engine oil used and effects on consumption

[cookingfat]

There is a thread running on Tiger 955i oil consumption - Triumph Forum: Triumph Rat Motorcycle Forums relating to variations in oil consumption depending on brand and type of oil used.

Have any XRV members any experience of different oils meaning differentials in oil consumption.

UP THE WORKERS!

[Zenarchy]

That's interesting.

I went on a trip to europe last summer, and the bike was filled with fresh Halfords 10W40 motorcycle oil before I left. Topped up to full just before I left, and took about half a litre of oil with me.

The bike doesn't tend to use hardly any oil, but I've noticed on very long journeys where it's mostly motorways it uses a bit, so thought it best to take some just incase.

I was surprised to find my extra half litre didn't last very long at all (lot of motorway miles to begin with).

I got a litre of 10W40 from a shop called Polo in germany a few days into my trip. Just topping it up with that over the next few days, oil consumption seemed to have fallen noticeably.

I assumed it was either because the bike hadn't been used a lot prior to my trip, and after a few days of heavy use it was getting into the swing of things, or that I'd headed off the motorways and into the alps, or maybe that the first few days I was riding with a guy on a VFR before we headed in different directions (seems to have much better acceleration and breaking than the africa twin so was a bit of a challenge for the bike as well as me perhaps). But then I hammered it home from Austria to Amsterdam along the autobahns in a couple of days on the way back even faster, and the oil consumption still seemed much lower than the first few days of my trip.

Never crossed my mind that it might be to do with the type of oil! Not sure if it would be the case here as I would have ended up with probably a 35%-40% mixture of the new oil in the bike at most.

I'll keep an eye out for that in the future though! Might try a different brand next time I change the oil and see what happens.

[Boris]

I keep (and always have) kept a close eye on my oil consumption and I remember, about a hundred years ago, my CBR600 that used next to no oil almost emptying its sump after being thrashed home from Berwick to Edinburgh.

It was pretty much held on the stop all the way up the A1. Even including the bit travelled through Edinburgh, which was much slower, I averaged just shy of 3 figures. After that run oil consumption went back to normal.

So I suppose the way you ride it makes more difference than anything else.

[StumpyFingers]

I use Castrol GPS and do not seem to use any oil with normal use.
Years ago I found that the air cooled bikes burnt oil when thrashed but when I got the CX500 water cooled engine, keeping the coolant at the correct 50 / 50 mix stopped the oil use but coolant needed topping up.

[davsato]

oh yeah that rings a bell, my ST 955i burned a bit of oil all the time, "perfectly normal sir" according to rafferty newmans servicing dept, then at 3yrs old the engine ate itself from the inside out.

my varadero doesnt lose a drop. it did burn a small noticable amount in a trip to the costas, but not enough to be concerned about considering it was cheap halfords brand 10w40 semi-synth, it was over 35degs every day and i was screwing the tits off her in the mountains (after a particularly full on ride racing a fireblade i lit a match on my very blue front brake disc, fantastic)
btw im not dissing halfords oil at all and will be using it again, im surprised it did so well!

[Rubberchicken]

Mixed results here.
I've mostly stuck with Bel-ray 10W40 semisynth in the dommie, and being a big aircooled single it does tend to drink a bit, switching to full-on boozing if I let her run too hot, but that's just her character I guess.

In the GS I've found that 20W50 keeps it fairly happy, while 10W40 runs through it like I left the sump plug out...

Maybe I should try some of that 20W50 in the NX sometime...