Burning a lil oil....

[Hppants]

I might make it to the "add" mark on a long tour of 6,000 miles or more, based on my current assessment of my consumption. I'll bring the 6 oz. nalgene bottle for safe keeping on the long tours. For rides of less than 3,000 miles, I won't worry about it.

[Geezer]

My '05 started burning oil somewhere after I hit the 125K miles mark. It uses about a pint between 5k oil changes. It is at it's worst during sessions of heavy compression braking so I assume it is oil being drawn past worn valve seals. It is not bad enough for me to want to fix it.

[Red]

OK, my bike has got 65,xxx miles on it, and its consuming a little oil. Between the low mark on the sight glass and the high is about 1/3 of a quart. At 3,500 miles since the last oil change, I'm about 1/2 way down to the low mark (about 1/6th of a quart).

Hppants,

I think RaYzerman nailed it. Try some Yamaha Ring Free fuel treatment for a while, and see if things improve. There may be similar products out there, I don't know about them. I'd go for the tried-and-true, here. Can't hurt, might help.
.

[Hppants]

Confirming, this is it, yes?
(this product is marketed for marine engines, but does appear to work on 2 and 4 stroke motors)

https://www.amazon.com/Yamaha-Yamalube- ... ooghydr-20

[Red]

Confirming, this is it, yes? (this product is marketed for marine engines, but does appear to work on 2 and 4 stroke motors)
https://www.amazon.com/Yamaha-Yamalube- ... ooghydr-20

Hppants,

Wow, they hiked the price! I thought it was fairly reasonable, before. Well, as I recall, it doesn't take very much, and you sure don't want to overdo it anyway. I'm fairly sure that's the right stuff. That container should last a while. Amazon reviews had several bikers using it, and all good.
.

[morecowbell]

It's really quite impressive how little oil modern engines consume.

Like Blind Squirrel, my old BMW R1100RT (with 168000 miles) burns a bit of oil between 6000 mile changes, so I always carry an extra quart in the side case. While out on a tour, I'll have to add a little oil every few days. But then the last time I had that bike out for a tour was in 2014!

My FJR is still pretty fresh with only 55000 miles on it. I'll occasionally check the sight glass between 5000 mile oil changes...it has never needed any top-up oil. Every so often I'll run some Yamalube Engine Med RX through a tank. It offers some ethanol corrosion protection and engine de-carboning. One ounce treats 10 gallons of fuel, so the 16oz bottle will last me quite a while. I really have no idea if it actually has any effect on the engine, but it can't hurt to try.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Yamalube-Engin ... Sw8mdepP~~

And then there's the oil consumption of the radial engine of the T-28. If I fly it for an hour and a half at normal power settings, it'll take about a half GALLON of oil to bring the level in the tank to where we like to see it. If I fly it out west this winter like I'm hoping, I'll need to carry about 6 or 8 jugs (1.3 gallons each) of AeroShell W120 oil in the equipment bay for the round trip. I should start buying lottery tickets and hope for the big win.

[Hppants]

Bought a bottle of Yammie Ring Free. As my Dad would opine: "Boy, they are proud of that shit, no?"

Of course, we won't know if it does any good for another 4,000 miles. But I was wondering - how many tanks of fuel should I run with this stuff in order to validate the experiment?

[ionbeam]

Bought a bottle of Yammie Ring Free. As my Dad would opine: "Boy, they are proud of that shit, no?"

...But I was wondering - how many tanks of fuel should I run with this stuff in order to validate the experiment?

Ring Free is supposed to treat gas in a 1:10 ratio IIRC. 1oz treats 10 gallons, check the package. There is no down side to adding Ring Free so far as engine operation, the only negatives are the cost and actually having to dose it out. IMO, try at least 5 tanks (~3 oz in total) or more. Thermal cycling and engine speed will do the work. The rings were seriously stuck on my '04 at <40k miles. I know this because I had the pistons in my hands. You may want to add the Ring Free as you get closer to an oil change so that anything suspended in the oil gets flushed out.

[Hppants]

Thanks for the tip. I actually used my "cup" with the graduation markings to "dose" the 6 gallons in the tank more accurately - 20 cc is not much.

I'll run 5 tanks of gas and change the oil. Then we will see what it does.

[Hppants]

For safe keeping, in 4500 miles, I burned 350 cc of oil.

We will see what happens with the ring free.

[danh600]

Roger that - Me thinks that my fajita steak and onions fried down in 10W40 Yamalube would NOT be too tasty!!

I would wager Pants burns more shampoo than the FJR burns oil on a long trip.

[danh600]

Bought a bottle of Yammie Ring Free. As my Dad would opine: "Boy, they are proud of that shit, no?"

...But I was wondering - how many tanks of fuel should I run with this stuff in order to validate the experiment?

Ring Free is supposed to treat gas in a 1:10 ratio IIRC. 1oz treats 10 gallons, check the package. There is no down side to adding Ring Free so far as engine operation, the only negatives are the cost and actually having to dose it out. IMO, try at least 5 tanks (~3 oz in total) or more. Thermal cycling and engine speed will do the work. The rings were seriously stuck on my '04 at <40k miles. I know this because I had the pistons in my hands. You may want to add the Ring Free as you get closer to an oil change so that anything suspended in the oil gets flushed out.

Can you explain rings being "stuck" to a non mechanic like me. In my mind stuck rings would mean the pistons would not move or the rings would break off cause they are stuck against the cylinders. Obviously that is not what you are talking about.

[Red]

Can you explain rings being "stuck" to a non mechanic like me. In my mind stuck rings would mean the pistons would not move or the rings would break off cause they are stuck against the cylinders. Obviously that is not what you are talking about.

Dan,

Okay, if an engine is not being run, the rings really CAN get rusted solidly to the cylinder walls, but that is not what we are talking about here. Rings have to expand in their piston grooves to make the pistons fit in the cylinders closely. If the rings get "stuck" in their piston grooves, they will not be expanding to the size of the cylinder walls, causing low compression and (usually) higher oil consumption. A product like "Ring Free" is intended to prevent the rings from becoming stuck in the piston grooves. If it works (not always), then engine compression and horsepower will go back up to normal, and oil usage is reduced to normal, or at least "normal" for an aging engine.

Naturally, such a product is better at prevention of the problem, rather than curing it once it gets really bad, but it CAN work, as intended. That trick can save you a lot of engine work; the revitalized engine should then continue to give the full service life that you should expect. It's no fun to tear apart an engine 'way too soon, only to find that some gum or varnish in the piston ring grooves was the real problem all along.
.

[Hppants]

To be clear, there will be no “tearing of the engine” in my case. Just throwing a dart at it and hoping for favorable results.

And BTW - the ratio of shampoo to oil consumption is definitely greater than 1

[ionbeam]

To be clear, there will be no “tearing of the engine” in my case...

Since my 04's pistons and valves shared the same space together at the same time I had to take my engine apart. This facilitated my manual ring inspection. I do not recommend doing this type of inspection as routine maintenance (except possibly for raYzerman sometime in January as a little project). Pistons 1, valves 0. Pistons crushed the valves with hardly a mark on the piston tops, the great unknown was what condition the plain bearings on the crank, piston rods and piston pins were in.

[raYzerman]

I hate tearing down engines unless I have to... once pistons come out, there is no more putting them back with the old rings and have the wear match up. At minimum, new rings and let them wear in to match the bores.... in the FJR's case, the bores are Nikasil coated aluminum and very hard, and the coating is too thin to hone them (or risk losing Nikasil).
I'm not so sure about the sticky rings theory on an FJR. My project bike was so carboned up on top of the pistons and valve area, but the rings were not stuck at all, nor was there a ring ridge on the top of the cylinders... hmmm.. Now, the PO had used RingFree all the time...... mostly naptha.
I think of stuck rings in the old days of oil burning cars where the oil got up past the rings and gummed up the rings....... I'd almost rather dump naptha in the spark plug holes and let it soak than vastly diluting it with fuel in the gas tank. That would dissolve any gummy crap.
I don't think you have anything to lose by using RingFree, but I'd guess it just as likely oil is sneaking past the valve seals.
The one thing you can do is a compression test... if that shows one or more cylinders with a much different reading than the others, then that may mean ring issues on that cylinder. However, I'd further verify that with a leakdown test.

[raYzerman]

For safe keeping, in 4500 miles, I burned 350 cc of oil.

We will see what happens with the ring free.

Just for the record, I'm wondering what exactly was your method of determining what the oil level was and is, i.e., were those methods exactly the same? Did you time it exactly? I'm trying to get at how you determined the burned oil was 350cc since there are several variables involved in a sight glass check.

[danh600]

Can you explain rings being "stuck" to a non mechanic like me. In my mind stuck rings would mean the pistons would not move or the rings would break off cause they are stuck against the cylinders. Obviously that is not what you are talking about.

Dan,

Okay, if an engine is not being run, the rings really CAN get rusted solidly to the cylinder walls, but that is not what we are talking about here. Rings have to expand in their piston grooves to make the pistons fit in the cylinders closely. If the rings get "stuck" in their piston grooves, they will not be expanding to the size of the cylinder walls, causing low compression and (usually) higher oil consumption. A product like "Ring Free" is intended to prevent the rings from becoming stuck in the piston grooves. If it works (not always), then engine compression and horsepower will go back up to normal, and oil usage is reduced to normal, or at least "normal" for an aging engine.

Naturally, such a product is better at prevention of the problem, rather than curing it once it gets really bad, but it CAN work, as intended. That trick can save you a lot of engine work; the revitalized engine should then continue to give the full service life that you should expect. It's no fun to tear apart an engine 'way too soon, only to find that some gum or varnish in the piston ring grooves was the real problem all along.
.

Thank you Red. I really appreciate the explanation. Now all this makes sense.

[Hppants]

For safe keeping, in 4500 miles, I burned 350 cc of oil.

We will see what happens with the ring free.

Just for the record, I'm wondering what exactly was your method of determining what the oil level was and is, i.e., were those methods exactly the same? Did you time it exactly? I'm trying to get at how you determined the burned oil was 350cc since there are several variables involved in a sight glass check.

Well, you asked....

First, as an old lab tech (wet chemistry), I freely acknowledge the possibility of error in my measurements. That said, with my line of sight "level", my last oil change was filled as it always is, with the bottom of the meniscus in the sight glass even with the midpoint of the "full dot".

4500 miles later, with my "graduated fill cup funnel", with measurements in 10 cc increments, I refilled to the same level. And then I "overfilled" just slightly (meniscus to the top of the dot) to determine a good guess for my error of measurement, which I believe to be about 10 cc.

Therefore, I burned 350cc (+ or - 10 cc) in 4500 miles.

I've got a 750-ish mile ride planned next weekend. Afterwards, I'll drain and change the oil and reset the clock. If it doesn't hurt anything, I'll add the ring free for 5-10 tanks and see what happens.

Regarding any 'tear down", in the extremely unlikely event that my motor blows up, that is where it will stay. I'll part out what I can, and buy another one. I'm capable of tearing the motor down, but likely not able to put it back together. Regardless, I'd rather ride another one....

[Uncle Hud]

ala Beavis & Butthead: Heh, heh, heh; he said, “meniscus.”