Whether to use Lucas or not?

1110 Views 7 Replies 5 Participants Last post by Terminal, Jan 15, 2016

MBDBRUCE

Discussion Starter · Jan 11, 2016

Hello my name is Ken. I recently had a Iridium Silver 2005 Slk 350 manual in which I had since 2005. Recently I had to say goodbye to her as I was struck from behind and thrown into a guard rail spinning, six times! Needless to say she was totaled, but I want everyone to know that I am fine and the car amazingly still started and drove, doors still opened fine and amazingly the roof still retracted! Any ways I recently purchased a 2009 SLK 55 AMG and wow what night and day difference! The color I always wanted and all the power! So I performed its first oil change by me since I work on vehicles for a living and now are in my twentieth year in doing so. Now I bought it with low miles and I don't know what the previous owner used, but I used Mobil One 0W40 full syn European formula and added 20% Lucas oil stabilizer to it. Now I drained both drains and the oil cooler and of course used a factory Mercedes oil filter. My issue is now there is a whine present on start up but seems to go away after its reved a little. I have read where people think this is the oil pump. The noise does seem to come from the oil pan. I used Lucas always in the Slk 350, but are the 5.5l amg motors to sensitive for Lucas oil stabilizer? Thank you in advance for your replies.

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jbanks15

· #2 · Jan 11, 2016

whine is common on startup. if it does not return until the next cold start, don't worry about it

read my whine thread?

http://www.slkworld.com/slk-r171-general-discussion/4502-hey-dan-remember-my-squeak.html

get your datacard fro your new car?

http://www.slkworld.com/vehicle-data-card/67706-free-how-request-datacard-free-us.html

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etyu

· #3 · Jan 11, 2016

MBDBRUCE said:
..... My issue is now there is a whine present on start up but seems to go away after its reved a little. .....

This is normal.

It is the sound of the high speed air pump that injects air to "warm up" the catalytic converters so they can do their thing on cutting down emissions. You do not have to rev the engine, the high speed whine (very similar to the whine of a motor tool at 10,000 rpm) will decrease after a minute or so. The whine may be more noticeable when the ambient temperature is low.

There is another low speed whine that seems to be "idiosyncratic" to the R171 55 and some may mistake it for the steering wheel pump. I have not been able to isolate nor identity it for many years and the vehicle drives fine (knock on wound).

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etyu

· #4 · Jan 11, 2016

If you will be doing the engine oil and filter change once a year or sooner if mileage dictates, then using Lucas® oil stabilizer may be overkill.

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55AMG

· #5 · Jan 11, 2016

Mobil recommends not to use additives at all as they do extensive testing to make a high quality product.
As for the whine I think they all do to some degree, it appears to come from the oil pump gears but I have not herd of any failing.

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MBDBRUCE

Discussion Starter · #6 · Jan 13, 2016

Thank you to all who replied. I am very familiar with the secondary air injection pump and I know for sure its not that as that only runs for 90 seconds. I have been all over the vehicle on my lift and found it definitely to be coming from the oil pump in the oil pan. I guess I was so used to running it in my Slk 350 that I thought it would be the same for the 55. I use it because the timing chain guides on any vehicle (yes even the mercs) are made of metal with a plastic insert over them that the timing chain rides on and what I have seen is the plastic becomes very brittle the older it gets (obviously) and due to lack of lubrication on start up and the Lucas actually does a great job of coating them so on a cold start up they are lubed and it protects them from the temperature oxidation. Well I guess I will stop using it. I wasn't aware they were that sensitive. Thank you once again to all. I greatly appreciate it. Oh and as a side note in case there are people out there who don't know, if you noticed that your right rear fog light doesn't ever come on (350 or 55) it's because it's set in Europe mode. Have the dealer go in with the star scan tool and set it as USA and it will work. They might argue as I had a 35 year tech argue with me until I got him to go in there and wala!!!

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55AMG

· #7 · Jan 15, 2016

http://youtu.be/cK_4QAe20Cg
Have a look at this

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Terminal

· #8 · Jan 15, 2016

MBDBRUCE said:
Thank you to all who replied. I am very familiar with the secondary air injection pump and I know for sure its not that as that only runs for 90 seconds. I have been all over the vehicle on my lift and found it definitely to be coming from the oil pump in the oil pan. I guess I was so used to running it in my Slk 350 that I thought it would be the same for the 55. I use it because the timing chain guides on any vehicle (yes even the mercs) are made of metal with a plastic insert over them that the timing chain rides on and what I have seen is the plastic becomes very brittle the older it gets (obviously) and due to lack of lubrication on start up and the Lucas actually does a great job of coating them so on a cold start up they are lubed and it protects them from the temperature oxidation. Well I guess I will stop using it. I wasn't aware they were that sensitive. Thank you once again to all. I greatly appreciate it. Oh and as a side note in case there are people out there who don't know, if you noticed that your right rear fog light doesn't ever come on (350 or 55) it's because it's set in Europe mode. Have the dealer go in with the star scan tool and set it as USA and it will work. They might argue as I had a 35 year tech argue with me until I got him to go in there and wala!!!

Europe mode is so that people following you can tell when you're braking - quite important if you're following a car with 20 Brembo pots biting into the rotors...

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