KINGPIN555

Going with Pennzoil platinum sae 5w30 full synthetic.... "More oil weight"

Instead of 5w20 full synthetic....

Need more weight to coat them bearing at high speeds.... Lol

Oh yeah oh yeah.... I already read the manual again....

Already use that weight on my sc430.....

Whats your opinion on the oil?
What brand you use?

dlbuckls10

You should be good for another 150K miles.

Kennyr44

If I used 5-20 in my LS 400 I could smell it burning out the tailpipe. It was very strange but true and at 198k I never had to add oil in between 5k changes with 10-30. I think 20 might be too thin for a car with miles on it.

Doublebase

You bought the car new and used 5w30 the entire time?

Or did you buy the car with 145,000 miles and use 5w30 once?

I personally would like to give the 5w30 a shot, I believe the industry went to the lighter weight oils to meet federal fuel mileage incentives/requirements, but I haven't done it yet. And then there is the fuel mileage aspect of it...how much will it effect it?

aypues

I like the Mobil 1 High Mileage. Not sure if it makes a huge difference or not but im at almost 150k on my LS430 and no issues.

is150

iTrader: (10)

I'll be switching to full synthetic 5w-20 from full synthetic 0w-20 to see if that changes the oil burning I'm experiencing. My driving is considered extreme since I live only 2 miles from work and all my driving is short trips.

Kennyr44

With oil burning I would go with 10-30. The oil burning can be slowed down with 10-30 and by no means will this hurt the engine, just look at a viscosity temperature chart. The whole 0-20 thing is all about manufactures cafe standards. Take the politics out of the equation and give the engine what it needs at this time.

is150

iTrader: (10)

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll definately look into it.

roadfrog

I dunno. Everyone talks about oil WEIGHT without considering the oil additive packages. All I know is, that TGMO is rich in moybdenum and other additives that serve well to our LS' needs.

I'm reluctantly thinking about trying 0w30 instead of my 0W20 I've been using for the last two years. But only because I want to experiment with consumption (2 qts added on my last 10k mile OCI)

DrQuality

I believe Kennyr44 & Doublebase have hit the nail on the head ...

Further, earlier comments from Nospinzone & abs also led me to suspect that this official 20 upper viscosity constraint was yet another Lexus Murica!-only rule … being tied to the US CAFE laws about auto manufacturers hitting fleet-wide MPG targets.

So I just spent an hour looking at Lexus LS460 Owner's Manuals from around the world. Only in the USA & Canada are the choices officially limited to 0w20 & 5w20. In Britain, Ireland & Australia, the owner is directed to choose the viscosity (appropriate to the operating environment) from among 0w20, 5w20, 5w30, 10w30, 15w40 & even 20w50. Even in ever-frigid Finland, Sweden & Norway, owners have access to all these viscosity options … and they were in fact all available in every Manual for the European Market that I opened.

As example, I've attached a copy of the relevant pages from the Irish-version of the 2011 Lexus LS460 Owner's Manual.

Very frustrating. Because of USA CAFE regulations that eternally increase MPG expectations, auto manufacturers are being forced to employ less viscous oil in order to gain greater fuel efficiency … at the expense of less actual engine protection. See https://bit.ly/3CtfrrM . The second graph at that website shows that a 30 upper viscosity oil (with a HTHS somewhat above 3.0) is maximizing engine protection … and at almost twice the rate of protection provided by an 20 upper viscosity oil (with an HTHS of about 2.5-2.7). And check out a few SAE Viscosity Temperature Charts; more than a few suggest that the protection of 20 upper viscosity oil begins to diminish after/around 75°F ambient, while the protection of 30 upper viscosity oil begins to diminish only after/around 95°F ambient. And Internet-searching on "5w20 5w30" brings up on-point many discussions, YouTube videos, etc. on this topic.

Perhaps if we had all been using 5w30 all along, those lower tension rings (also an artifact of CAFE standards) wouldn't be wearing out causing increasing oil consumption after 150k and such.