Rich & Lori Pelletier

All You Need to Know About Motor Oil Cold Flow

Engineers agree that most engine wear occurs during cold starts. While the exact percentage depends on several factors and is difficult to define, the reasons include the following...

A richer air/fuel mixture at startup washes oil from the cylinder walls
Condensation forms inside the engine that causes rust and corrosion
Cold piston rings and cylinders don’t seal as well, causing combustion gases to “blow by” the rings and contaminate the oil
Gravity causes much of the oil to fall back into the oil sump, leaving components unprotected
Cold oil doesn’t flow immediately at startup, temporarily starving the engine of oil

While all these factors are important, lack of oil due to poor cold-flow properties is the biggest culprit. Fortunately, there’s something you can do about it.

"Cold" isn't just for winter

First, it’s important to define a “cold” start. While true that oil thickens more in sub-zero winter weather and causes increased starting difficulty, an engine is considered “cold” after it’s sat long enough to cool to ambient temperature, typically overnight. Even in warm climates, cold-start wear is a problem.

The oil inside your engine cools as it sits overnight. As it cools, its viscosity increases (it thickens). When it’s time to start your vehicle in the morning, the thicker oil doesn’t flow through the engine as readily as it does when it’s at operating temperature. It’s during this time that vital engine parts can operate without lubrication, increasing wear.

The problem is more pronounced the colder it gets, particularly if you’re using conventional motor oil.

Waxes solidify in the cold

Conventional lubricants contain paraffins, or waxes, that solidify when the temperature drops. These waxes cause the oil to thicken. In the comparison shown in the video, we cooled a conventional oil and AMSOIL Signature Series 5W-30 Synthetic Motor Oil to -40ºC. The conventional oil thickened so much it barely flowed from the beaker. If that oil were inside your engine on a cold morning, it could prevent the crankshaft from spinning fast enough to start the engine, leaving you stranded. Even if the engine started, you wouldn’t be out of the woods. Thick, cold oil can fail to flow through the tiny screen openings on the oil pickup tube, starving the engine of oil for several vital moments before the oil begins to heat up and flow throughout the engine.

In addition, thick oil can fail to flow through the tiny passages in the crankshaft to lubricate the main bearings. Similar oil passages in the camshaft ensure the engine's upper end is lubricated. The further away from the oil pump these oil passages reside, the longer it takes the oil to reach components at startup, placing your engine at increased risk of wear.

Poor lubricant cold-flow properties can also affect variable valve timing (VVT) systems. Engines equipped with VVT have solenoids with tiny openings through which the oil flows and acts as a hydraulic fluid to actuate VVT components. The solenoid pictured above, from a Ford® 3.5L EcoBoost® engine, contains openings .007 inches across – about the thickness of two sheets of paper. Oil that fails to flow through these tiny passages reduces VVT performance and can trigger a check-engine light.

Here's how to protect your engine

AMSOIL synthetic motor oils provide better cold-flow properties than conventional oils. Their synthetic base oils don’t contain the waxes inherent to conventional oils. As a result, they demonstrate reduced pour points and provide increased fluidity during cold starts. This translates into oil that flows almost immediately through the oil pickup screen and other tiny oil passages when you start your engine, protecting it against wear.

Look at the oil’s pour point to gauge its ability to flow quickly at startup, typically reported on the oil’s data bulletin. Pour point is the coldest point at which an oil will flow. Lower values equal improved cold-flow and maximum wear protection. AMSOIL Signature Series 5W-30 Synthetic Motor Oil, for example, provides a pour point of -50ºF (-58ºC).

0W-20

0W-30

0W-40

5W-20

5W-30

AMSOIL Warranty

AMSOIL guarantees the performance of its products, so you can be confident they perform as advertised. AMSOIL introduced the world’s first API-qualified synthetic motor oil and has since introduced a full line of industry firsts. For more than 40 years, AMSOIL synthetic lubricants have proven themselves in the lab, on the racetrack and on the highway.