cover and fill to the top) has usually been done on engines that aren't going to be used for a year or more, 4 months down time is hard to justify all that work when sealing intake and exhaust is so simple.
insert
Well-known member
i agree, with you, but only up to the point where you say that i am not doing the engine any favour. but i didnt say anything about trying to save the engine by doing this. at worst i get some moisture into my oil, get a little bit of milky sludge on cap, but one nice ride will burn the moisture out, and even then, the next oil change isnt that far away. so please read again.
and engine does NOT have to be worked for engine to heat. the heat from an engine comes from combustion, it will heat faster under load, but it will not heat more. additionally, my bike is a 4-stroke not a 2-stroke, i dont see any gases of any sort getting anywhere to contaminate my oil.
as for when you say that cooling fans just tell you that coolant is warmed up... i disagree, it tells you engine is warmed up... the coolant gets heat radiated off the engine.
as for sealing intake... the only thing that this will really protect is the inside of your exhaust (assuming its not stainless). your intake will be plastic, the manifold will be aluminum, and depending on the bike, intake valves will only be open, or partially open on 1 or 2 cylinders. and your cylinders... well, most blocks are aluminum. and although aluminum is not corrosion proof, it will take longer than 12 weeks. ANY corrosion that MAY form on a cylinder wall would be a minimal amount of surface corrosion that would be scraped off by your piston/rings and fired out the exhaust the first time you cranked the bike to start her up. it would be cleaned out even before it started.
as for filling the whole engine up to the brim with oil. hell to me it seems to be waste of time, money, and oil. but it wont hurt the engine so long as you remember to drain some out in the spring.
so, OP, as you can see lots of different opinions. none are right, none are wrong. change the oil whenever you please. just make sure you change it eventually. either way your bike will be fine. Tom-ey-to, Tom-aw-to... its all the same in the end.
Last edited:
Now that's a response. Thank-you. Nitric acid I know about--it's used to etch magnesium and copper stamping dies. Nasty stuff.
Ice Pic
Banned
That's why they are "back-yard" mechanics. Guy buys a tool kit, fixes his lawnmower, thinks he's a licensed mechanic.
We used to have a sign at a very large dealership i worked at for the "back-yard" mechanics. It read:
"You are paying me $100 per hour to fix your car, talk to me all you want."
Less is more here people. You are taking 16 weekends!
Keep things lubed and moving. It's just that simple.
The "milkshake" effect of oil is seen when you literally add water, or blow a head-gasket.
A bike idling in the garage in the winter will take up to ten minutes to click on the fan relay, twenty mins to get oil up to operating temp.
Any condensation is burnt off then.
Oil is delivered to every square inch of the engine. There are now no "bare and exposed" areas.
Put a piece of plywood between the floor and the bike on stands, as concrete is porous, and anything porous holds moisture.
Although I've been licensed twenty years, truth is, you don't need to be a mechanic. This is basic stuff, and is just common sense.
This is how I "don't" store my bikes...meaning the bike isn't really "stored", it's just immobilized for 16 weekends, has a fresh oil change, a full tank of gas, is off the ground, and the bonus of the psychological effect on withdrawal of hearing it come to life, takes some of the sting off of winter.
Removing plugs, fogging cyls, fuel stabilizers, temp control, humidiy, I would most certainly take into consideration, if I was storing a bike for five years!
We used to have a sign at a very large dealership i worked at for the "back-yard" mechanics. It read:
"You are paying me $100 per hour to fix your car, talk to me all you want."
Less is more here people. You are taking 16 weekends!
Keep things lubed and moving. It's just that simple.
The "milkshake" effect of oil is seen when you literally add water, or blow a head-gasket.
A bike idling in the garage in the winter will take up to ten minutes to click on the fan relay, twenty mins to get oil up to operating temp.
Any condensation is burnt off then.
Oil is delivered to every square inch of the engine. There are now no "bare and exposed" areas.
Put a piece of plywood between the floor and the bike on stands, as concrete is porous, and anything porous holds moisture.
Although I've been licensed twenty years, truth is, you don't need to be a mechanic. This is basic stuff, and is just common sense.
This is how I "don't" store my bikes...meaning the bike isn't really "stored", it's just immobilized for 16 weekends, has a fresh oil change, a full tank of gas, is off the ground, and the bonus of the psychological effect on withdrawal of hearing it come to life, takes some of the sting off of winter.
Removing plugs, fogging cyls, fuel stabilizers, temp control, humidiy, I would most certainly take into consideration, if I was storing a bike for five years!
Last edited:
If we use your numbers of 1L of old oil left in the engine and 3L added, the percentage of old oil in newly mixed oil is 25%, so you are correct in that math. Where you go wrong is in the percentage of acid that would be present in the newly mixed oil. The 1L of old oil would have to no longer be oil at all, it would have to literally be 100% acid with no traces of oil left for the acid level to be 25% in the newly mixed oil. I have no clue as to what the percentage of acid present in the 1L of oil oil would be but I would guess that it would be NO WHERE near 100% making the acid level "minimal" as dricked stated.
25% would be old oil, and the % of acid would be 25% of what it was before the oil change. The opinion stated is to do an oil change in the fall to get rid of the acids....it's not possible to get rid of them all. If you did two oil changes you'd be much closer to no acids remaining.
If you completly dissasemble the motor the difference is .7L on my zx 10. 3L of oil when changing a filter 3.7 completly dry. Ok so leave the 3L of acidic acid in your bike as apposed to minimizing it by doing a change. The old oil isn't 100% acid just has an acidic content. By starting your bike and letting it sit and idle for 20 min and not putting it under load its going to be full of carbon. Do whatever you want with your bike, by now you have enough opinions that you can form your own. I change my oil frequently but if I only did it every 5000km it would get done once a year.....before it gets stored. I adj my valve clearence on my bike at 20,000 km which was also premature but I don't care, they were not within spec and the bike ran rough so just like when the bike doesn't shift like butter I change my oil and don't care wether I spent an extra 30$ and 15 min of my life over a season to ride a bike that performs to my standards.
Now you're making more sense. Yes it would be 25% of what it used to be but that's not what you wrote. You wrote........
You didn't write "25% of the percentage of acid in the old oil", which would have made the meaning of your statement 100% different........100%. Just quoting a percentage will always make the results seem higher or lower depending on how you word it. Lets plug in some numbers and see. Lets say the 1L of old oil is now 10% acid and you add 3L of new oil. Your new acid percentage would be 2.5%. Saying 25% makes that 2.5% seem huge when you look at the numbers it's tiny.
87m6chris
Well-known member
Insert, I was talking to you, I was referring to Icepic starting his bike weekly.
Concentrated nitric and sulphuric acids may etch metals, dilute nitric and sulphuric acid won't. Dilution isn't only aqueous solvent (the water byproduct) but also the non-aqueous oil, which is present in large quantities. Also remember this, gases are more soluble in colder solvents, oil in your bike gets heated up when running so the amounts of the gases that can dissolve in the water (in the oil) are not huge. You can also add something like Seafoam to oil to remove water (thus limiting the amount of acid that can form).
No kidding, there should be rules for this threads - any argument that's not backed up by a mathematical proof or study done to standards backed by an engineering association will be deleted.
Ice Pic
Banned
Last edited:
|
|
|
|
|