Oil problem.

[Jarbuz]

Hi guys I'm new here. Sorry to bore you with oil again but I have problem with oil and no experience at all in the field. Please help. I have bought my TA 600 two years ago from a German guy. The bike was very nicely looked after. It had 11K miles on clock. He advises me to use fully synthetic oil only. I have done 18K miles on it with no problem. Never had to top it up. While serviced I was always asking to get fully synthetic oil in it. Every mechanic tried to tell me that it is wrong oil for it. Just a month ago I was going to south of Spain I decided to get it serviced before. The story started again. I do not know why but I just give in to it and allowed them to fill it with semi synthetic. Surprise, surprise it started to take oil like never before. I even manage to ride the bike without much oil in the engine. I must have done about 210 miles with oil below level of the bayonet. I have to say that red oil control lamp never was on and that the temperature never was higher that ¾ of the scale, fare away from the red. But it took two litres of oil over 4K miles. When I come back they say that it is because bike have 30K on clock and they fill it up with mineral oil and said that that will stop it the oil consumption. I somehow don’t like it.
Could you please say what do you know about oil problems with TA. My TA is from 1999 year.
Also about driving without oil as I describe it, what sort of damage could it cause and how to assess the damage?
It would be great to hear some people with more experience than mine.
Many thanks.

Greg

[robelst]

Hello there!
Despite the myths, there is no logical explanation why a different type of oil with the correct viscosity would have such a dramatic effect on oil-consumption. If anything, I'd expect synthetic oil to be burn "easier" because it typically is thinner at lower tempreatures than mineral or semi (for example 5W40 instead of 10W40). Only under extreme load (revs and temperature) synthetic oil tends to be more resilient but it is unlikely a TA or AT will ever outperform the limits of a good quality mineral or semi oil.

Did you check the oil level right after the service? Maybe they didn't check it or forgot topping it up after running the engine (the oil-filter fills up, making the level drop). I once got my Buell back from a dealer, and discovered I could top it up a whole litre (which is "interesting", because it only take 2 litres ).

If the level is only slighlty under the minimum and you didn't see the oil-light come on it is highly unlikely the engine has been damaged. The easiest would be to to a compression test, but only if oil consumption remains this high, otherwise I wouldn;t bother.
I use Halfords mineral 10W40 in my Africa Twin (or semi in case they have no mineral in stock) and oil consumption is virtually zero at 50k-miles.

[ChrisH]

From what I understand, Synthetic oil is for high performance, high revving engines - not exactly how you'd describe the TA or AT I use semi in my '99 TA, but probably cos it happens to be handy. Be quite happy with mineral oil though. I agree with Robelst that you'd expect synthetic to disappear more rapidly..... keep a check on your oil level and hopefully you'll find it was just a one off glitch.

[24ftlb]

From what I understand, Synthetic oil is for high performance, high revving engines - not exactly how you'd describe the TA or AT I use semi in my '99 TA, but probably cos it happens to be handy. Be quite happy with mineral oil though. I agree with Robelst that you'd expect synthetic to disappear more rapidly..... keep a check on your oil level and hopefully you'll find it was just a one off glitch.

Generally speaking, a fully synthetic in a worn engine is an expensive way of using oil as its likely to be burnt off. If the engine is worn then a decent mineral oil is the only way to go. I use 5w40 fully synthetic in my alp without any issues, such as oil consumption or clutch slip. Though my alp was low mileage and had a full honda dealer history. Also the fully synthetic oil will have a better heat shear than mineral oil. The alp doesnt need the fully synthetic oil granted, but as Ive said before, oil is cheap maintenance.

paul

[raymo]

usually use mineral oil but I tried the Halfords fully synth.. no problems no oil usage on the 3000mile stella trip us a 10W40 1994 TA 28,000 miles


there have been a few threads on oil on the forum, bottom line change regular top up if required and don't use oil with tricky additives as per car engines ( clutch slip being the issue)
hope that helps

agree with the use of mineral oil on the worn motor

ray

[babybadger]

Just a thought but check the breather pipes and clean out thoroughly. It may even work to replace any breather pipes. This can cause excessive oil consumption.

[robelst]

Just a thought but check the breather pipes and clean out thoroughly. It may even work to replace any breather pipes. This can cause excessive oil consumption.

Good point: I had excessive oil in the breather system when the rear cylinder's rocker cover gasket (the internal square bit that is supposed to seal off the breather-"tunnel" from the rocker box) was not correctly in place: Oil was blown from the rocker-box into the tunnel at high revs It is very easy to have this bit of gasket slighlty mis-positioned because it doesn't fit very tight on the edge of the breather-tunnel so it hooks off easily when putting the rocker cover in place. You can't really see this so I now always use a drop of glue on the breather-part of the gasket; I have tested on an old gasket if the glue didn't damage the material and found "UHU All Purpose Adhesive" works well.

This was on an AT but I bet the TA rear-cylinder has exactly the same setup?