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December 9th, 2013 at 8:19 pm
I guess 12 degrees F isn’t cold, because my 5w20 Synthetic/ATF mix worked fine Saturday.
December 9th, 2013 at 8:21 pm
He was using straight 30 weight – and probably not synthetic, either — a recipe for FAIL, even in warmer weather.
December 9th, 2013 at 8:49 pm
30W worked fine in warm temperatures until a combination of age, carbon sludgey buildup and migration into the firing pin channel of the bolt resulted in fail.
Your synthetic / ATF blend isn’t far off what I’m currently using, which has been pretty great in all conditions.
December 9th, 2013 at 9:40 pm
“Any old motor oil you happen to grab” doesn’t work so well when it’s cold. That’s Studebaker oil. They make zero-weight now. It’s not the “motor” part that was wrong. It was probably doing fine as a storage protection, and hey, could have been worse. Brit singles, warm weather, we used to run straight 50. Clunk.
December 10th, 2013 at 2:19 pm
He said “straight 30 weight”.
That’s the problem, like everyone else said; you wouldn’t use 30W in a car in cold weather, at least not one made in the past 40 years or so, and even then it’s probably unwise.
Bitter cold calls for lightweight, probably a winter blend, and probably a synthetic. It’s not THAT expensive, especially in gun-lube quantities.
I’m pretty sure Mobil 1 0W-30 or 5W-20 would work just fine (or any other brand’s equivalent).
$6-9 a quart isn’t a big expense, considering how long one should last.
December 10th, 2013 at 6:38 pm
Motor oil works great in the cold, if you use the contents of your brain housing group to pick an appropriate viscosity. Straight 30W non-synthetic isn’t it if you are doing anything other than starting warm and getting really hot, especially if you choose a fossil based oil with lousy cold-weather properties.
Most of us who use car oils as gun oils are using synthetics (Mobil 1, Royal Purple, etc.), and for everyday use when it might get cold, most of us aren’t using SAE 30.
I use Mobil 1 5W-30 in my AR and it works great in eastern-NC cold. Further inland or further north, I’d probably go 0W-20 in the winter, after verifying that it works.
December 12th, 2013 at 2:04 am
Yep. I was gonna suggest a synthetic as it flows better at low temp. Also a low weight, 5-20W maybe, oil would be a much better bet. Have you tried Amsoil? I prefer Mobil one, but to each.