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THE OIL
The engine will run 24/7 while we’re out in sub-zero temperatures of minus 50 degrees – so that’s where
the oil plays a huge part because if we don’t have good oils in the engine, running your engine 24/7 could be a
huge problem. Oil is like the lifeblood of an engine – just imagine the blood in your body; we need it to get
our muscles to move – well the engine needs it in the same way – for the parts to function in the engine, for
them to go up and down continuously at these temperatures – you’ve got to have oil. But you need special
oil for temperatures like this because minus 50 is a very seriously low temperature – and only a really good quality
oil like the Shell Helix oil we’ve put in will do the job.
This is our safety, this is our lifeline – if this thing packs up we’re in the middle of nowhere at extreme temperatures
and we won’t survive – we’ve got good, warm kit but we rely on this engine more than you could believe.
We want to see how the oil has been affected by this icy cold temperature. This is a mineral based oil – it’s
about a 20/20 grade, something we bought locally. I’d like to catch it but this is like treacle – you would not want
this oil in your engine. Here’s the next oil – this again is a mineral oil – it’s a 20/50, more of a summer oil. You can
see that this is like treacle as well. This is almost frozen – almost like an ice cube. The next oil we’ve got is a fully
synthetic Shell Helix oil and as you can see – this is running.
The oil has got a detergent in it to clean the engine out – so we expect a bit of discoloration in the oil.
Oil does its job over a period of time – if you look at this oil now; it’s black. That just shows that the oil has collected the
impurities that it needs to; the soot that goes around the engine – and still I could run this oil for longer – but because
we’ve run these vehicles 24/7 at temperatures at minus 50, we just thought it really good to take a good change of oil.