engine oil 2.2KV

[Colin Aitchison]

These old style of 4 and 5 pot engines are not as sensitive to engine oils as new engined cars, with the wide market place of engine oils today you have to make your own mind up, a good place to start is to look for an oil that was about when you car was new back in the 70's, 80's and 90's, my own oil of choice is 20w-50 mineral oil £10-£12 for 4.5lt, I use this in my 2.2 KV, 2.3 7A, 2.1 WR(ur quattro), 2.6 ABC, the only thing I would say is that my oil is changed every 2-3K miles, I don't believe in running £40-£50 oil for 6-10K miles or even more, I think that clean oil is best for your engine, also the 2.3 7A 20v engine that I have is my B2 coupe is my hill-climb/sprint car and it sounds nice a 7000RPM and no smoke, another bit of sound advice is if you have a rebuilt engine with new rings and bearings always use mineral oil any synthetic oil will not let the pistons rings bed-in, some more sound advice I hear you ask for, well, always use MAHLE oil filters Ur quattro WR OC47+OC78, ABC OC264, KV+7A OC47 at VOLKSPARES most filters £3-£4 EACH, OC78 £8-£10 from local stockist, now how to test you oil, rule of thumb, take the car for a little run and get the oil and water up to temp, when you get back dip the oil and take the oil from the dip stick to between your thumb and forefinger and give it a little rub between them, REMEMBER THE OIL WILL BE HOT, if it feels like you have fell in the sand on the beach between you fingers, you may have left the oil change a bit late or it may feel like a delicate place in the female anatomy, no need to change the oil, if you have the sandy beach feel to the oil you need to change your oil, remember to dispose of you used engine oil properly at your local council recycle center.

[Cossack]

Alright, thank you for sharing your experience.

I am rebuilding B2 coupe. Soon it will have rebuilt KV (new rings, bearings, if possible new pistons) engine, and KV because want to rebuild it as much as possible in original state, so was concerned what oil to use.

[Eddy]

For 'normal use'
Castrol 10-40 or 15- 40 GTX (not too much ££££ but a good quality oil WHICH IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING)
The hydraulic tappets seem to like it. Been running VAG cars for years on this stuff and you can stick to the 'recommended service intervals'.


For track or hard use
A 10-60 or 15-50 BMW M speck oil.
Why- the KV has no oil cooler and no oil cooling piston jets so with hard use the oil gets very hot, and your 'run of the mill oil' starts to break down at really high temps.
Also the radiator isn't the most efficient so the cooling effect for the oil from this can be limited.

[K Simmonds]

I swear by VAG Quantum 10W40 semi synthetic for naturally aspirated VAG engines from this period, the 1980's/90's, it's inexpensive so you can afford to drop it every 5K if you want to be really anal or if you drive hard. As I'm in the trade it only costs about £8 for five litres if I buy a box of four at a time, but it's not stupidly expensive regardless.

For turbo charged cars or if you drive VERY hard all the time then 10W50 Fuchs Titan Pro-s is what I go for or Millers do a very similar product in 10W40 that's also excellent, I use the former in my S2 which gets a good thrashing on a regular basis. It gets changed every 5K or 12 months which ever comes first.

[msh]

My current runabout is mk2 golf with 2E engine swapped in - last owner of that seat toledo it came from was careless, so everything leaks and so on - the logical oil choice, of course, was some cheap 5w40, as I have rather hard foot, and the engine is being driven without warmup - but I'm not using the car on track, therefore engine doesn't experience high temperatures - my favourite parts store currently offers champion synthetic from a drum for 5 euros per litre - previously there was likely 10w40, so everything is black and dirty - nice to see how engine slowly becomes cleaner, also rough idle slowly became better, although that could be from use, not better oil