Put wrong oil in my truck

[Shayne Dugan]

I noticed that I was low on oil even below the “add” line, so I mistakenly added 10w40 instead of the 10w30 the owners manual calls for. I added less than a quart. Will this oil hurt my engine in any way?

Thanks

Topic

[Louis Reed]

Short answer: No don’t worry about it.

Hope this helps.

[chevyaz]

You have no worries my friend. Ive done that to on my chevy truck.

[James O’Hara]

Short Answer: Not going to hurt a thing.

[Chuck]

You should be safe since its not fully the wrong oil. Could something happen yes but will it no or rarely. This may explain a little for your info as well.. So it just made it thicker at operating temperatures. So your pressure could increase if u did a full oil change with higher.

A thin oil has a lower number and flows more easily, while thick oils have a higher number and are more resistant to flow.

Multi-weight oils (such as 10W-30) are made possible by adding polymers to oil. The polymers allow the oil to have different weights at different temperatures. The first number indicates the viscosity of the oil at a cold temperature, while the second number indicates the viscosity at operating temperature.

If you want to know more about oil browse this: http://micapeak.com/info/oiled.html

[Kathryn Kaufman]

Glad to hear that your “mistake was a minor one that won’t cause any damage to your truck. I actually had someone at an auto parts store sell me some 10W – 30 High Mileage oil for my Toyota when the manual clearly calls for 5W – 30. I guess his thinking was that an older engine has looser parts that would benefit from the use of a thicker oil at this point. I did buy the oil but did not use it to change the oil in the vehicle. (I went over to Walmart and bought High Mileage 5W – 30 instead.) Though intrigued, and foolishly reluctant to stand my ground and not buy the 10W -40 from the auto parts guy, I felt it safer to use the tried-and-true manufacturer-recommended 5W – 30 oil. ( I’ll simply use the 10W – 30 oil in my high mileage 1981 Yamaha Maxim motorcycle instead!) 😉

[Author]

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