Engine oil advice

benham3160

Flying-High wrote: »

Is that the Kind of Mileage an Ambulance covers weekly then circa 500?.. I dont know why but I'd of hazarded a guess at bit higher.

I think the gent posting this works for London Ambulance Service, so I guess this is possible. Remember in London you generally are pretty close to a hospital.

My dad worked in the rural side of Essex (north) and the vehicles he worked on would normally be changed at 200,000 or two years, whichever came first.

Although when he started the job, (in the days of special issue 3.0 V6 automatic! mk1 Transits) they would often go many days without doing a job, so it shows the strain placed on the ambulance service over a 30 year period! Aparently those big auto Transits where a little heavy on fuel.... lol

Regards,
Andy

N9eav

mikey72 wrote: »

Just to confuse people, GTX is now available from Castrol as a part synthetic as well, in a 10/40, as well as a mineral 10/40, and a mineral 15/40.
Some varieties are A3/B3, and some are A3/B4.
The only way to make sure you get the right one is to read the label, as it is quite often sold will the wrong description as well now.

Thats my point. It's a diesel PT cruiser not a performance Evo. The book says B4 so if Castrol new GTX is B4 I am assuming it's good enough...

bigjl

benham3160 wrote: »

Just a slight aside, my dad worked for Essex (now EEAS) and they have traditionally always used Transits (2.4TDCi six-speeders recently) the main vehicle he last worked on has now clocked 300k ('07' plate) and is still just about running on it's original engine. EEAS are now rolling out Mercs thoughout I believe, replacing the Essex fleet of Transits.

Infact, that was only of the reasons he was glad he left when he did, as apparently all new vehicles have to be fixed-bulkhead? My father did say the day they introduced those would be the day he handed in his notice:rotfl:

My friend is a tech for EEAS (old East Anglian) who are allegedly getting the automatic Mercs, what are they like?

Regards,
Andy

So long as they have the 3.0 diesel lump they are great, in London, for co2 reasons some bright spark, on about £70k a year thought the 2.2 would do, I have noticed that the first lot of Mercs in Norfolk are the 3.0 with a manual box. They are heavy though, and more than a bit wobbly, travel sickness is now a part of the job when in the back.

The fixed bulkhead is a nightmare, we refused to use them if they had it, so we had the compromise of the automatically closing bulkhead door, easily "modified", ahem, so that it doesn't close.

As far as mileages go, some vehicles will barely do 500 miles a week, some will do more than a thousand, but due to flexible fleet and the additional costs of having different intervals and making sure services aren't missed, they haver adopted the6 week interval, they sometimes do them a week late, but if you think that we have 300 odd response cars, probably 400 Front Line Ambulances, 200 PTS Ambulances and 40/50 Logistics Support Vans. Not forgetting the 50 Duty Officer cars and 60 odd Corsas for general running about.

I makes sense to simplify the schedule, otherwise it would be a logistical nightmare.

The fact that the LAS has already proved, at great cost, that extending the intervals didn't work. Should be all the evidence needed to validate the schedule and my opinion that it is a good idea.

Vehicles used in Urban areas will always be driven a bit more harshly than those where a nice run on an open road is the norm.

Getting back to the OP's question I would use the best oil I could afford, and if the new GTX is a B4 oil then go for it.

My point about Evo's and Scoobys chabging the oil at shorter intervals was just to illustate a point, I think I know the dofference between a PT Cruiser and a Scooby.

On the subject of big juicy petrol Ambulances, we have just started to get rid of the last of our LDV's, with the Rover 3.5 V8, Auto box. They even had carbs, incuding the one's on an X reg.

There was, until recently still a few R reg, T reg and Xreg Ambulances being used, they where also serviced every 3000 miles, though historically we used to do less mileage, and the vehicles where complex based so the mileages where checked every week and sent for service when needed, sometimes as much as 2 months, but this was found to be labour intensive, and a schedule based on time was introduced, it means that the entire vehicle can be checked out a regular intervals.

One thing about these soon to be retired vehicles, they are almost all on their original engine, we only had one that I know of that had top end problems, and only a couple that had overheating problems.

And that was in the 17 yrs that we have used these LDV's with the 3.5 V8.

Also if any of you live in certain parts of Essex or Norfolk you might see our old Astra Hatchbacks, being used by EoE Ambulance service, we gave them a load about 3 or 4 years ago, sometimes if you look close you can see where hey have covered or changed the crest to hide the word "London".

We should have kept them as they were bullet proof, but some have been working front line for up to 8 years, a testamount to a rigid service policy, well within what a manufacturer recommends.

Not saying the way I do things or the Emergency services does things is for everybody, but I think the results over a period of almost 2 decades says it all.:cool:

benham3160

bigjl wrote: »

The fixed bulkhead is a nightmare, we refused to use them if they had it, so we had the compromise of the automatically closing bulkhead door, easily "modified", ahem, so that it doesn't close.

My brother worked for WMAS, he did mention a kit-bag accidentally left in the right place would stop the door doing what it should do?

My friend prefers the fixed bulk-head Mercs (no door,) but my father and brother have said they'd refuse to work on a vehicle they couldn't get in to the back of quickly. (For the protection of their crew-mate rather than any clinical reason) but they've also said having to get out and walk around the vehicle stopped at the side of a busy A road is not a good idea.

Has there been much resistance to them in London?

Regards,
Andy

bigjl

We just refused to use them when the consultation was done in 2003. The union got involved and the auto shut doors where the resulting compromise.

The only fixed bulkheads we have are on the two BETS vehicles but they aren't owned by the LAS technically, ecven though they are in our livery, driven by our staff and serviced by our fitters. They are owned by the RLH, but as they are only for paed retreavels, like CATS there is no problem with them from staff.

The fixed bulkhead was an EU recommendation, as was RAL Yellow paint, nice to know they have ruined any chance of our response cars being sold on at a good price when at end of life, meaning we have to keep them longer than we would like.

I miss the LDV's already, you could get them sideways, erm, or so I was told:D