Hey guys,

I know this has been covered before and I read some old posts about it, but I just wanted to get some current opinions. My '94 960 is getting an oil change tomorrow and I'm on the fence between Amsoil 10W30 and 5W40. I switched it over to Amsoil 10W30 (from non-syn) soon after I bought it at about 81K mi. My sister should be driving it past 85K mi as I type this. It appears to have used about 1/2-3/4 of a liter in the ~4000 mi which is not bad I guess. The oil still isn't that dirty (I ran an engine flush through it before I converted it to synthetic). Anyway, even though it seems to work just fine with the 10W30, I was wondering if Amsoil 5W40 "European Formula" would be a better choice. The 960 gets driven year round (-20C to +30C) and my V90 only gets driven in the summer (currently has Amsoil 10W30 in it as well). I was planning to change the oil in them every 8K km (5K mi) and stay on track with the service intervals in the manual. Both cars will see a mix of hwy and city driving and I'm not afraid to use the throttle (that engine sounds GOOD from ~4500-6000 RPM:), but the 960's usually stays under 4K RPM. I haven't driven the V90 enough to see what it commonly revs to. Anyway, what do ya think; Stick with 10W30 or switch to 5W40? My mechanic carries Amsoil, and it's been an excellent product in my experience, so I'll continue to use it, but I seem to remember the specs showing their oil a bit on the thick side of the weight ratings.

One other question; I have a 'white block' magnetic drain plug from IPD. Is it worth installing or should I just stick with the stock plug?

Thanks for any advise/insight!
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Chris. Halifax N.S. '98 V90 > 195K km, '94 964 > 82K mi. SOLD: '91 745T and '91 745 NA (I miss both of them!).