Even if its just straight automobile synthetic oil with a 15w-50 or 20w-50 weight from autozone or advance auto parts or wally world or whatever?

 

I personally make sure the 15-50w or 20-50w sythentic oil says "vtwin" or " motorcycle", "4 stroke" etc. on the bottle. Supposedly there are different additives in a motocycle blend synthetic. I can't verify that becuase Ive never sent out samples to be tested.

 

There has been debate about whether motorcycle oil is any different than car oil and so far nobody has found any significant differences. Motorcycles are much harder on oil than cars, but there's no evidence that motorcycle oil holds up better than car oil. I think a lot of people have used mobil 1 car oil in there bikes without any problems (again you want to confirm this).

 

Iam now totaly confused about this post. One says you will die if you use the engine oil in the primary now someone says you will get a BAZILLION miles on it.

 

Ill make it real simple for you. The ones that say putting 20-50w into your primary/trans will kill it don't know jack about the subject. You should make a note of who those people are and avoid their opinions like the plague.

HD sport trans fluid IS motor oil. Ever notice how HD recommends Synth 3 in the primary/tranny hole if you switch to a synthetic blend? What do you think Synth3 is? Its 20-50w motor oil.

 

Thats what I thought. I would do just what Harley says to the letter. Hell, they build them!

 

Err, I dunno bout always doing what Harley says to the letter.......... [:'(]

 

I did send some out to be tested. The results are down in the oil forum, but are buried in there a little deep. Bottom line was there is not enough difference in the additive package to justify the price of the motorcycle oils vs the car oils. HD Syn 3 came off poorly when compared to Mobil 1 V-Twin 20w-50, and Mobil 1 15w-50 car oil.

I wrote up (shameless plug for me) a 2 part article on oil basics. It's in the top section of the oil forum. I tried to make it easy to understand, and not too technical. Give it a read if you're interested.

 

excellent, thanks man! i'll definately look up those reports.

 

How often do you check your primary oil?