Conventional 5W-30 No Longer Available?

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df2x4

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I was wrong and edited my response. We do have other brands. Even text messaged a coworker to double check.

Some websites (including O'Reillys) seem like they haven't updated all their listings yet to reflect this situation. I'd be willing to bet that if you went and pulled a jug of that Pennzoil High Mileage in your picture off the shelf, it says "Synthetic Blend" on the bottle just like the standard 5W-30 does now. If it doesn't then maybe O'Reillys is still clearing out old stock.

For example, here's the same part number of that Pennzoil High Mileage on Amazon.

www.amazon.com/Pennzoil-550045218-quart-5W-30-Mileage/dp/B01MF9B4EA

Marketed as synthetic blend, and says synthetic blend on the bottle.
 

1990C1500

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Some websites (including O'Reillys) seem like they haven't updated all their listings yet to reflect this situation. I'd be willing to bet that if you went and pulled a jug of that Pennzoil High Mileage in your picture off the shelf, it says "Synthetic Blend" on the bottle just like the standard 5W-30 does now. If it doesn't then maybe O'Reillys is still clearing out old stock.

For example, here's the same part number of that Pennzoil High Mileage on Amazon.

www.amazon.com/Pennzoil-550045218-quart-5W-30-Mileage/dp/B01MF9B4EA

Marketed as synthetic blend, and says synthetic blend on the bottle.
Maybe we have and are getting old stock. We sell a lot of the oriellys brand 5-30 not so much of the others.
 

454cid

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I just got back Meijer's. I looked at the oil while I was there. All Valvoline and Pennzoil seemed to be synthetic or semi-sythetic. The Meijer brand oil (Warren) was availble in conventional, but was only a dollar cheaper than semi for the 5-quart bottles. The conventional in quarts was actually more expensive than the semi-synthetic.... maybe an anomaly?

There was plenty of conventional on the shelves.

This got my thinking, as I reflect on the prices of oil going up over the last few years. I wonder if this is mostly a pricing/profit thing.... I wonder if conventional at a such a high price is a tough sell, and the semi-synthetic has a greater margin?
 

Pinger

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My issue isn't finding the standard offerings from the major brands, it's that they all seem to be marketed as "synthetic blends" now.
The big hope was that pure synthetics would extend drain intervals dramatically. What followed was a hasty U-turn when this was not the case. Pure synthetics lack solubility and thus the ability to absorb the additive package. Without sufficient additives the hoped for drain intervals were unrealisable.
The solution was to blend with mineral oil to gain the mineral oil's solubility and add the additive package at required concentration levels.
The addition of mineral oil re-introduces the problems synthetics were supposed to be a cure for. Namely, oxidation at higher temperatures, which returns unless the blended mineral oil is of sufficient quality to be immune. When the mineral oil is of sufficient quality (a pure paraffinic) it is actually the oil that synthetics are trying to emulate - so you'd be as well just going with it. (Which is what I do).
 

TagAllen

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for the last 5years it has frequently been hard to find conventional 10w-30 in eastern IL. Then here in the last couple months it seems to be trickling back in. Some reason 5w-30 was always easy to find.
 

sntrym

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I talked to my parts guy about this a while back. since all of the oils have at least a little synthetic in them now they were forced to label them synthetic blends, even if it was just 2 or 3% synthetic. So don't sweat it, the blends are still mostly conventional.
 

AuroraGirl

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Where are you getting DexIII? Have not been able to get it in east central IL for years.
DEX III is still produced under the 88861800 part number. You may notice it doesnt say anything about automatic or Dexron on the label, because of the shift to Dexron VI gm only keeps the fluid around to spec for transfer cases and certain manual transmissions that could not use Dexron VI. newer models do not use that fluid, they typically use the new atf or another kind of fluid
 

AuroraGirl

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^ Yeah.

From what I understand several companies are still producing and selling Dexron 3 compatible fluid, it's just not officially licensed by GM any longer.

GM says to use Dexron 6 in it's place except in transfer cases or power steering systems that originally called for Dexron 3. For those transfer cases they recommend GM manual transmission and transfer case fluid, part number 88861800. For power steering systems, GM power steering fluid part number 9985010.
correct, GM does not police the use of Dexron III which means the fluid can be as compatible or incompatible as humanly possible and still say Dexron III
 
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