ORIGINAL: Kiteflyer
I lubricated a few engines with synthetic motor oil last year and then put them away. Looking at them today, everything seems fine. However, are there any ingredients in it that may adversely effect the engines in the long term? Any thoughts?
My 2 cents on this subject.
First, I think jakahasmistakenhow the rust problem happens.It's cause isfrom the leftovermethonalin the engine after runnning. The rusthappens due to the water absorbtionproperty of methanol, not because the castor oiloxidizes. That's just plain non-sense. If castor oiloxidizes the engines would wear out after a couple of runs. Water is the oxidizer in this case, as a matter of fact rust is oxidized steal or iron.
As far as the ingredients are concerned detergents in a oil are what you want to look out for. The best oil to use for long term storagewould be Caster, the synthetic oil usedin our RC fuelminus thenitro andalcohol,hydraulic jackoil,or a
Non-Detergent motor oil, in that order,
ATF is the worst to use if the engine has silicone gaskets, eg YS, due to the high concentration of detergents that are placed in ATF Fluid. These detergents will eat away any silicone gaskets and possibly may even harden some types of rubber orings.If you ever used silicone on a transmission pan gasket you would see what the detergents do to the silicone. After a few months the silicone turns to goo.
Caster is tried and true.
The Synthetic oil in the fuel we use would work fine as long as it's just the oil. Can't use the fuel as lubricant as the alcohol, in the fuel,loves to sap moisture from the surrounding air.This is why you want to get all the fuel out of the engine right after running in theshort or long term between running it. Otherwise the water absorbed by the leftover fuel will rust any steel parts in the engine.
Hydraulic oil is ok use as it does not contain detergents.Thedetergents, foam under high pressure. Gasoline engines would not normally have this problem as the don't use methonal. Only speaking of Nitro engines here.
Non-detergent motor oil would also be ok to use. It's been a few years since I rebuilt the engine in my truck, but it used to be that you would use a non-detergent motor oil for the first 500 miles for break in then switch to a detergent motor oil after that.