Ouch!

[Francis]

I just bought a quart of BMW 5-40 Full synthetic oil at the dealership for my 2009 K1300GT and I could not beleive the $ 20.00 cost. I realize prices here in NY might be a bit higher but...OUCH!

 

What are the rest of you using for this motor and how can I lower my costs on oil changes?

 

[notacop]

There are other brands of oil. If it's made for a motorcycle it will work. I pay 24 dollars for freaking GALLON on Honda oil.

Some folks will follow the company decrees and buy only stock fluids. That would be a $75 dollar oil change plus labor of 80-100 bucks/hour.

I can't afford that kinda stuff.

[SKYGZR]

What are the rest of you using for this motor and how can I lower my costs on oil changes?

 

AMSOIL, made in the US. For the Liquid Cooled machines, the regular cage oil will work fine. George Biddlecomb (a member here) is a Authorized Dealer: No1Synthetics

 

Sign up to be a preferred customer, and save on your purchases.

 

 

[Boffin]

There are other brands of oil. If it's made for a motorcycle it will work. I pay 24 dollars for freaking GALLON on Honda oil.

Some folks will follow the company decrees and buy only stock fluids. That would be a $75 dollar oil change plus labor of 80-100 bucks/hour.

I can't afford that kinda stuff.

 

BMW do not decree BMW oil - in fact I have never seen BMW branded oil - it is just not sold in the UK.

The manual has a chart of viscosity ratings for temperature and minimum specifications. If the oil meets them, you are good to go.

 

Andy

[RichEdwards]

I use Castrol Activo Motorcycle oil in my GT. Partly synthetic. It was the oil my dealer was putting in the bike when I had the dealer doing oil changes. It's currently on sale at Cycle Gear at $4.99 a quart.

 

 

And if you spend over $69, shipping is free.

[Bill_Walker]

The BMW oil in the US is made by Spectro. You can buy it a lot cheaper with a Spectro label on it.

[boatzo]

It is my understanding that MOTORCYCLE specific oil is formulated for wet clutches (which we don't have). There has been a lot of discussion on the LT forum about this and while synthetic oil is particularly good for high temp applications such as oil heads, it doesn't do all that much good over good dino oil in liquid cooled engines.

 

I do think that synthetic oil is probably good for high mileage engines.MHO I have no scientific data to back up what I say and I am not a petro-engineer.

 

BTW, as stated above, BMW does not make oil, batteries etc. They brand some other manufacturer and you can buy these items at much less if you do not buy BMW brand.

[BrianT]

I use Castrol Activo Motorcycle oil in my GT. Partly synthetic. It was the oil my dealer was putting in the bike when I had the dealer doing oil changes. It's currently on sale at Cycle Gear at $4.99 a quart.

 

 

And if you spend over $69, shipping is free.

Yep Castrol is what my dealer has used for the past few years as well. I wonder if the Spectro with the BMW logo on it is any different than the off the shelf Spectro. Probably mark it up for BMW so you might save a few coins buying the motorcycle Spectro from other places.

[Dennis Andress]

I don't think a wet clutch cares much what kind of oil it's bathed in. I mean, it's all slippery, right. (Actually, STP oil treatment used to be fatal to a wet clutch...)

 

But, a motorcycle with a wet clutch implies that the transmission is running in the same oil as the engine. There's a huge difference here, the oil is subjected to the shear loads of meshing transmission gears. Oils that cannot handle that quickly lose their viscosity -- they thin out. Years ago I learned that Castrol GTX oil in my Yamaha 750 would be thin as water in around 1500 miles. The oil also has to work its way into all the bushings and bearings, and stay there. This can have an affect on how the bike shifts. My K1300 S shifts really nice with Rotella T.

 

I think BMW recommends API Service Classification SJ or above for most of its engines. I've only glanced at the motorcycle oils sold at bike shops, but I don't recall many of them reaching that spec. Most of the good SJ oils are made for Diesels, imagine that.

 

Dennis

[Firefight911]

I don't think a wet clutch cares much what kind of oil it's bathed in. I mean, it's all slippery, right. (Actually, STP oil treatment used to be fatal to a wet clutch...)

 

The oil itself is fine on clutches. The friction modifiers in this oil is not. Motorcycle oil is specific to motorcycles in the presence of a wet clutch. On the dry clutch breeds, oil is oil as long as it meets the manufacturer spec/classification.

[Francis]

Thanks for the input. I had very good luck with Golden spectro on my Suzuki GS 1000 shaft drive. It worked very well on the multi-plate wet clutch in thta bike and the motor also responded well to their formulation. I looked Spectro up and found they also have 5W-40 which is what my dealer has in the bike now.

 

Any thoughts on oil weight range for the K1300 GT?

[Boffin]

 

Any thoughts on oil weight range for the K1300 GT?

 

Whatever your owners manual reccomends for your local temperatures. Vehicle manufacturers spend a lot of money doing the engineering so you do not have to guess.

 

Andy

[Joe Durt]

Wow !!! So many different opinions. I even find it confusing at times and I am an operator at a lube oil re-refinery.

BTW folks..get ready for a huge price jump in lube oils and it's not because nobody is drilling for it or trying to get it. It is liquid gold and there is a huge shortage.

Of all the oil pulled out of the ground in the entire world, only about 2% contains lube oil whatsoever and most contains none.

When i have questions about what kind of lube to buy I go straight to our lab guys and get the skinny.

Bottom line is.....The bike does not care what name is on the label.

It is all about the specs.

If it meets or exceeds the SAE and API standards..." think of those like the USDA, UL, and Good house keeping stamps" you can save a butt load of money.

For instance...I use Coastal 80/90 gear oil in my final drive. It costs less than $10 a quart compared to many that much more expensive.

I even go so far as to take a sample of my used oil to the lab and they run it through an X-ray spectrometer that measures every element contained in the sample for me. I also had them run a couple of other tests that include NOACK Volatility ect..ect..

The coastal stuff performed awesome since there were no metals found in the sample that are not normal additives that were put in by the manufacturer. That was with about 15K miles on that change.

 

With a little home work on the net you can learn a lot and save a lot of money.

 

My motto on all this is...don't look for more expensive stuff so you can stretch out oil changes...Find more affordable stuff and change it more often ! AND...RECYCLE THE USED !!!! About 80% of used lubricant oils are dumped or burned to just be lost forever.

[Francis]

any recommendations on an oil brand for a K1300GT?

 

Francis

[extrachrispy]

I don't think a wet clutch cares much what kind of oil it's bathed in. I mean, it's all slippery, right. (Actually, STP oil treatment used to be fatal to a wet clutch...)

 

The oil itself is fine on clutches. The friction modifiers in this oil is not. Motorcycle oil is specific to motorcycles in the presence of a wet clutch. On the dry clutch breeds, oil is oil as long as it meets the manufacturer spec/classification.

 

This.

 

BMW's specific recommendation for the new K bikes is Castrol Power 1 Racing 4T 5W-40 (in the U.S., this is apparently Castrol Power RS Racing 4T). That's the full synth stuff--I don't know if it's appropriate for the first few changes or not. If you can't find the full-synth Castrol, then the manual lists by weight and service grade what the acceptable substitutes are.

 

I have no help to offer on the filters, alas. I've used Napa Gold for years on a Hayabusa (based upon a "saw it in half and see how it's put together" comparo website, vs. the Toyo-Roku OEM filter); dunno if they have an equivalent for BMW K4's.