Marvel's Mystery Oil

[lloyd3]

Does this stuff help stuck rings at all? Old wives tale or an actual value?  Any downside to use?

[Daytona R/T SE]

Does this stuff help stuck rings at all? Old wives tale or an actual value?  Any downside to use?

I don't know about the rings, but I've loosened up seized engines with it and they ran fine afterwards.

A friend of mine did the same with a '51 Dodge pick up that sat out in the desert for 30 plus years, he drives it all over the place now.

The only downside is, they smoke like Mount Saint Helens for quite a while when you fire them up...do it outside.  

[XH29N0G]

Completely unrelated to your application.  Seeing the name brings back memories of using the stuff and the smell from my time as a kid on the outside of my dad's outboard motor each time we pulled the boar from the water and flushed it.  He told me they used to use the stuff when he was a kid on his mark 20H (mercury) and how he remembered the smell at that time.  I loved the stuff, but now wonder whether it was as good for as I thought it was then.  

[67tbird]

The machine shop I go to uses a 50/50 mixture of it and wd-40 to keep stuff rust free and lubricated.

[odcics2]

For loosening rusted parts : ATF and Acetone 50-50 mix.    

VERY cost effective!  


Also - MoPar Heat Riser Solvent works wonders, if you can find it cheap enough, like at garage sales. (5 cans for 2 bucks)

[GMP440]

   No downside to it's use.  Been using it since the early eights.  Never had a lifter that I could not quiet using Marvel Mystery oil.
   It will loosen piston rings if the piston and ring assembly were submerged in MMO.  In an engine, the MMO would seep into the ring grooves, but the rest would drip down past the pistons.
    If allowed to set in the ring grooves, eventually they would loosen up.   I have used MMO to free up seized engines.  Works well.

[lloyd3]

OK, how about using it in a non-seized engine to possibly help rings get a newer, better seal? If the accumulated crud from sitting for 30-years was cleansed by pouring it down the carb with the coil disconnected (no spark!) and then letting it sit for a few days?  I know this has the sound of desperation to it but, what would one have to lose here?

Lots of old-timers (& who isn't these days?) used to pour ATF down the carb for exactly the same reasons. Occasionally this would reportedly produce the desired results.  The other possible result would be that the "crud" actually helped maintain what little seal that still existed. When it was gone, the rings were then really ineffective.

[odcics2]

If the rings are shot, the rings are shot....   

[Troy]

I haven't had anything stuck yet - but I use that stuff to take the corrosion off of aluminum (heads, intakes, wheels, brackets, etc.).

Troy

[TexasStroker]

If it isn't seized, but has sat quite awhile without being turned over, I was always told to use an oiler and shoot ATF in each cylinder (via the spark plug hole) and let it set...I guess the logic was it decreases scoring and burns off.

I will say, all the times I've done this with newer oilers I wind up having the ATF leak out wherever I place it...be weary of that.  At work I only use Goldenrod oilers and haven't had that happen. 

[BrianShaughnessy]

A friend freed up a '36 Olds 6 cylinder that had been sitting for years with it. 

[NHCharger]

Was just talking with my Dad about MMO. He said they were using it to free up seized engines when he worked for Wentworth Motors as a teenager. My Dad is almost 85. Do the math

[Kern Dog]

A math problem? Really?

[XH29N0G]

just a sec.  let me find the calculator app on my phone....

impressive - that is a longer time ago than my dad's 20H  mercury story

[alfaitalia]

It was invented in 1923.

[fc7_plumcrazy]

   No downside to it's use.  Been using it since the early eights.  Never had a lifter that I could not quiet using Marvel Mystery oil.
   

you use it to make a noisey lifter quiet?

Carsten

[krops cars]

Try it. When I was a kid old guys swore by it. What do you have to lose.

[BSB67]

impressive - that is a longer time ago than my dad's 20H  mercury story

I'd like to hear that story.

[XH29N0G]

I don't know too much about it other than when I was a kid we used to spray marvel's mystery oil on our outboard motors because my dad grew up in south Florida, spending a lot of his time with a friend running utilities (boats) and old Kefauver(?) mercury engines. He used to tell me about the boats and engines when I was a kid and using marvels mystery oil to take care of them. He still loves those old engines and recently acquired a small number and a D utility from the early 1950's.  We have yet to run them, but he did just fix up (or have fixed up) a mark 25 for my 16 year old nephew.  I think those boats were what started him liking things mechanical.

[BSB67]

Pretty cool.  Used them as a kid, have a few today still.  Funny though, never done anything to store them.  I think there was so much oil used in fuel that short of total neglect, they were probably fine.

[GMP440]

     "you use it to make a noisey lifter quiet?"

      Carsten

      Yes.   MMO quiets noisy lifters.  That's my experience.   Add it to the oil.  For example, a five quart oil system;  use 4 quarts oil and 1 quart MMO.  May take a few days to a couple weeks
     before the lifter cleans up and ticking goes way.  Once it stops ticking, change the oil again and just go back to 5 quarts of oil.

[odcics2]

MMO is part solvent, part metal protection.   

[fc7_plumcrazy]

     "you use it to make a noisey lifter quiet?"

      Carsten

      Yes.   MMO quiets noisy lifters.  That's my experience.   Add it to the oil.  For example, a five quart oil system;  use 4 quarts oil and 1 quart MMO.  May take a few days to a couple weeks
     before the lifter cleans up and ticking goes way.  Once it stops ticking, change the oil again and just go back to 5 quarts of oil.

thanks.
I will have to figure out where to buy it in germany.
Might be worth the test

Carsten

[5wndwcpe]

I've been substituting MMO for a quart of conventional oil in my '02 diesel 2500 since new.  The truck has 226,000 miles on it now and the last time I pulled the valve cover, the inside was clean enough to eat out of.  Then again, I'm not a picky eater, so YMMV. 

[Mytur Binsdirti]

The machine shop I go to uses a 50/50 mixture of it and wd-40 to keep stuff rust free and lubricated.

Sounds like something that just might work if the wife!