I purchased a 2007 Volvo V50 in Sept and it will soon be experiencing its first winter in Northern Ontario where overnight temps often dip into the -20C and sometimes reach the -30C range. The car doesn't have a block heater. It was recommended that putting 0W30 Synthetic Oil will be good enough to get the car started without a block heater.

I would love to hear what others thinik about this. I have been told it is a real pain to put in a block heater, but I am not sure the synthetic will be good enough in the cold.

Thanks for your help.

JD

 

You should be able to get a Dipstick heater pretty cheap and use that along with the Synthetic Oil. I wouldn't just let the oil take the brunt of the cold. I spent a year in Greenland and we kept the engines running 24 hrs a day and added a dipstick heater to boot. When it really got COLD we added 1 gallon of alcohol to every 5 gallons of gas to keep it from freezing.

 

Thanks for the advice.

I did some research on dipstick heaters and found that the have been banned in Canada due to engine fires....

Back to the drawing board!