A method for experimental determination of the temperature intervals of structure formation and the activation energy of viscous flow is described on the example of lube oils. The results obtained are interpreted from the point of view of nonequilibrium thermodynamics.Lube oils, whose quality significantly affects the reliability of operation of machines and mechanisms, are considered to be complex colloidal systems. In contrast to true solutions, multiphasicity and internal heterogeneity are characteristics of such systems [1]. Intermolecular interactions of different intensity take place in colloidal solutions, as in real solutions. As a result of these interactions, micelles, supramicellar formations, associates, and liquid-and solid-crystalline structures arise as a function of the external conditions and temperature [1,2].The behavior of colloidal solutions when the temperature of the system decreases is of special interest:the mobility of associates decreases sharply due to strengthening of their internal bonds and the appearance of new bonds. Based on the practical importance of such behavior, we will analyze the process of low-temperature structure formation below. The physical analysis of the behavior of such complex multicomponent systems as petroleum disperse systems (PDS) can be performed statistically by introducing the concept of the average current energy of the intermolecular interaction in a liquid in given external conditions X:In practice, structure formation in PDS is usually investigated by viscometric methods [3]. However, these methods have a number of drawbacks, and the fundamental ones are:• usually use of an exponential dependence between the structure-sensitive parameters of a liquid (viscosity, conductivity, dielectric constant, etc.) [4,5] that characterize its structural transformation in certain conditions and the reciprocal of the temperature of the liquid; theory and experiment show that this extrapolation only holds in a narrow temperature range, outside of the region of strong structural changes [6]; • use of rotary or capillary viscometers for determining the viscosity, which causes mechanical destruction of the structures;