VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - GENERAL Tech Talk non detergent motor oil

new to antique car , been told by a few people to use only non detergent 30w motor oil, all the non detergent 30w I can find says lubricating oil in fact walmart has a non detergent 30w and it says lubricating oil not for use in motors . what is everyone using I feel better using what has been tested by people who are happy with it . thanks

You will find 98% of the guys here use modern 10W.-30 oil detegent AND ALL. Chevrolet reomended a detergent oil since 1948 when it first became popular. At that time they specified #10 in the wintter and #20 in the summer

There is no such thing as 30W as the W indicates it is intended for winter and #30 is too thick for that..

Listen to what Gene says.

NEVER use non-detergent oil in any engine.

At summer time start-up temperatures a 10W-30 will be a little thinner than the thickness of the straight grade 20W-20 Chevrolet used to recommend.
At winter start up temperatures a 10W-30 will be about the thickness of the straight grade 10W.

In my opinion straight SAE 30 is too thick for cold start-up at ANY ambient temperature.

After 10W-30 was introduced in 1954 Chevrolet reommended it for all Temps. over -10 Deg.

I agree I won't use anything in my vintage Chevrolets but 10w30 detergent! Do not use non detergent in anything.

I have been using 10w30 in mine. This is what the valves looked like when we pulled the cover to replace the gasket. Looked clean to me without sludging.

My beset guess is that head has been removed for some type of service. It would never be that clean if it was original and had started life with the non-detergent oils that were available in the 40’s. Detergent oils prevent sludge. They will not clean a sludged-up engine.

The use of 10-30 oil is best after you service the crankcase and valve train by removing the pan & cover and cleaning all the sludge.

I do not know the history of the car but I could see evidence someone had attempted to fix the oiler in the past. I had to properly correct that. What I can say is that since I have had it I used the 10W-30 and that is how it currently looks. It does not look to be hurting it.