I've been having a quick glance through the vw workshop manual for the 1.9 aef Diesel engine in the felicia, and it states you can use vw 501.01 or 505.00 or any multi-grade oil, these are both old specifications for pre 2000 vehicles, what do these grades actually translate to? Various different places have different grades on sale such as 10-40 or 5-30 etc etc all of which meet the (frankly low) specifications listed in the workshop manual. Can anybody shed any light as to which is the best oil type to use? Bare in mind it's an old school mechanical rotary pump injected engine with 100k+ miles, I normally buy fully synthetic juice but I can't help thinking that even asda's own supermarket oil might be sufficient?

Tom,

I can't give you a definite answer but these links may help you:

http://www.my-gti.com/2543/volkswagen-oil-standards-lists-of-all-approved-oils-skoda-audi-seat

https://erwin.volkswagen.de/erwin/volkswagen/files/oil/step_50200_50500_50501.pdf

(502.00 is the successor to 501.01)

This site helps you compare the relative requirements of different oil specs:

https://www.lubrizol.com/apps/relperftool/pc.html

Looking at the 501.01/505.00 list on the my-gti link, the majority of the oils seem to be 10w40 so perhaps that is the way to go.

Hope the above is of some use.

I'm liking 10-40 semi, was in wilkinsons buying some stuff earlier and I noticed that that are turning out the Mobil semi synthetic stuff for £24 which is quite reasonable to be honest.