Motor Silk?
scnvsleep
12-17-2005, 11:23 PM
My mother in law gave me an early Christmas present of a 16 oz bottle of Motor Silk, a Boron CLS (Crystal Lattice Structure) Bond, that supposedly reduces friction by bonding with metal at the submicrometer level, parralel to the direction of sliding, creating new low friction surfaces...
Anyone ever hear of this stuff, or have any experience with it? A perfunctory Google search reveals little besides company propaganda...
Anyone ever hear of this stuff, or have any experience with it? A perfunctory Google search reveals little besides company propaganda...
CanukGMC
12-18-2005, 05:39 PM
Everyone has an opinion on products like this, some love em some hate em. Here's my two cents and the science to backup why I refuse to run such products in any of my engines:
THE BIGGEST problem with these "frictionless surface" products is that once in your engine, IF they do what they say they do they will produce a surface that your oil will no longer cling to. If the surface becomes very "frictionless" the oil that gets pumped around the engine cannot stick to the walls and to moving parts like bearings, this in turn will destroy your engine over time since the lubrication won't be where it's needed. The only bonus these "frictionless" additives say they will give is better lubrication and less friction between metal surfaces....WHY do they think the engine has oil in it in the first place!
Do a search for "engine teflon ptfe additive problems" and you'll find a slew of studies that show creating a frictionless surface does nothing but stop the oil from doing it's job and increases metal on metal. The stuff only stops oil from sticking but won't stop metal on metal damage since it's not that tough. Teflon had a short run in additives and there was a huge uproar from the makers (Dupont) because they knew it was doing more harm than good, but what they couldn't do was stop companies from adding it to their additives since it wasn't their decision on what a company could do with their product.
In my opinion this stuff says it does the same thing that teflon does, therefore it cannot be any better. I wouldn't run it since the severe risks by a large margin outweigh any good that might come of it.
PS I know you aren't adding "teflon" directly, but the stuff seems to basically be on the same idea or maybe even has a copy of teflon just under a different name. Here's a good quote to think about:
"General Motors has issued an internal bulletin to its dealers warning against the use of teflon-based oil additives in GM engines. In the bulletin, GM warns about the problems with accelerated wear after the use of PTFE additives."
Cited from http://xcelplus.com/industry_info/qlube.htm
THE BIGGEST problem with these "frictionless surface" products is that once in your engine, IF they do what they say they do they will produce a surface that your oil will no longer cling to. If the surface becomes very "frictionless" the oil that gets pumped around the engine cannot stick to the walls and to moving parts like bearings, this in turn will destroy your engine over time since the lubrication won't be where it's needed. The only bonus these "frictionless" additives say they will give is better lubrication and less friction between metal surfaces....WHY do they think the engine has oil in it in the first place!
Do a search for "engine teflon ptfe additive problems" and you'll find a slew of studies that show creating a frictionless surface does nothing but stop the oil from doing it's job and increases metal on metal. The stuff only stops oil from sticking but won't stop metal on metal damage since it's not that tough. Teflon had a short run in additives and there was a huge uproar from the makers (Dupont) because they knew it was doing more harm than good, but what they couldn't do was stop companies from adding it to their additives since it wasn't their decision on what a company could do with their product.
In my opinion this stuff says it does the same thing that teflon does, therefore it cannot be any better. I wouldn't run it since the severe risks by a large margin outweigh any good that might come of it.
PS I know you aren't adding "teflon" directly, but the stuff seems to basically be on the same idea or maybe even has a copy of teflon just under a different name. Here's a good quote to think about:
"General Motors has issued an internal bulletin to its dealers warning against the use of teflon-based oil additives in GM engines. In the bulletin, GM warns about the problems with accelerated wear after the use of PTFE additives."
Cited from http://xcelplus.com/industry_info/qlube.htm
Automotive Network, Inc., Copyright ©2026