Use of old unused motor oil

[Fergie 307]

Used to use this sort of cheap stuff as flushing oil. If you have repaired a blown head gasket for example, and the engine contains oil that has emulsified with water. You can put a couple of fills of the cheap stuff through it to rinse it out before filling up with good stuff. I would just use it to top up any oil cans you have, or as you say wipe it over tools etc.

 

[Just4Fun]

I have a 1-litre oil "can" that is good oil but not the oil I use in any vehicle. I use it for general oiling tasks. Doesn't everyone put Mobil 1 on their door hinges? Perhaps I do too little maintenance but that can has lasted for years. I'm sure a larger can would outlast me if used just for this type of thing.

 

[diytoolbox]

We use WD40 for door hinges stiff opening or making creaking noise. Works like magic.

 

[diytoolbox]

Find someone with a classic car they will bite your hand off for it, and then your ear telling you about thier pride and joy!

Cheers James

I used to love the classic VW Beetles and diesel Mercs. The one I used to have was 1970 Merc for Sunday drive, and a few diesel 1980s Mercs and 124 petrol Mercs. Should have kept them, but I was going away for some business long time, no one to look after and had to sell them.

 

[hairy]

I used to know a forester with contracts for eco sensitive clients who would insist on the likes of olive oil on chainsaw blades.

 

[Dee J]

Is oil. Oil things with it. Latches, hinges, bicycles, metal surfaces etc. Personally wouldn't want to put it on handles and wood surfaces, nor would I feel OK about slathering outside surfaces with it in large quantities due to ground contamination concerns. Or give it to someone who can use it in old low-tech engines. Or ultimately, if you can't bear it cluttering the shelf, just empty it into the used oil recycling at the tip. Other opinions are available.

 

[Richard_C]

I must think about my odd stock of unused and now obsolete oil, I have an almost full 5l of pre-semi-synth and even an unopened pint (yes, pint) can of Hypoid that I have left over from overnight re-building my Hillman Hunter differental around 1978.

Out local tip (sorry, recycling facility) has a place where you can leave used and unused oil so I guess it all gets recycled. For a full container you might try freecycle, someone might want it.

Other (perhaps less helpful) suggestions:

• Obtain some artists pigments. Grind and blend into your engine oil. Paint several large masterpieces and become rich and famous.
  
  
• Build a device to inject a fine mist of oil into flame of a blowlamp or camping stove. A bicycle pump might be a starting point for the pressure bit. Keep it to hand near your front door so you can "make smoke" should a passing battle cruiser begin shelling your house (particularly if you live in Gt Yarmouth, Scarborough, Hartlepool or Whitby, all shelled by the Kaiser's navy in 1914). Might never happen, but "be prepared" is what I say.
  
  
• Give your local community a free skid pan training area by brushing your oil all over a local car park and wait for it to rain. The company I worked for gave all company car users some very good driver training. One bit was the skid pan day. Mk3 Cortina with bald tyres, large tarmac area soaked (permanently) with oil, hoses and fine mist water spray.
  
  
• This perhaps sensible but won't use much. Before we had stainless steel garden tools, there was the sandbox and man method. Man is just a wooden scraper, probabaly a local name and may differ round the country. Sandbox was an old bucket or wooden crate filled with sand which had plenty of oil in it. Scrape off big bits of mud, wiggle spade, fork, hoe or whatever round in the sandbox and hang up ready for next time.
  
  

 

[diytoolbox]

I wouldn't use engine oil on anything I was going to touch and I'm no h and s pedant. it's fairly horrible having all sorts of chemicals added. hydraulic oil is more like a pure oil. ( still horrible though) I know mechanics are smeared in it and they are OK but they don't have a choice.
I do use oilstones and I've got some German scharfeol.from a car boot or Dan's honing oil(this has an old fashioned proper oil smell)or some oil from lidl that smells like cumin( curry mmmmm)in a spray.

I suppose the smell of motor oil will be problem for applying to anything indoors.

 

[MARK.B.]

If you use it as chain oil on your lecky machine indoors cover up as being much thinner it sprays quite a distance at full revs and makes quite a mess

 

[diytoolbox]

If you use it as chain oil on your lecky machine indoors cover up as being much thinner it sprays quite a distance at full revs and makes quite a mess

I would never use chainsaws indoors. Chainsaws are always outside tools. But staining wooden furnitures, doors and wooden handles of the tools with motor oil, I can't see working for me due to the possible oil smell and chemical attacks on the skin it might touch. Maybe staining and preserving the wooden borders or external panels of shed in the garden sounds OK.

 

[MARK.B.]

Would not use a petrol inside for obvious reasons but have a electric one inside many times

 

[diytoolbox]

Problem of using even electric chainsaws indoor would be their spewing out saw dusts all over, and also as mentioned above, the oil from the chain and bar will project out to the floor and walls