5.3 clean dirty oil

[Scooterwrench]

Thanks for all the feed back. I religiously change oil on or before milage and always use wix filters on my own vehicles. I was raised that oil is the lifeblood of an engine. So to sum things up change oil/ filter run a couple short oil/filter change intervals? Other than throwing a quart of atf in is there any other additives that I could use to help get a cleaner block such as (seafoam) seeing how my intervals will be very short at first. Or is just running cheap oil the best way until I’m satisfied before going back to mobile for regular changes?

Oil change intervals get sooner as the engine gets more miles. Rule of thumb is when you pull the stick and you can't see it through the oil it's time to change it.

 

[Jksconny]

How many miles over that period of time and was it synthetic oil in there during that time? Likely be just fine as long as you do use a good quality filter, Like a WIX 51522XP, which is the longer more filter material than the stock WIX 51042XP. Mobil 1 5w-30 or 10w-30. If worried, do the change and cut the old filter open and inspect. Run 3k miles on the first oil change and then 5k miles after that.

I’m assuming it was synthetic, hoping it was but have no way of really knowing

 

[RDF1]

Thanks for all the feed back. I religiously change oil on or before milage and always use wix filters on my own vehicles. I was raised that oil is the lifeblood of an engine. So to sum things up change oil/ filter run a couple short oil/filter change intervals? Other than throwing a quart of atf in is there any other additives that I could use to help get a cleaner block such as (seafoam) seeing how my intervals will be very short at first. Or is just running cheap oil the best way until I’m satisfied before going back to mobile for regular changes?

ATF cleans very good.
When bought my wife her 08 tahoe it had the lifter tick.
So i drained the oil and put 4 quarts of ATF in it. Let it idle for a couple hours at 1500 rpms.
Drained all that mess out and put some cheap 15w40 in it and a new filter.
When it was time to change the oil again i dropped it out and let it high idle with 4 quarts of ATF.
The lifter stop ticking so it gave me time to get the other engine built and swapped in.

Tore the old engine down and it was very clean inside for 200k miles on it. But the nastiness that drained out with the ATF "Flush" impressive.

 

[Jksconny]

Best way I know of to get the all the old oil out is to run the engine for a good 20min. after it comes up to normal running temp. then immediately pull the drain plug and let it drain overnight.

If you can,fill the filter with oil before you spin it on so you won't have as long a dry start.

I’m liking that idea

 

[Jksconny]

ATF cleans very good.
When bought my wife her 08 tahoe it had the lifter tick.
So i drained the oil and put 4 quarts of ATF in it. Let it idle for a couple hours at 1500 rpms.
Drained all that mess out and put some cheap 15w40 in it and a new filter.
When it was time to change the oil again i dropped it out and let it high idle with 4 quarts of ATF.
The lifter stop ticking so it gave me time to get the other engine built and swapped in.

Tore the old engine down and it was very clean inside for 200k miles on it. But the nastiness that drained out with the ATF "Flush" impressive.

How long of a idle with 4 qt atf?

 

[0xDEADBEEF]

Be very careful about aggressive cleaning products. All that gunk has to go somewhere and has the potential to clog the oil pickup. I second the frequent oil changes as a solution.

Having said that, I dumped a half can of seafoam in the Tahoe and the oil filter felt at least twice as heavy as any filter I have ever changed before. Engine is still running. I kinda wanted it to die though.

 

[Scooterwrench]

Run 1 quart of atf every oil change in the engine and the rest one weight heavier oil. This Toyota was a disaster 20k ago when I replaced the valve cover gasket after my dad bought it. The intent behind these pictures wasn't to show how clean the engine is but if you look at the timing components you can see that there isn't a spot of sludge. We started at the 1st change and ran it on about a 50 mile run through mountains to get it hot and changed it. The 2nd was at 500 miles. The 3rd was 1000 miles. The 4th was 3000 miles. It has been on a 5000 valvoline synthetic and atf ever since. We use Wix or Napa Gold filters.

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I'm not sure running tranny fluid in the oil continuously is a good thing to do. Tranny fluid is designed to allow friction for the clutches so in theory it is reducing the lubricity of the motor oil. I'm sure it is a great detergent for cleaning out a gunked up motor but I wouldn't put the engine under load with it in there. I quit using Amsoil motorcycle because it is designed to also run in the primary where the clutch lives. I was getting piston skirt scoring in big inch motors that stopped after switching to VR1.

 

[Jksconny]

Next question, how do you do an oil analysis? And with this truck as it being a complete 5.3 ls is that going save me a lot of money doing the swap into my 91 k2500, or is still going to be around $1500 to $2000 for swap?

 

[movietvet]

I have used ATF in my "old" days but now I use Sea Foam when is warranted. Hell, before O2 sensors and cats, I used to use ATF down a vacuum hose to help clean valves and such. Made for a really great smoke ball at back of vehicle. Even had the cops show one time thinking there was a fire as they had driven by the shop I was in. Good times...

 

[Jksconny]

I'm not sure running tranny fluid in the oil continuously is a good thing to do. Tranny fluid is designed to allow friction for the clutches so in theory it is reducing the lubricity of the motor oil. I'm sure it is a great detergent for cleaning out a gunked up motor but I wouldn't put the engine under load with it in there. I quit using Amsoil motorcycle because it is designed to also run in the primary where the clutch lives. I was getting piston skirt scoring in big inch motors that stopped after switching to VR1.