I don’t know if I’m losing it through a bad gasket or just burning it, but my mower (scag swz 52” with probably 700 hours on it) is using a fair amount of oil. I actually checked it the other day and it didn’t register on my dip stick.. not a good feeling. Anyway, it calls for just good ol SAE30. Should I run something else(maybe a 5w-30 high mileage) to slow down its consumption? Or is this just the nature of the beast?
JB_lawn_services
Not sure if yours has a Kawasaki, a Kohler, or some after market engine but that owner's manual would determine first which oil to use.
Be careful using straight grades (such as SAE30), not every straight grade sold is a detergent oil. Unless you purchased this SAE30 from a Kawasaki dealer as a KTECH oil, engines require a detergent oil, if you had purchased a non-detergent SAE30 (such as from Dollar General) you would be doing more harm than good.
I find it is best in this day and age to use a Full Synthetic Multi-grade oil, of the viscosity recommended by the Engine Owner's manual, normally that would be along the lines of 5w-20, 10w-30 or 10w-40.
What you might do in terms of leaks, is find a big piece of cardboard and park your mower on it overnight... Next day inspect that cardboard, any leaks or drips will show up as dark / damp spots. Doing this will help in ways of pinpointing the issue.
Be careful using straight grades (such as SAE30), not every straight grade sold is a detergent oil. Unless you purchased this SAE30 from a Kawasaki dealer as a KTECH oil, engines require a detergent oil, if you had purchased a non-detergent SAE30 (such as from Dollar General) you would be doing more harm than good.
I find it is best in this day and age to use a Full Synthetic Multi-grade oil, of the viscosity recommended by the Engine Owner's manual, normally that would be along the lines of 5w-20, 10w-30 or 10w-40.
What you might do in terms of leaks, is find a big piece of cardboard and park your mower on it overnight... Next day inspect that cardboard, any leaks or drips will show up as dark / damp spots. Doing this will help in ways of pinpointing the issue.
I would run the Kawasaki brand 20w-50 .
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A slightly thicker oil will reduce oil use on engines that use oil. You can do this on a high hour engine because the bearing clearances have open up or increased due to wear.
On a new engine or low hour engines, you would not want to run oil thicker than 10w-40, which is thickest oil Kawasaki recommends for your engine.
Also the Kawaski oil has Zinc, and is designed for air cooled engines., Cost is about the same as oil you buy at the autoparts store.
On a new engine or low hour engines, you would not want to run oil thicker than 10w-40, which is thickest oil Kawasaki recommends for your engine.
Also the Kawaski oil has Zinc, and is designed for air cooled engines., Cost is about the same as oil you buy at the autoparts store.
One more thing...
I repair mowers on the side.
Quite a few come in with some sort of "well it's doing this or that"
For example, lets say the customer will state it is USING oil...
Guess what?
The first thing I will do is find out, what kind of oil is in it?
Because if it's not the correct oil the first step is to see if an oil and filter change might correct things, and yes it is quite possible that is all it needs but before I go further...
Then I will see if it's LEAKING or USING!
Yes, REGARDLESS of what the customer just told me.
I will do actual DIAGNOSTIC work to find out just WHAT is going on, otherwise you will spend hours and days throwing parts at it and it's still not fixed. So you'll rebuild an engine and oops, it wasn't that?
Diagnostics first, always, and regardless of what you've been told or what you assume.
There are ways to find out for sure.
That's what needs to happen here.
If it is leaking then that needs to be addressed first, and if it has the wrong oil or who knows what in the crankcase then the oil and filter will get changed next.
And if it is using AND it has the wrong oil or who knows what in the crankcase then the oil and filter gets changed, then we run it and see what happens... If it's still using at this stage things get more complicated, but I always start with the easy parts of the process.
I repair mowers on the side.
Quite a few come in with some sort of "well it's doing this or that"
For example, lets say the customer will state it is USING oil...
Guess what?
The first thing I will do is find out, what kind of oil is in it?
Because if it's not the correct oil the first step is to see if an oil and filter change might correct things, and yes it is quite possible that is all it needs but before I go further...
Then I will see if it's LEAKING or USING!
Yes, REGARDLESS of what the customer just told me.
I will do actual DIAGNOSTIC work to find out just WHAT is going on, otherwise you will spend hours and days throwing parts at it and it's still not fixed. So you'll rebuild an engine and oops, it wasn't that?
Diagnostics first, always, and regardless of what you've been told or what you assume.
There are ways to find out for sure.
That's what needs to happen here.
If it is leaking then that needs to be addressed first, and if it has the wrong oil or who knows what in the crankcase then the oil and filter will get changed next.
And if it is using AND it has the wrong oil or who knows what in the crankcase then the oil and filter gets changed, then we run it and see what happens... If it's still using at this stage things get more complicated, but I always start with the easy parts of the process.
Best widely available (walmart) and relatively cheap oils I use in all of my small engines. Mobil 1 15W-50 or Mobil 1 V-Twin 20W-50. High Zinc, robust additive packages, great oils for hot hard run air cooled small engines.
Question : I check oil before cranking before every use of Vanguard 37 EFI. 90 hrs. since last oil change. On dip stick it has dropped very slightly from full mark, about the length of this line —.
Should oil always be at exactly full mark on dip stick, or is it OK as long as level is anywhere between add and full mark. My mower never drops any until about 80 hrs. after oil change, then drops slightly. I normally change at 100 hrs.
Should oil always be at exactly full mark on dip stick, or is it OK as long as level is anywhere between add and full mark. My mower never drops any until about 80 hrs. after oil change, then drops slightly. I normally change at 100 hrs.
As of a few years ago Kawasaki recommends 20w-50 in all their engines to help oil consumption. I will try to find the service bulletin from Kawasaki.
One of the posts above mentioned it correctly that as the engine ages and the tolerances open up, a thicker oil will help reduce consumption.
I doubt you have non-detergent SAE30W oil. It's hard as hell to find and pretty much none of the big companies supply it at any local level unless you're going to a specialty store.
One of three things are likely going on -
1. You have a leak
2. You were burning an acceptable amount of oil over time, however, the oil level dropped too far whereby it did damage while running it. Now that you realized the level was low, the damage is already done. Nothing will fix that except a rebuild.
3. You're running the wrong oil grade per the chart. Increase your viscosity to match the correct temperature range - ie 20w50, etc.
I doubt you have non-detergent SAE30W oil. It's hard as hell to find and pretty much none of the big companies supply it at any local level unless you're going to a specialty store.
One of three things are likely going on -
1. You have a leak
2. You were burning an acceptable amount of oil over time, however, the oil level dropped too far whereby it did damage while running it. Now that you realized the level was low, the damage is already done. Nothing will fix that except a rebuild.
3. You're running the wrong oil grade per the chart. Increase your viscosity to match the correct temperature range - ie 20w50, etc.
I am surprised this isn't better known in the industry. According to John Deere...there was a Hot Point Bulletin put out a couple of years ago by Kawasaki and other engine makers. And we weren't told until we experienced your same situation several times over. We run the JD Z950 R ZTrak plus 11 other various models. Our mowers were losing oil as well at 700-900 hours, so much so that by lunch some mowers were half empty and we even had one just like yours, not registering on the dip stick.. According to the bulletin, the EPA has made it so difficult with the emission standards that the makers have had to lean out the engines so much that at around the 700-900 hour mark, they will burn up to 1oz of oil per cylinder per hour so yes if you do the math right, you can burn 1 quart of oil if you mow 8 hours in a day with your standard two-cylinder motor. I was so pissed, The mowers aren't even broken in till then and they are telling me I have to keep adding oil or replace gaskets or whatever fails. The fact that it wasn't relayed to us as commercial consumers who make a living using these mowers with these engines was appalling. So we blow a head gasket or the top of a motor and then you tell us???Since then, we went to leasing our mowers at the designated hour mark so that we would not get stung with the bill. They will say its a wearable item, but the life expectancy is no longer even remotely close to what it used to be. Blame it on the EPA, or whomever, but we all should have been notified just like a recall or safety hazard, that;s how important this issue was/is. We paid $900+ dollars to get one fixed and that was the last time. Just be very careful.
The hash marks on the dip stick is the " safe" range. As long as the oil is between those marks engine has enough to run safely without damage. Of course you want keep near the top, especially in an engine that uses oil.
Too much oil is bad also, can lead excessive crankcase pressure which can blow gaskets or in extreme cases break rings or cause the crank to beat the oil into a foam, causing oil starvation.
Too much oil is bad also, can lead excessive crankcase pressure which can blow gaskets or in extreme cases break rings or cause the crank to beat the oil into a foam, causing oil starvation.
I have heard the 1 oz per hour per cylinder usage rate before also. That sure seems like a lot of oil 12-16 oz per day. I have had mowers with 2500+ hours on the engine Kohler & Kawasaki. Kohler 22 HP with over 2000 hours would use 4-6 oz per day and heavy load would put out a little smoke. I always use wal mart/rural king sae30 never a problem. This year I did go with kohler and Kawasaki brand oil because of the zinc. 2016 Toro grandstand 48 with efi kohler has 1950 hours on it. Scag turf tiger liquid cooled 27hp kaw has 1650 hours. New Bobcat 52 ztr mid mount has 50 but it started with kaw oil. We will see if it makes a difference.
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