How to distinguish an original engine oil from a fake

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Everything about seals, holograms, QR codes and other methods of checking oil for authenticity.

Engine oil is one of the main consumables that car owners regularly buy. And dishonest sellers do not miss the opportunity to make money on such a popular product. You can run into a fake when buying both expensive and cheap oil.

The main danger lies in the decrease in the engine's service life due to the inadequacy of the counterfeit to the declared characteristics. To make a fake, scammers most often use the cheapest mineral oil with a minimum amount of additives, or even without them at all.

The resulting product, which already does not meet the manufacturer's tolerances, becomes too liquid when the temperature rises and, conversely, thickens when it decreases. In both cases, this leads to insufficient lubrication of loaded engine components, increased friction in them and premature failure.

It is rather difficult to distinguish an original oil from a fake by its appearance, but there are still several ways. This is what you need to pay special attention to when choosing and buying.

What to look for when buying engine oil

1. Price

A price tag lowered by 10–20% almost certainly speaks of a fake. Even large dealers with large volumes of sales, oil producers offer a discount of only a few percent. Small shops are out of the question: all promotions and sales in them are nothing but fiction.

You can also run into a fake in a large retail network that sells original oils and has all the necessary certificates. In this case, the blame falls on unscrupulous sellers who add a certain amount of counterfeit to the batch of real oil.

To avoid suspicion, scammers often sell counterfeit oil only slightly cheaper than the original. Therefore, in addition to the price, you need to look at other factors.

2. Place of purchase

In dubious places like the market or little-known online stores, there are more chances to run into a fake, although here everything is not so simple. In large retail chains, the risk of buying an incomprehensible bodyag at the price of the original is significantly lower, but, unfortunately, it cannot be completely excluded.

Use common sense when choosing a place to buy. Give preference to trusted stores and car services that value their reputation. When problems arise, decent dealers usually meet the needs of the customer.

3. Packaging

This is the main way to combat counterfeiting. Manufacturers create multi-stage protection with holograms, double-layer labels, caps with complex seals. The design of canisters is constantly changing, and with all the variety of oils, it is simply impossible to distinguish the differences between each of them. Let's dwell on the general signs that will help identify a fake.

Canister

The original container is made of high quality plastic (sometimes interspersed), shimmering in the light, like metallic paint. The surface of the canisters must be smooth, with even seams, and also free of burrs, cavities and any other casting defects.

For fakes, the plastic of the canisters is often patchy. The walls of the container are translucent, the places of adhesion of the two halves are clearly visible. In especially advanced cases, an unpleasant odor may even be present. Unlike the original, handicraft canisters sin by uneven marking of the oil level scale or the use of colored marks instead of casting.

Lid

Canister lids also have several protection methods. The first is a ring-seal with antennae, which fixes the cap on the neck and breaks when opened. Some manufacturers additionally apply a barcode or logo to the side surface of the cover and seal. Re-alignment of both parts of the lettering is not possible, and this clearly indicates that the canister has been opened.

It does not do without protective holograms, which are glued to the cover and shimmer in the light. From different angles you can see changing symbols, inscriptions original or genuine, indicating the authenticity of the product. Some of the holograms are destroyed when the canister is opened.

The fake holograms are either absent or static.

Often scammers do not bother with repeating the relief of the edges of the lid, making them narrower, or they forget to engrave the brand. On fakes, the lid is often held not by the retaining ring on the seal, but corny with the help of glue. It can be the other way around - when the lid dangles and oil starts to drip, if you turn the canister upside down.

Label

The most sophisticated piece of packaging, serving as much information as it is for protection. The appearance of the label should not arouse any suspicion. All manufacturers of original oils use labels with high quality printing. They are glued evenly and without bubbles, and it is not so easy to pry them off with your fingernail.

A fake will be given by a low-quality label with poor printing, uneven fonts, or even spelling errors. Images and colors on counterfeit products appear washed out or washed out. There are no gradients and color transitions in them.

Manufacturing date

Other important signs that will immediately give out a fake are the date of manufacture, batch number and expiration date. For original oils, the date of production breaks through to the nearest second and cannot be the same on different canisters. The date stamp must be legible, no abrasions or other imperfections are allowed on it.

At the bottom of the canister, the date of manufacture of the container itself is usually indicated. Of course, it must be earlier than the date of production of the oil, and coincide with that indicated on the label. It is also worth paying attention to the presence of expiration date and batch number marks. They are often absent on fakes.

How not to run into a fake

It is best to buy oil from authorized representatives and large stores that work directly with oil manufacturers and their distributors.

You can find regional dealers and official points of sale on the website of the oil manufacturer. It is also easy to check there if the selected store is an authorized partner or not. Relevant information is available on the websites of Shell, Mobil, Castrol, Liqui Moly, ZIC, Elf, Total and other oil manufacturers.

When buying, it will be useful to check with the seller the dealer's certificate confirming the originality of the product. The document is certified by the manufacturer's seal and may contain holograms. Usually such certificates are kept in a frame in a prominent place at the store's office.

If doubts have arisen after the purchase, then for authentication, you can use special services provided by the manufacturers themselves. For example, Castrol will allow you to break through a unique twelve-digit code from a hologram on a canister via SMS, through a mobile application, on a website or by calling a hotline. Other companies operate in a similar way.

How to tell if you bought fake engine oil

1. Difficult launch engine in the cold season. Poor quality oil thickens excessively at low temperatures. In addition to difficult starting, this entails insufficient lubrication and failure of loaded engine components.
2. Increased oil consumption … The need for constant topping up also indicates a fake, especially if this was not observed before replacement. The reason lies in the banal burnout of oil during operation due to inconsistency with the parameters.
3. Change in consistency when frozen. A grandfather's method to check a fake. If in doubt, you can take some oil and place it in the freezer for a few hours. Nothing will happen to the original oil, the counterfeit will simply freeze and become viscous.

Be that as it may, with any suspicion, it is better to drain the dubious oil and replace it with a good one. The cost of buying another canister will be an order of magnitude less than the cost of repairing the engine.

How to distinguish popular oils from fakes

Finally, we will consider the key features of the original oils from popular manufacturers and the types of protection they use.

Castrol

At Castrol, canisters and even barrels for wholesalers are numbered with unique codes on holograms, which allow you to check the oil for originality through an official service.

On the lid of the canister there is an embossed logo. It is also applied to the side surface and a protective ring that breaks when opened. There is a silver foil membrane under the lid, and a shiny lock with a colored Castrol logo is located at the bottom of the canister.

Mobil

Mobil has been introducing new security features since 2018. To check the oil for originality, it is enough to scan the QR code, which is on each canister. In addition, the manufacturer uses three-dimensional graphic elements with raised metal dots and unique twelve-digit codes that are easy to punch through on the official website.

For oils with previous generation labels, Mobil has compiled detailed video instructions to verify the authenticity of products and recognize a counterfeit.

Shell

Shell also uses a unique code to check for originality. You can find it on the canister lid under a tear-off hologram sticker. The code consists of 16 digits and is verified on the company's website.