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no or very little The very same characteristics that makes it a good lubricant also makes it non-conductive. A good lubricant is not necisarily non-conductive. Soapy water is a good lubricant and is also a fair conductor of electricity. Engine oil does not conduct electricity because there are no charge carriers in it. A charge carrier is any chemical species with a net electric charge. Pure water is a very poor conductor of electricity. Dissolving salt in water produces ions (charged chemical species) which act as charge carriers. As a result, salt water is a much better electrical conductor than is pure water. In the case of motor oils, there are no charge carriers. Furthermore, salts are not soluble in oil so it isn't usually possible to add a charge carrier to increase the electrical conductivity. In metals, the "charge carriers" are electrons. A hunk of metal is essentialy a single molecule. Some of the metals electrons are not held tightly to an individual atom and can migrate through the metal under the influence of an electric field. In oil there are no loosely held electrons in the indvidual molecules, hence no possibility for the electrons to migrate within a molecule. Even if there were loosely held electrons within the molecules, there is no low energy mechanism to transfer mobile electrons between molecules. So, oil is non-conductive because it doesn't contain any charge carriers. Oil usually can not be made conductive by the addition of salts.

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