Finally made the switch from 5w20 to 5w30. What a difference it has made. Seems to have a little more pep and seems to have made it a bit quiet. Not so much pinging and knocking as the 5w20 when next to a wall. Not 100% gone but about 80% quieter. Changed oil last night and only had 1,900 miles on the 5w20 and it looked like 4,000 mile oil. Truck has 210,000 miles on it. Never have had any problems. No phaser ticking nothing. Just wanted to see what the hype is all about using 5w30



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I went from losing a quart every 1k miles to only losing a quart every 6k when I made the switch to 5w30

 

Your oil is always going to get darker after a few hundred miles of usage, so changing from one weight to another will not differ in that aspect.


I changed from 5w-20 over to 5w-30 on my truck, as it hit the 110K mark, and I noticed I was adding a quart or two between oil changes. The switch to 5w-30 lowered that by maybe a 1/2 quart between changes.

 

Pinging and knocking? This isn't something oil will fix.

It is an overhead cam motor so you are going to hear a steady rhythmic ticking while the motor is running. Almost like a sewing machine. 5w20 to 5w30 isn't that much of a difference to say you saw any type of improvement. Now if you went to a 10w30 or a 20w40, I could see it getting quieter.

 

I run castrol 0w40. So quiet and smooth. The 3V 5.4 was released in Australia before North America (circa 2001 in the Falcon XR8 and others). tooling for the block and cams hasn't changed since then...it was spec'd for 5w30 or 5w40 oil.

 

Yes I know oil will not fix problems. I don't gave any problems. I went to a 5w 30 because of the heat in my area. Did it quiet the ticking down. Yes it did. I'm not trying to fix a problem. I was telling what I observed. Next to a wall it isn't as loud as it was before.