At 04:43 PM 1/11/03 +0000, Bob Donahue wrote:
>The MG club has a meeting tonight. I'd like to take the B, but it's
>supposed to get down to the lower teens tonight. I have 20W50 in the
>engine. Bad idea?
If it will crank over well enough to start in cold weather, go for it. I
have been doing this for years, quite often at temperatures below 20dF and
occasionally below 0dF. I do get a peek inside the engine occasionally,
and it doesn't seem to hurt anything.
Just allow enough time for the oil to warm up before you rev it very hard,
because the stiff stuff doesn't like to flow well. You are likely to see
slow-to-rise and lower-than-normal oil pressure when the 20W50 oil is
cold. Reving it too hard with slow flowing oil can do in the rod bearings,
because the bearings depend on the oil flow to carry away heat to keep the
bearings from melting. Once the pressure comes up to normal you can drive
"normally" (like give it hell if you like).
Barney Gaylord
1958 MGA with an attitude
http://MGAguru.com
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