USMCBuckWild
Full Access Members
From what I've read, the brand of oil really doesn't matter much anymore as all oils are decent enough to handle the rigors of engines of the last 30 years or so. You just need to keep the oil clean.
When was the last time you heard of an engine fail due to improper lubrication when regular oil changes were kept up with? There's a guy on ford-trucks with a 5.4 in an F-150 with 550,000 miles and he uses conventional oil that he changes every 5000 miles.
OK, I'll admit to one. I know a guy with a 2007ish WRX STI that he autocrossed heavily. Sticky tires generated high lateral G loads and long sustained corners (most courses were set up on old airstrips: wiggle down, turn 180 and wiggle back) and he fried 2 motors. But the type of oil wasn't so much the problem in this case.
From my own personal experience, Subaru engines (the EJ255/WRXand EJ257/STi to be more specific) are very sensitive to not only viscosity but pressure variances. This is why the Blue Subaru OEM filters are strongly recommended for use on these engines, even by high end motocross builders. Alot of Subie owners/builders experimented with various weights and manufacturers of oil and found a very narrow margin in which the engines ran properly and the product maintained spec and was not burned off prematurely.
This is the type of info I want to document and provide for 4.6/5.4 engine owners. I have read on the Exploder forum that people have had good results with the OEM FL-820/FL-820s and the Motorcraft 5w-20 synthetic blend. Personally, I am not overly enthused by the Motorcraft oil, but this is why I am asking everyone here to speak up.