Optimal Care for Hybrids: Hybrid Vehicle Oil Maintenance Essentials

Publisher's Note: Welcome to our 27th edition of Tech Tips Tuesday on "Optimal Care for Hybrids: Hybrid Vehicle Oil Maintenance Essentials".  We'll be re-publishing an edition of AMSOIL Tech Tips for you every Tuesday.  Click on the Blog Category "Tuesday Tech Tips" to see everything published to-date.

Optimal Care for Hybrids: Hybrid Vehicle Oil Maintenance Essentials

John Gardner: Perhaps you want to get a few more miles per gallon; maybe a hybrid's for you. Welcome to this AMSOIL Tech Tip.

This Ford F-150, yep, it's a hybrid. And you know, there's a lot of special service precautions that go on with a hybrid, and oil is just as important. But before we get to that, let's talk a little bit about hybrids. What's going on? Well, you have an ICE (internal combustion engine), and sandwiched in between that, well, there's your actual hybrid motor, your electric motor that goes in between that and the transmissions. You could have a couple of different types of hybrids.

You can have the one right there on the top, a series hybrid; it's just feeding the battery packs, and then the motor and the actual electric motors driving the vehicle. On the bottom, well, it's a parallel; both of them, the ICE (internal combustion engine) and the hybrids, are driving it. And you got a series-parallel, which everything kind of helps as you're going along.

But that's a big problem, because this is a Ford F-150, but there are Priuses, there are Accords; they're low compression engines, they don't develop a lot of heat. Oil is the key here. Hybrid oil, as a matter of fact

Len Groom: Right? It requires a specialized product because those engines that you talked about have a tendency to produce condensation, and water and oil, they're not friends. So, you have to formulate the product to deal with that moisture. We do that by adding rust and corrosion protection into the formula.

John Gardner: Now, something I've never seen before, Len, is 0W-16. I mean, that's phenomenal.

Len Groom: Yeah, 16 weight, that's the thinnest recognized oil out there right now. And with a 16, there's not a lot of room for failure, so you really need to make sure that that oil is built properly right out of the gate.

John Gardner: Now, any hybrid, it's a good idea to put hybrid motor oil in it. I mean, it's specific. Everybody's just dumping normal oil in there, not a good idea.

Len Groom: No, it's not good in the long run. As you're hanging on to these cars longer, this is where you want to be at. It's going to deal with these issues, provide nice, reliable, problem-free protection.

John Gardner: Now, these hybrid vehicles are full of technology, so you better make sure that your oil is too. And AMSOIL is up for that task.