ratflinger

This is Amsoil's Tech Support reply:

"In general, it is true that diesel formulas are allowed more anti-wear additives such as ZDDP or other newer additive technologies. It is also true that flat tappet engines require a higher level of anti-wear additives. Zinc works very well as an anti-wear additive but is rapidly being replaced with newer high-performance AW compounds. It is not necessary to use diesel oil if you were to use one of our high performance oils such as our AMSOIL ATM 10W30 Turbo formula. We have not lowered the levels of anti-wear additives in this formulation and we also incorporate newer anti-wear additive technology that is very effective for protecting this type of application."

jackson

Does mountain or others have info & opinion regarding Joe Gibbs Racing's line of motor oils?

breathial

Ok, this is one of those areas of engines where I'm not the least bit educated.....

So, can someone please boil this down to basic English for me?

I mean, for a guy like me, who's running a medium camshaft (not stock, but not a high-lift radical cam), and wants to get good, LONG life out of it... What should I REALLY be running, so I don't have to tear off the top of my engine to replace the cam....?????

A little help, please? Cost is not the issue, having to bust my knuckles to do a cam-swap IS....

Anybody....? Anybody...? BUELLER?????

bobs77vet

well seems to me that what i am reading is that any of the good manufactures "racing oils" such as valvoline racing oil is good stuff, and any of the "racing oils" has good stuff in it also.

SanDiegoPaul

At last month's Corvette Club meeting, we had a guest speaker from a private oil company speaking on this very topic.

His opine was that you CANNOT get proper zinc protection in ANY 5w oil because it cannot be put there. He said that 10w-30 oil is the thinnest viscosity that offers any protection via zinc additive.

I quizzed them after the meeting about the oil I have used for years and YEARS on my hot rod motors: Valvoline 20w-50 Racing oil. He said the zinc content in that oil is good, but that he recommended I drop down from the 20w-50 viscosity.

C66 Racing

Redline is a really good oil, but... the ester basestock really causes seal expansion which may or may not be an issue with some older cars. AMSOIL and Mobil 1 use a Group IV PAO basestock which causes seals to shrink. Though I'm not sure about Mobil 1, AMSOIL actually adds a small percentage of ester basestock to its predominately PAO basestock to counteract the shrinkage caused by the PAO. The result is that a seal should actually expand a few percent when switching to AMSOIL SAE synthetic, which helps prevent seal leakage without causing significant seal swelling.

BKbroiler

From Valvoline's website, 10w-30, 20w-50 and straight 50 Valvoline Racing Oil all have 0.12% Zinc, by weight.
I had to order a case of 10w-30 from the local parts store. That's what I will be using after reading this thread.

SanDiegoPaul

Interesting - the link above shows .2 percent. On the other hand it does not matter to me - I've built a dozen or so motors and used Valvoline Racing oil on each one and NEVER have had a failure yet, street or strip.

So I'm just sticking w/what has worked for me since I was a teenager building hot rods.

GOSFAST

Between our customers and our own builds we, "break-in" about 3-4 flat tappet cams per week on an average. We have never lost so much as a single cam. Just this past month we delivered a 396 BB pump-gas unit that produced over 500 HP with a solid lifter setup. A .580"/.600" lift and no problems. It was fired using a set of Comp Cams 911's and Pennzoil 25-50 Racing oil. Pulled the valve covers and had absolutely no foreign material in the valve area. Cut open filter and drained oil from pan, both "spotless". Proceeded to retorque the heads, changed to the
"dual" springs and customer now has unit. BOTH "Valvoline Race" AND
"Pennzoil Race" still are acceptible for proper break-in.

I will not let any of my customers use "synthetics", any brands. We've seen nothing but loss of power on ALL dyno tests. Moreso with the
"Amsoil" brand, but all the brands we've tested. We can actually watch
the "pyrometers" go cold in the headers and the "fuel-flow" meter "take-off". The last unit we tested using "Amsoil", a 331" SB, lost 40 HP, went from 531 straight to 491 HP. One unit we follow in the car runs 11.35's with "conventional" oil and runs 11.70's with Mobil-1. Over here, NO
synthetic's, period. Thanks, Gary in N.Y.

P.S. ALL the old rules still apply for proper break-in however. Coat the lobes with "moly", keep the RPM's up (2000/2500), no idling, make certain unit fires instantly, and most importantly, examine BOTH oil from pan and filter (internally) for any contaminants!

mountainmotor

Hi Paul , the person was incorrect in his statement . Did you see the 3w-30 and 5w-30 Synergyn oils plus the 5w-40 Redline I listed ? Huge amounts of phos/zinc in those .

Here's another example . The oil is the SL Phillips Trop Artic 5w-30

Moly 41
Magnesium 11
Calcium 1820
Phos 959
Zinc 1363
Silicon 7- defoament
Vi @ 100c 10.95


Now the only differences in the oil and it's 10w-30 brother of the time was a slight different viscosity at 40c , a bit less viscosity modifier for the 10w-30 and in all likelyhood the 5w-30 was blended with more group II base oil to achieve the cold performance target . The viscosity of the 5w-30 is not thinner than it's 10w-30 brother at operating temps and both use identical additive packs which includes the total amounts of zinc/phosforus . The 5w-30 just offers better sub 30F performance .

Bob ,


There are no seal issues with Redlines Pentaerythritol base oil . In fact it will help keep seals in both static and dynamic operation clean and pliable over an engines life . Redline , Maxima and a company who makes F1 racing oils are the only one's using the pentaerythritol type ester that I know of .

To continue on Redline ,ester ect , when you see an oil marketed as ester based , well thats it's primary make up . They use enough PAO to offset any real seal swell just as any real synthetic using PAO's use 10-25 percent ester to counter or offset seal drying . Modern nitrile seals are almost impervious to most all these engine oils made today . There were issues with very thin 20wt synthetics leaking from old and silicone type seals in the 70's but not anylonger .

Group II mineral base oils used in the low cost mineral oils all use a seal conditioner of some type and that includes the group III synthetics whether or not they are blended with a small percent of PAO . One of the type seal conditioners actually plays as a dual role or better put , are multifuntional in design .

jackson ,

I have not had chance to see the Gibbs oil through spectro analysis in regards to it's additive pack . I'd like to though .

ratflinger ,

Those diesel oils use alot of zinc becasue the oil is ran for long intervals . Zinc can deplete over time plus it's multifuctional as well . It's a great anti-wear additive and also serves as an anti-oxident to help prevent thickening over long use .

Yes there are other friction modifiers not seen through the typical spectro analysis . Four distinct types in fact but at the end of the day when it comes to cams and lifters it the phos/zinc package that does the brunt of the work . It activates a much lower temps than oil soluable moly as example . Also , last I saw that ATM 10w-30 was being marketed as meeting API SM and had but 800 or so parts per million phosforus .

breathial ,

Of all these oils , are there not any available in your area that meets your viscosity needs ?

Honestly this all is basic english so to speak . Oil and formulas are very complex yet so easy to understand once the basics are learned . Now the chemistry parts of it , branched chains , polar ends , the tri's , the di 's ect , ect and all that are much beyond me and go far beyond basic and I don't care to learn such . I have better things to do but it boils down to this .

Automakers are making valvetrains lighter and lighter and lessoning the valve spring prssure as they go . Tolerances are held much closer than ever before . Those driving Civic's , Ford modulars and other new cars will be just fine by using the owners manual and basic oil but this section of the forum has to do with older Corvette engines from mild to wild and what may work well in a 2006 Civic " 5w-20 " might just be certain death to the cams , lifters and fulcrum rockers of these older 5.7 Chevy designs and thats what the topic is about , not the newer cars .

There are more oils out there to get the job done to include the Exxon 0w-40 thats available to our Canadian friends but not sold in the states . Also , for warmer climates or fairly hot engines that get ran hard Valvoline has a nice 5w-40 Premium Blue Extreme diesel oil thats built different than other diesel 5w-40's . All NAPA's can get it for 15.00 or so a gallon .

You also might keep an eye out for the new Phillips 15w-40 Synthetic Blend thats soon the hit the shelfs . It will pump better than some 10w-40's , be low cost and have probably 1500-1600 ppm zinc . They also have a good race 15w-40 Synthetic Blend thats highly friction modified but with a little less zinc and will last long time when see'ing street duty

I hope this helps in some way and as far as needing some spelling corrections I'm out of time and thats just the way it is

Nitromad

Any info on BG Products line of motor oil?

I'm Batman

Then why does nearly every manufacturer use Mobil 1 as the "factory fill" in nearly every high performance engine made today???

Mako72

bobs77vet

well the engines are significantly different...

Nitromad

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