Fun Thread on another site. "How long will an average automobile engine run without oil"

[enginesrus]

And think of the old hit n miss engines of the past, with oil cups, oil pressure was at a low ebb in those days.

 

[berkshire]

I remember an advert in the UK in the 1960s with an old car , touting Molyslip a Molybdenum disulfide compound , They had put this in the engine oil run it for a while , then drained all of the oil out.
They then drove this thing up hill and down dale until the engine seized. It took ten miles.
B.E.

You are judged not by what you know, but by what you can do.

 

[gruntguru]

We had a similar stunt many years ago in Australia. I think the product was Nulon. A car was treated then driven something like 1000 km with no oil.

Found this.

"In 1983 Nulon modified a Holden Commodore engine which had hydraulic lifters to solid lifters, so it would work without oil
They ran the car around for 5k with the E30 additive and then at a public press event, drained the oil from the sump.
The car was then driven by a motoring author and some other guy (neither from Nulon) from Sydney to Melbourne
At all times the oil light was on showing no oil pressure
The car/engine successfully completed the 1031km journey

This "no oil" demonstration has been done often (in the past) in the USA at motorcycle events.
They show an engine mounted on a test frame running, then drain the oil and restart the engine.
Sometimes these demonstrations include actually riding a bike with no oil.

The Briggs and Stratton company decided to perform a back to back test.
They ran two new engines on test frames for 20 hours, one with a (unspecified) PTFE oil additive
They then drained the oil from both and ran the engines for a another 20 hours
Both engines survived this ordeal - so they were run for a second 20 hour interval without oil
Both engines were then torn down and inspected
both engines suffered from scored crankpin bearings,
the engine treated with the additive also suffered from heavy cylinder bore damage that was not evident on the untreated engine.
"

je suis charlie

 

[enginesrus]

gruntguru, good stuff about the Briggs Strattons, is there a good place to find that information? So where those aluminum cylinders? And what year did they do that? So a total of 40 hours run time with no oil? Where they loaded on a dyno?
Even so major engine loading or not there is still a lot of load from running. It would be nice to see the details of that test.

 

[itsmoked]

Had a motorcycle buddy who'd built up a 600CC 2 stroke dirt bike. I helped him over to a big dirt lot in the industrial park to give it a few laps on the 1/4 acre. We got it out of the truck and he started it up and let it idle for about 2 minutes. He then started around the perimeter of the little lot at a brisk pace. He made it about 1/2 way across the lot before the back tire locked up on him almost dumping him. He stared at it for a minute lifted the seat and then I could hear intense air darkening swearing. Turned out this was one of the early two-strokes with the little oil tank that mixes automatically with the fuel and he'd failed to fill the little oil tank. The top end was toast.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[enginesrus]

No more editing ??????? In my above post where is were......................

 

[gruntguru]

A Google search brought up this book. Link

je suis charlie

 

[itsmoked]

enginesrus; this site, rather generously, allows us about 48hrs to edit a post compared to the usual 1hr of most forums. I suspect you waited 49 hrs...

Dont woorry, we all no your a engineer an donot expekt u two be able too speel.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[waross]

No names No pack drill.
Many years ago I was driving a 5 ton truck for a city electrical department. It was an old GM product with a 6 cylinder engine.
Our truck came back from a scheduled oil change and we went to work. We never drove very hard or very fast. We spent most of the day parked.
On the third day, in a fit of boredom I checked the dipstick. ( Due too union jurisdictions I was not supposed to check the oil.)
Bone dry.
We headed to the shop. After a quiet conversation the sump was filled with oil and nothing was ever said for many years.
I don't remember why there had been no indication of low or no oil pressure.
The truck had never used oil and after the event it seemed to run as well as ever.
It may have had some oil but it took a lot of oil to top it up.
When every one is in coverup mode a lot of details are not determined.


Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter