trsulliv

I have a 73 with a 93 ZZ3 crate engine. I am sure there are other threads about zinc in the oil, but was not sure how to find them. So, do I need to start looking for oil with zinc for the ZZ3? If yes, can somebody recommend an oil? I have been running Mobil 1 in it for many years now, and Valvoline 20W-50 Racing oil for an occasional track day.

GeorgeS

Zinc is needed for solid lifters. If you have roller lifters in your new engine this will not be an issue at all. You should get plenty of opinions on which oil is best soon... my experience has been to use inexpensive oil and change it regularly. For me this means once per year when I put my 68 away for the winter. I run about 1,200 miles per summer and never had a problem. I didn't name the brand because it will start an oil fight but I truely wouldn't be afraid to use any brand out there. I do not race! Almost never over 5,500 RPM. If you run your engine hard you may need to be thoughtful of the brand you use.

Jims66

Do a search on "ZDDP" in this Forum and I think you'll get answers to your question.

Paul L

Yes, I use it. Castrol GTX 10W-40 with this added. Works fine.

FKING1

If you check, diesel oils have zinc in them. Some solid lifter folkd use it.

timgman

Brad pen racing oil with zddplus added...

RobbSalzmann

I've owned several turbo charged vehicles and until recently always used Rotella in them and in my NA cars without issues.

In just the last couple of months I've noticed the Rotellas are now SM (not enough zinc for flat tappet engines) rated.

It seems most of the oils out there that you would normally buy for your street machine have gone SM.

However, there are other alternatives worth exploring, such as certain motorcycle oils, some (racing) synthetics etc or severe duty oils like Swepco. I think by the time you buy some of this stuff, you could have bought 'normal' oil and added the fore-mentioned ZDDP product.

A note about synthetics, due to smaller molecular composition, they tend to leak when dino oils don't in older engines.

Here is a chart That Mobil has produced. Column 4 indicates Zinc content in Parts Per Million.

I'm currently building a solid cam engine, and will follow this conversation for greater insight on what oil to use in it.

Now maybe I have a use for all that leftover zinca from my surfing days....

Regards,
Robb

Paul L

I don't trust that anymore since the feds mandated cat cons on diesels in 2007.

baxsom

bobistheoilguy has an oil analysis of that zddplus stuff. it had like 15k ppm of zddp in it.

billla

The oil spec you need to avoid is GF-4 for gasoline and CJ-4 for diesels. Both of these oils are constrained by specifiction to 800 PPM ZDDP - less than 1/2 of what most flat-tappet cam manufacturers recommend.

Racing oil is not constrained by these specs and so will almost always have the appropriate (or more) amount of ZDDP and other additives. They're fairly expensive by comparison, and the additive package really isn't made for start-and-stop driving.

Many vendors now have "high milage" oil that are exempt from GF-4/CJ-4 and have enough ZDDP. The only way to be sure on these oils is to check the Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS), although some of those leave something to be desired in detail.

This is really all you need to know

not a '76

One thing that everyone seems to overlook is that there are an assload of modern flat lifter motors and they do not care or worry about zinc one bit.

I did a semi-quick google search and couldn't find examples of 'I took care of my motor and my cam is junk'

so at least two possibilities exist:

1. zinc problems are an over-inflated internet hoax and good oil is still good oil. bad oil is still bad oil.

2. Our cams and lifters are made out of crap metal. <doubtful.

I am interested in concrete evidence along the lines of Mobil 1 vs. Mobil 1 with zinc additive and cam wear problems. Something tells me that nothing bad will happen when there is no zinc additive in the M1.

billla

I hope we can keep this discussion respectful and fact-based.

Can you identify some of the said gasoline, modern, in-block cam, flat-tappet engines?

Having lived throught the GF-4 swap in 2005 and associated cam failures, I don't question it for a moment. If you were doing a fair bit of engine work as I was during that time, it almost seemed like something just fell out of the sky and was killing cams.

Here's CompCams take on it - I can't think of what's in it for a cam manufacturer to call this out. I've seen observations that it was all hype to cover up poor QA by CompCams, but at the time it was happening with EVERYONE's cams.

http://www.compcams.com/Base/pdf/Fla...chBulletin.pdf

Is it hype? Maybe it is. For me, there's enough data to spend maybe $50 an oil change vs. $20 for MY cars - but clearly everyone has to determine their own risk tolerance.

Jeff_Keryk

I believe Rotella is still pretty good; from Wikipedia:
Shell is marketing their new CJ-4/SM oil as "Triple Protection," meaning it provides enhanced qualities for engine wear, soot control and engine cleanliness. Shell's Rotella website indicates that on-road testing confirms the new Triple Protection technology produces better anti-wear characteristics than their existing CI-4+ rated Rotella oil. This is achieved despite a lower zinc and phosphorus additive level as called for by the API CJ-4 specification. (The 15W-40 Rotella T with Triple Protection oil has approximately 1200 ppm of zinc and 1100 ppm phosphorus at the time of manufacture.)

Retro78

Nope, not enough anymore.

RunningMan373

Oh no.....

baxsom

this is why my new engine has a roller cam in it. i can go buy a gallon of whatever SM rated oil is the flavor of the month and call it good.

marz

ZDDP is needed in all flat tappet cams installed. All of the car mags and car shows tell you to use this in these motors. I myself experienced what happens when you don't use this oil additive. Bought new crate motor, broke it in. changed oil ( no zinc additive) and my cam went flat. I swapped the cam and lifters ( still flat tappet), but used the additive. Bottom line almost a year later and the motor is still running strong. If you don't want to use it then roller cams are your answer. The problem with rollers is that they just don't seem to last as long. This, per my engine builder.

Mobil 1 is good oil, but you can also use other synthetic oils for the newer motors. I started with Mobil 1 in my Z06 and now use Q Racing oil. No problems.

Hope this helps.

not a '76

marz and billla,

sorry if i sounded a little rude. Thanks for the evidence. Point taken.

Solid LT1

WRONG! with the advent of catalytic convertors on modern Diesel motors the Zinc additive is being removed from these oils too. Brad Penn or Joe Gibbs "Hot Rod" motor oils have the ZDDP additive package you want for your motor.

marz

No problem. I understand and we all want to make the right decisions on products.