5w-20 or 5w-30? doesn't matter, right?

mostsmooth said:

and while im asking probably stupid questions, i happen to have a jug of un-opened Mobil 1 syn 5w-30 that has been sitting in my garage for possibly up to 17 years. this is garbage now, right?

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So how long was the crude oil in the ground first? (about 6000 years or much, much longer depending on how you think the world was created?)
17 years in a sealed plastic container is not long enough to deteriorate the oil. I do not think it affects the additives a bit either at normal garage temperatures. I found a stash of the right service grade oil for flat tappet cams at grandpa’s shop. There was no separation, it looked and smelled like new, although I did not taste test it.
Eight years later I have almost enough for one oil change before I start using VR-1 Valvoline. I wish I had found another two cases.
Now the Fram and Puralator filters went into the trash. Surface rust and questions about how brittle the glue made that choice easy.