What's the mileage? And what oil brand + viscosity and OCI?
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In the market
- Thread starter Shadz
- Start date
What's the mileage? And what oil brand + viscosity and OCI?
I'm sorry but I have been in manufacturing for too long to agree with any of that. It can easily be all of those things. Think about the Firestone/Explorer issue. It wasn't a bad batch of tires, it was a design flaw. But yet not 100% of the tires would fail.
It's got 150K and a quart between changes is completely normal.
It really can't. An engine that isn't lubricating properly will not kill itself in 32k in one case and another case after 300k (or not at all) under the 100% exact same conditions. That's not a lubrication issue, that's a materials issue on the part that is randomly failing.
Didn't answer my question
Definitely not something every hemi ends up with. My nephew has a hemi with over 400k kms and doesn't use a drop either.
NorthskyBlue NHT
Member
That's too broad of a year range to simply exclude IMO. That would be like someone saying avoid all 2014 - 2019 Silverados/Sierras because of AFM problems.
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Nothing against your nephew, but I’ve started becoming suspicious about the “not a drop” of oil statements. I mean, you talk with the engineers and mechanics I do, and they all agree engines should use some oil. It will either bypass the rings or go through the PCV valve.
Engines that don’t use oil make me wonder what is wrong with the engine. Sounds counterintuitive and upsets people, but that’s how I think of engines now after the experience with the Duramax, interviews and discussions I’ve had since then.
GMT 900
Well-known member
Great link, my Tahoe is in the shop fora a leaking oil pan gasket seal, I will ask them about the replaceable VLOM filter and
the AFM oil pressure relief valve.
Why? My truck has never burned oil. I can walk out to it at anytime, pull the dipstick, and it will be right at the top of the full mark. I'd go out there right now and take a video but what would that prove to one who is skeptical, I could have topped it up a day ago etc.
Oil choice makes a very big difference. Many refuse to accept this and say "oil is oil" but it's not. Just the other day on bitog (oil forum) there was an article from the API who made the claim that half of the oils they tested failed to meet their own standard.
Keeping the rings clean is very important, and this is what HPL and some other premium oils excel at. Oil is not oil.
There are some engines which are far more prone to this than others, I know some toyotas have a reputation for it due to using low tension piston rings, and so do the chevy v8s according to a few ex GM guys on the Ram forum. But even there I've seen GM guys say their engine doesn't use any oil.
I have not verified my nephews claims, but I know he's not a liar either. He is a fisherman... so maybe that is playing a wee small part in his claim. But I can absolutely assure you that mine doesn't use enough oil to register a visible change on the dipstick. That's at 60,000 miles. But I bought it new, have only ever used premium oils with high viscosity, and do regular oil changes at 5000 to 7500 miles. If you're not a "believer" in doing any of that (which I take it from you're interviews and comments, you're kind of skeptical) then I can see why you have trouble believing an engine doesn't have to use significant amounts of oil either.
What would be really worth doing, is maybe running a scope down the bore of some engines that are burning, and some that aren't, and looking to compare and contrast the shape of the insides. Is it varnished up? Lots of carbon buildup? High chance you're going to be burning some oil.
There is a guy on the bitog forum who has run HPL for 25,000 mile interval on a pentastar while only swapping the filter out in that interval, and the insides (according to a scope) are literally whistle clean. You could wipe the oil off with a rag and you wouldn't know it was used (literally, not exagerating in the slightest, if you're interested I'll track the thread down for you).
I certainly did provide that answer, weeks ago in another thread. PPP, OCI as needed depending on use of towing or not. And it's completely normal for engines to burn some oil as they age. Now a days, it's completely normal for it to occur with new engines even. It's how they are manufactured. "Tight" engines are history.Didn't answer my question
Definitely not something every hemi ends up with. My nephew has a hemi with over 400k kms and doesn't use a drop either.
lol...and one more time....it very well can! Look, you can believe what you want from reading bitog or ram forums but you cannot provide any proof of one way or the other. I also cannot prove why so many hemi lifters fail either because we do not have the data. We'll have to just agree to disagree on that point.
NorthskyBlue NHT
Member
Like Fightnfire said I wish we had percentages for how common problems like the Hemi tick and lifter failure for the GM V8s are. It could be far less frequent or more frequent then common knowledge suggests.
You have to apply a little bit of logic. I can't prove to you the sun will come up tomorrow but it's the most likely scenario, isn't it?
Same with this lifter failure. You cannot provide a set of criteria, where if that criteria is followed you can say with any certainty: "If you do X, Y, and Z, you will get lifter failure". Given that lack of criteria, and the massive range in mileage when the lifters fail, and the complete randomness of it all, the only explanation that makes sense, is that the lifter itself fails due to a materials issue in that lifter.
The hemi is not an oil burning engine. Not like some which are known for it, like some toyotas with the low tension piston rings, and the recent GM v8's. You can find many hemis that are well maintained that don't burn a drop. If you run cheap oil and change your oil way too late, yes, burning oil is a pretty good indication that you're doing it wrong.
FCA has sold many millions of hemis. It's available in the charger, challenger, durango, grand cherokee, wagoneer, ram 1500, ram 2500 and probably something else I'm forgetting. The ram 1500 alone probably accounts for 400,000 5.7s sold per year. It's been out for 15 years now in its current form. Even a tiny increase in lifter failure from normal, would show up as an issue that keeps popping up on forums, simply due to the many millions of sales.
Compare that to (say) the tundra's 5.7 and how it sells much smaller numbers, you're just not going to see nearly as many problems on the forum either, even if its reliability on average is worse (which it isn't, just using it as an example).
Same thing with the GM failures, my guess is that the actual percentage of failures is quite low on both these engines. Forums amplify every issue, the vast, vast majority will never have a problem.
Fightnfire
Moderator
Forums and the internet in general definitely inflate the not such a big problem to legendary status. I don't think we'll ever know the why behind the majority of issues that don't become a recall.
That's just it, you are not following the basic logic. If a part continuously fails from 2009 forward, that's a design flaw by definition. If they all failed at +200K forward, then you could attribute it to a wear part. And the fact that every Ram owner or dealer knows about it, and the history about it, and there are news stories about it and there are lawsuits about it, logic would dictate the fact that it's more than a "random" problem. How many times have you heard of hemi sparkplugs failing?
lol...that I'll argue with all day. Please ask any mechanic anywhere if an engine is more prone to burning oil as it ages. It's a given. And today, it's even more common. The gaps are bigger today than 20 years ago. They do that for a reason. When was the last time you rebuilt a motor?
Yes, basic logic says that a part which demonstrates completely random failure, is due to the part itself. There is no design flaw in the block, there is no lubrication issue, it's a materials issue on the lifter that completely randomly fails.
The hemi is a 20 year old engine. It should not be burning oil at < 200k miles if it's maintained properly and uses a high viscosity, high quality oil.