You have to be careful in trying to determine cause and effect. I have to point out….

I do not run my car in winter at all.What would be a good Viscosity off oil to go with on my 06 Boxster S 3.2.
I usually drive it from May 1 thru to Nov just before it starts to snow so temps rang from approx 5 degrees celcious to 90 degrees (40 f to 90 f) in peak off summer.No track use,usually
around 1/2 hr to work each way all hwy.Thx

Quote
moresquirt
I do not run my car in winter at all.What would be a good Viscosity off oil to go with on my 06 Boxster S 3.2.
I usually drive it from May 1 thru to Nov just before it starts to snow so temps rang from approx 5 degrees celcious to 90 degrees (40 f to 90 f) in peak off summer.No track use,usually
around 1/2 hr to work each way all hwy.Thx

I used Mobil 1 0W - 40 in my 06 Boxster for 106K km for seven seasons. Never had a problem. During the first season with break in, it used about 1/3 litre of oil. After that it never dropped down a single bar. Mine usually comes out some time in April - once the salt is off the roads.

Ok thx,have almost same mileage on mine now,it does use oil though,maybe a litre over 10000 kilometers (one summer),if i baby it no useage but if i hammer it alot usage goes up.
I think thats an exceptabe amount. I know Pedro uses much heavier oil but hes Resides in Florida.I purchased car used at almost 70000 kil and previous owner was using
5w50,(saw the invoices) they only used the car in the summer also.

I use Castrol Edge 5W40.

I read, somewhere here, that it might have the 'edge' on Mobil 0W40.

In either case, it's a good idea to change it frequently.

Puzzling over this myself too for my new to me '01 with 110,000Km. The owners manual seems to suggest 10W-40 synthetic as being "in range" for cold and warm weather driving so I'm tempted to go with that. I have been using 5W-40 Kendall GT-1 Synth (Euro blend) in my 951, mainly that's what Furtmair was filling it with for the previous owner.

Chris - '01 Boxster - Seal Grey / Black / Black ; '87 944 Turbo (track beast) ; '86 944 - needs a new home!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/01/2014 04:31PM by Crooster. (view changes)

Quote
Crooster
Puzzling over this myself too for my new to me '01 with 110,000Km. The owners manual seems to suggest 10W-40 synthetic as being "in range" for cold and warm weather driving so I'm tempted to go with that. I have been using 5W-40 Kendall GT-1 Synth (Euro blend) in my 951, mainly that's what Furtmair was filling it with for the previous owner.

oils you should check with your local Porsche dealer. (IIRC the owners manual somewhere states something to this effect.) You can use this then to ask the parts department or perhaps a tech to print the list for you. Or join renntech.org which has available to members the current list of approved oils.

No 10w-40 oil has been on the list as long as I've had a copy and I've have a copy dated from early 2003 in my files.

Quote
moresquirt
I do not run my car in winter at all.What would be a good Viscosity off oil to go with on my 06 Boxster S 3.2.
I usually drive it from May 1 thru to Nov just before it starts to snow so temps rang from approx 5 degrees celcious to 90 degrees (40 f to 90 f) in peak off summer.No track use,usually
around 1/2 hr to work each way all hwy.Thx

I have a 06 987s as well...aren't they a blast

I have owned my P Car for 4 years now and started using Mobil 1 0W40. I used ~ 1 ltr per season as well after ~ 10K Kilometers.

I switched to Fuchs 5W40 the last 3 seasons and my usage is ~ .5 ltr >

So that works for me.

Come on spring

MIKELLIG

Probably stay with a 5/40 or 5/50.The porsche oil filter is paper and the micron size is probably designed around the oil viscositys they suggest meaning (to me) that
if i go much thicker especially on the first number ,the oil will go thru the bypass if it can,t get thru the filter quick enough which could cause dirty oil or contaminants
to enter the engine without being filtered atleast until the oil has warmed up enough to ALL go thru the filter.I guess if u change the oil often enough then this may not be an issue.
I have found that with my car after about 9000 kilometers the engine starts to tick when cold and after i change the oil it goes away.I am sure the oil is still good just not as good!!

For reference, here is the page from my manual:

[i781.photobucket.com]

Porsche has released bulletins that overrule that information and have done so since back in 2003.

The last line is the one that really matters. Check with your dealer to get the latest info regarding oils. Semi-synthetics are out. Full synthetic oils are in. 10w-XX, 20w-XX are also out.

And not all oils the API grades or ILSAC grades are suitable either.

If you want to shelf shop approved oils, look for an A40 on the bottle's label. A40 on the label means the oil is approved by Porsche for use in their sports cars dating back to the early 80's to current.

Interesting info,thx Apparenty Porsche was useing the thick stuff,pulled my book out on my 06 and nothing thicker than a 5 weight showing under any conditions.
Wonder why.I believe Pedro uses 20/50 i believe in his 99 and has a ton off miles and no problems even with IMSB. Wonder if thats the secret to IMS longevity.
Oils to thick to seem thru the bearing seals.

my 02 Boxster's 2.7l engine has run for over 276K miles and it has been filled primarily Mobil 1 0w-40 oil.

With Pedro's engine, as well as mine, the common factors are both get used quite a bit and both receive regular oil/filter changes. HIs spends its time in the mild climate (but humid climate) of Florida. Mine spent a couple of years in the mix of weather in the KC Mo area though road trips had it in the northern reaches of Wisconsin and Michigan in cold and even snowy weather or in the desert southwest and hot (116F temperature) and dry weather.

Since 2004 the Boxster has been here in northern CA where the climate is milder at least in the winter while summer time temperatures can reach 100F+. But it gets used rain or shine, summer or winter.

BTW, the same oil gets used in my 996 Turbo and has for over 117K miles. While the Turbo engine doesn't have the IMSB weakness the Boxster engine has, the Turbo engine makes its own severe demands on the oil. One Turbo owner has over 350K miles on his car's engine and I believe he runs Mobil 1 0w-40 oil.

As I have mentioned several times an early oil analysis -- done on a whim -- of the Boxster's oil found a rather large amount of water in the oil. The oil analysis was done in winter with about 4K miles on the oil. The amount of water (IIRC around 7%, which is nearly 1/2 quart of water in about 9 quarts of oil!) caused me to wonder about among other things engine temperature and I started monitoring engine coolant temperature using an OBD2 scan tool and found the engine required considerable running to warm up and even with a lot of running if the ambient temperature was low the engine ran rather cool.

Other than trying to avoid short trips whenever possible nothing I could do about that but I did decide that to avoid the possibility of running oil with too heavy a concentration of water build up -- which also means a lot of acid -- to change the oil not at the 15K miles the factory called for but at 5K miles. And along with the oil changing the filter too which the factory had scheduled to be changed only every other oil change or every 30K miles.

To me that decision to change the oil/filter every 5K miles and whenever possible to avoid short trips has helped the engine reach 276K miles with the real chance of continuing on to double that 276K miles to 500K miles and beyond.

Marc,is that the original IMSB in your boxster.Thats really interesting info on the water in the oil,actually alarming!! I usually change my oil at end off season or late fall
with about 10000 kilometers (6500 miles) Maybe an earlier change is required.I definately notice lifter ticking with a cold motor once i hit the 6000 mile mark.probably the water
diluting the oil somewhat.Thx for the info.

First I just wanted to point out that Marc's experience with water in the oil was in Winter. I think Marc was referring to MO winter and not California "winter".

It really does take a while for the engine oil to warm up to operating temperature. I've become more aware of that since I got my 981 which shows oil, as well as coolant temperature. Based on my observations, the oil doesn't really start to warm up until the coolant is almost at operating temperature (90 C = 194 F for the 981). Depending on the type of driving, it can take another 10 - 15 minutes for the oil to reach 90 C (That's with ambient temperatures around 20 C = 68 F). In part, this may be influenced by the thermal management designed into the 981 and 991, which focuses on getting the engine warmed up to optimum temperature as quickly as possible for both fuel economy and lower emissions.

When you start a cold engine, that's when the largest proportion of water is created. Some goes out the exhaust (We see LOTS of that here in Ontario at this time of year.), some gets into the oil. You need to get the engine nice and hot and drive it for a while to burn/evaporate that water from the oil. That's why short drives are so hard on the engine. The colder the ambient temperature gets, the longer it takes to get things up to operating temperature.

I think that the distance Marc drives to work every day (about 60 mi. each way, right Marc?) gives his engine lots of time to get to operating temperature and burn off the water in the oil. I think that is a contributing factor to Marc's engine longevity.

That's why I think it's a big mistake for people who store their cars, who start them up and let them run for 15 minutes or so every few weeks. Might as well just add a few cups of water to the oil (along with a few acids) and save the gas.

So if you drive your car a lot of short distances during the week, it would be good (Hey, it's fun too.) to get it out for a longer, enthusiastic drive at least once a week. It's good for the car and good for your soul.

I add a bottle off SEAFOAM fuel treatment every fall before storage to help with Ethenol and also keep the injectors clean,some off that will shurley
find its way to the oil in the case due to the flat 6 design,maybe this will help with moisture as i am only 20 minutes in the car (all hwy) each way to work
and the oil probably never gets hot enough to burn it off.Any negatives to adding this fuel treatment thru the season in addition to storage.