Oil Additives Reduce Your Car’s Friction
A little friction is a good thing. Your car wouldn’t move forward if there wasn’t friction between its tyres and the road’s surface, and friction also provides traction and control to keep your car from skidding or hydroplaning in wet or icy conditions. When you need to unexpectedly stop, friction helps your brakes pads and disks bring your car to a halt safely and smoothly.
Of course, too much of a good thing can cause problems, and friction is no different. Too much friction will hinder your car’s ability to move, by keeping its parts from moving easily and effectively. This is where lubrication and oil come in, and they do the job of reducing frictional force enough for your car’s parts to perform as it should. When it comes to keeping this engine oil working at its best, many recommend the use of engine oil additives. But are these products worth the hype?
The Purpose of Engine Oil Additives
Engine oil lubricates and reduces friction between your engine’s moving parts. Most oils already contain additives, which are chemical compounds designed to improve the oil’s performance. However, in time, this oil will lose some of its additives through natural oxidation and decomposition. If your car uses a cheap or poor quality oil, there might not be sufficient additives in oil in the first place.
Liqui Moly’s oil additives lubricates and reduces friction between your engine’s moving parts.
Types of Engine Oil Additives
To help your car’s engine oil perform many of its key functions, different types of engine oil additives have been created. Here are a few of the most common ones:
1. Viscosity Index Improvers
2. Anti-wear Additives
3. Detergents
4. Lubricating Additives
1. Viscosity Index Improvers
These additives keep your car’s motor oil flowing freely throughout the engine, so it can coat the parts needing protection. External temperatures can increase and decrease your oil’s viscosity, and additives help keep the oil at the correct consistency.
2. Anti-wear Additives
These additives coat the surfaces and parts of your car’s engine to protect it from wear and tear, and can also slow down oxidation and corrosion by neutralising motor acids and repelling water.
3. Detergents
These additives help remove and neutralise deposits, oils, impurities, and acids, making them soluble so that they don’t create sludge in your engine.
4. Lubricating Additives
This additive mixes with your engine oils when your car starts and pumps it through its engine, where it will cling to its components and prevent metal to metal contact, a well as start-up related wear and tear.
Do I Really Need to Use Engine Oil Additives?
While it’s true that you don’t need engine oil additives for your car to run, using it will improve your car’s performance and lifespan, help maintain it between services, and decrease its need for serious replacements or repairs.
If you’ve driven a brand new car off a dealership parking lot, it’s probably functioned well without any additives for some time. However, as you put more kilometres on your vehicle, your engine will experience increased stress, friction, and wear and tear. If your vehicle is older or pre-owned, it could already have existing corrosion and rust that you aren’t aware of, and while engine oil additives won’t be able to turn back the clock, they’ll help slow down the damage and improve your car’s performance.
Purchasing a car with a full-service history might tell you a car has undergone its mandated services, but your car’s service history won’t tell you exactly how well they maintained your car’s engine. Waiting for strange sounds, smells, and lights might already mean its too late and the damage is done. You also don’t want to wait for your car to start consuming more petrol than usual – even while idling.
Liqui Moly Cera Tec reduces friction and wear by using chemically and thermally extremely high-resilient ceramic compounds.
What’s The Best Type of Engine Oil Additive For Your Vehicle?
Engine oil additives can be compared to medicine for your car. Use the wrong one, combine two different kinds together, or use too much (or little) of it and you could do more damage than good. The chemical balance of your engine oil is delicate, and randomly adding any oil additive isn’t recommended.
If you’re experiencing resistance and hearing noises when shifting gears, a gear oil additive could help reduce wear and friction, while an engine flushing product can help remove sludge and lacquer build-up, bringing them into suspension so they can be removed in your next oil change. A general anti-friction additive can help improve the overall performance of diesel or petrol engines, compressors, and pumps. Engine oil additives aren’t limited to use in motor vehicles. They can also be used on motorcycles. Additives are available that are compatible with two and four-stroke engines, and can do everything from help improve acceleration to preserve and protect its fuel against ageing and oxidation.
While the primary benefits of different additives will differ, your car can look forward to less wear and tear, extended service intervals, improved fuel economy, and a smoother, less noisy ride.
Select Your Engine Oil Additive Today
Before making your final selection of an engine oil additive, you should consult your car’s user manual, to make sure that you don’t choose a product that could be incompatible to your vehicle. It’s also worth bearing in mind that an additive can never replace a quality engine oil and that this should be chosen with equal care. In addition, an oil additive will enhance the function of your engine’s oils and is unlikely to dramatically transform your engine. If any product promises results that seem too good to be true, they most likely are.
When you’re ready to make your purchase, you’ll find that there are dozens of additives available for purchase on the South African market. So which one should you pick? You’re unlikely to go wrong with a business that has over sixty years of experience in creating and finetuning engine oil additives for the market. Liquid Moly South Africa can offer your vehicle access to a wide range of quality, German-produced engine oil additives. To find out more about which additive would best suit your vehicle or to answer any other question related to engine oil, contact us today.
