Publisher's Note: Welcome to our 25th edition of Tech Tips Tuesday on "Essential 2-Stroke Engine Care Tips".  We'll be re-publishing an edition of AMSOIL Tech Tips for you every Tuesday.  Click on the Blog Category "AMSOIL" to see everything published to-date.

Essential 2-Stroke Engine Care Tips

John Gardner: You know, a 2-stroke engine has twice as many exhaust pulses as a 4-stroke at the same RPM. What does that mean? Well, welcome to the AMSOIL Tech Tip. Len, man, this is actually a 4-stroke, everybody knows that, but you probably have a 2-stroke, like this, a dirt bike or something going on, and there's a difference. What's the difference? Well, it's going twice as fast. You can see our 4-stroke cycle versus the 2-stroke; it's taking some abuse.

Speaking of abuse, man, you actually put it on it, Len. You just don't talk the talk. I don't think our viewers know. I mean, you understand oil inside and out, but you're living it on a daily basis, man. You take this oil, you prove it. I mean, in the harshest conditions, you guys try to make this stuff fail so you can go in and improve the oil. Man, this is some phenomenal stuff, Len. Look at these parts. These are all 2-stroke parts, and there are issues with them. Talk about the 2-stroke and how you can prevent that.

Len Groom: You know what, John? If you want to beat on something, you should put it in a rental fleet because, boy, that equipment gets abused. So that was what you were looking at there. We put that snowmobile in a rental fleet, we let them beat on it for an entire season, then we took it apart. Right? Because what you're looking at, as you saw in some of those pictures, are we want—we're looking for piston protection, we're looking for cleanliness, because in a 2-stroke, the oil is consumed.

So, there's a tendency to get dirty exhaust, dirty power valves, things like that. So we're looking at piston protection, power valve cleanliness, and then cold temperature performance, in the case of that one being a snowmobile.

John Gardner: Now, for me, there are a couple of different types of 2-stroke oils. Take us through the Interceptor versus the Dominator.

Len Groom: Sure, it's fairly simple. The Interceptor is for anything that's oil-injected, so your snowmobiles, different things like that. It's very well balanced, uh, in the fact that it can provide cold temperature performance and all of those different things that we've already discussed. The Dominator is for the track, it's for racing, anything that is competing. So you'll find that recommendation for dirt bikes, for other things that are really, really being abused.

John Gardner: Well, whether you're abusing the equipment like Len does, or you're just driving it on a daily basis, no worries. AMSOIL has their oil tested and proven.