Irish Mini Owners Club

Hey lads, since i don't know when the last oil change was done on the mini I decided that I will change it, so I would like to know according to your experience what is the best oil to put in a 1litre engine 998H/D80, supposed to be between 1985 and 1989. The car is a 1974 one, but looks like the engine has been replaced. Would there be much of a difference between the oil that you put ina 1974 1litre and in a 1985 one? According to the manual the oil to be used is a 20W50, mineral? semi syntetic? fully syntetic? would it be better to go for a 5W40 since the weather in ireland anyway is never that warm but that would help to start during the winter?
Cheers, sergio.

Standard 20W/50 mineral oil will be fine.

Brand wise there isn't much in them, but some people like the Millers Classic oil, I just use the stuff my local motor factors have, Alpha I think, I used to use good ole Shell Four Seasons and Unipart Oil when I could get them back in the day.

mineral oil is cheaper than semi or syntetic, right?

Yup.

has anyone tried the halford classic car oil it even has a pic of a minion the front i need to change to but wanted to check if it was any good its a new engine

I find oil in halfords over priced my local motor factor is half the price

duckhams 20w50 all the way!

Ashgrove Interparts has it fairly cheap most of the time

Duckhams Q20-50, oil has to do gearbox also,so lighter oil is no good.

Macker thats the responce i was lookin for most of it ends up on the driveway anyway

if thats the case joe you need a new mechanic

DUckhams q20w50 for classic cars or q20w50 for petrol and diesel cars, are they different?

anybody knew duckhams is a thai company based in bangkok?

Duckhams 20w50 mineral oil

I would go for the Millers oil they made specially for the classic MINI. Just talked to the Millers man on an autojumble two weeks ago and he recommended that oil for my frogeye box.Its a combined Engine and gearbox oil ( MINI need that ) In the frogeye box normal engine oil 20/50 will do but that will suffer from cracking between the gears. So give it a try.
Cheers
Peter

[quote="sanguiss"]anybody knew duckhams is a thai company based in bangkok?[/quote]

Duckhams brand is owned by Castrol and the oil is made at their UK refinery!

DO you know anywhere in Dublin that sells the Millers 20w50 mini classic? would that be more expensive than the Duckhams?

Lloyd stocks it ,think its 30 r 35 euro

There was a guy at Terenure yesterday selling the Castrol Classic 20W50 oil for €30 for 5 Lt.

P O'Reilly were giving away Classic 20w50 oil as part of the prizes they sponsored at the event also, so they must stock it.

Hi guys, had a look around on saturday, couldn't get the Duckhams, Ashgrove inteparts was already closed whn I got there, south motor factors in Bellyfermot has the millers, but it's 30 euro for 5L, so I got the Halfords one, for 20 euro per 5L, it's green stuff. The car runs so much better now.

€30 seems to be the price of Classic oil, I remember getting Unipart oil for £3.50 a gallon


Glad to hear you got it sorted.

sanguiss wrote:Hi guys, had a look around on saturday, couldn't get the Duckhams, Ashgrove inteparts was already closed whn I got there, south motor factors in Bellyfermot has the millers, but it's 30 euro for 5L, so I got the Halfords one, for 20 euro per 5L, it's green stuff. The car runs so much better now.

sorry bout that!
should have said they close at 1pm on saturdays!
but at least you got it sorted