More on Thin Oils, A Used Oil Analysis

Redline states they use polyol-esters. Perhaps sourced from companies like Hatco http://www.hatcocorporation.com/pages/syntheticlubes/polyolesters.htm Motul also make an ester based motor oil. I'm not sure what family of ester is used. A long time ago Amsoil sourced diesters from Hatco. Mobil 1 uses some type of ester with its majority PAO product. This is because PAOs have poor solubility with the additive package.

 

Thanks. Was there ever anything said about esters naturally having some detergency to absorb moisture or the like?

Fascinating subject.

 

Actually Terry, Ferrari made that available to the dealers some time ago and we stocked it. We were told to use it in any car that saw severe use. If I recall there is a TSB to that effect. We used it in a number of cars, mostly 355 and 360. We had several that would see such high oil temps in summer months, sometimes even in street driving that the Shell 5-40 could just not cope with it.

 

I suggest 10W60 synths for track cars. Makes a huge oil temp difference in porsche and Lambos FWIW. Used Elf but now Lubro Moly.

 

Brian(s)- Interesting. Makes sense. I do not have the bulletin, but then I do not have very many of them.

For anyone wondering when Ferrari starting using Shell lubricants instead of AGIP, it was January 1996 and here is the bulletin. They started recommending both 5W-40 and 0W-40 beginning with the 550/360, as near as I can determine. Have never seen any Shell Helix Ultra 0W-40, though, only 5W-40.

Taz
Terry Phillips
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When I ran the oil weight experiments several years ago, I noticed that the oil temps would go up when heavier oils (xxW-50 and xxW-60) were used both at the track and on the road.

 

Mitch- Some inconsistencies here. I think I understand everything going on, since my BS is in chemistry, but some folks see lower temps with higher oil weight second numbers (xxW-XX) and some see lower temperatures under extreme conditions.

Guess that is why I am sticking to factory recommended oil weights. Like Mark said, maybe I get a little extra wear, but I am not going to trash my engine.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

Terry, I have 6 Ferrari motors out for rebuild or a big repair right now and not a single one because of worn out lubricated parts or parts worn out or failed from lubrication issues. In 30 years of Ferrari that has been pretty constant.

But I suppose it makes for a good intellectual exercise if no one follows silly advice.

 

Ali

I change my oil after every track day period. Make yourself happy but I stand by my statement:

I would not buy a car that ran lighter weight oil than that reccommended by the manufacture. Period.

I ran my MK-IV for 25K miles on the street and track using 40W rotella which is what is reccommend for that one. I changed the oil often. We recently tore it completely down.
Everything was fine. Think everything would be fine if we'd used 20W oil? I don't.

You get your oil up to 180 F That doesn't impress me. I get mine up to over 300 F. In my Cigarette Boat which runs 50W Mobil one it gets past 330 F. Those motors have held together for many, many years and hours.

 

Pic?

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmjPa9YCr-Y&feature=related

 

The infamous Manhattan Express (knew that by heart!). One of my favorite "cult" JC movies, and IMO helped launch Jackie Chan's career in the USA.

Jim, if you ever feel like talking about the behind-the-scenes stuff on that movie, I'd love to read it. I've read that you and Jackie didn't exactly see eye-to-eye, and I am sure you have some great commentary from your perspective.

 

As it should by a couple degrees due to the increased shear and that's what you got right?

The point is though that even with the increase in temp you move 25 degrees further from the failure point and putting you in a much safer place.

 

Valve guides are a lubricated part. {Valve seats were a lubricated pat when tetra-ethyl-lead was in the gasoline.}.

 

Exactly.

Ali's engine doesn't blow up because he doesn't drive the car....he idles it. Hammer with oil that thin and the temp at the bearing will rise FAST the viscosity will drop and the bearings will fall.....I would give it well under 5 minutes.

What’s worse is he knows that full well and yet he continues to post absolute cr*p about 20w being appropriate for the car. The good doctor has very clearly doesn't understand the difference between a honda civic and an enzo........

 

Your point being?

 

Oil temps at 103dF ambient temperatures (all taken at TWS one summer)
10W-30 oil 283dF
10W-40 oil 285dF
20W-50 oil 295dF

20W-50 oil also has slow to build oil pressure at startup (cool to cold) and you can hear it. 10W-40 gets up to pressure in 3-ish second after a week of not-running. 10W-30 gets up to pressure in 1-1.5 seconds after a week of not-running. I currently run 10W-40 oils mainly due to a desire to run the car on the track at some random time in that oil fills life. Were this car be decomissioned from track life, I would be happy to run it on 10W-30 oil (Redline).

All oils tested (more than 8) loose 5-7 PSI on the oil pressure gauge after a day at the track. And it does not seem to mater if the track day was one session or 4 sessions. Its not the oil filter as it has been replaced but the oil pressure stayed low. I suspect shear.

We have been inside the bottom of this engine and removed the bearings for inspection. They were in such good shape* the bearings were reinstalled, this was 10K miles ago. Prior to this the engine had been in 24 track events and has at least 10 minutes over redline**, and afterwards has been in 8 track events and a couple of dyno sessions. Overall there are almost 5,000 track miles and 58K actual miles.

(*) there was a minor polish at the loaded point but 75% of the bearing surface had the original lightly-brushed patina. The polish was perfectly smooth, thin, and absolutely free from surface details (such as scratches).

(**) only 3 times was the rev-limter hit

 

What is the factory recomended oil for that engine?

It appears 40 is just fine.....I'd still probably run a 50 becasue i like margin, but a 0-10w 50 instead of 20w50, I quit using the 20w except for staight racing when the synthetics came out years ago.

 

I think Jackie hadn't had some one stand up to him for a long time. He got over it. It was an interesting experience which in the end is what it's about.

 

What's in it for me? Although I'm told I have a gift for blowing up engines gives me no pleasure.

Just so you know, if we are talking about an enzo the bill bill be closer to $100k I'd guess for just the engine damage (it's over $20k for a 308 rebuild) not counting the clutch, trans and brake work you'll also need. Pretty much any engine could be destroyed in 10 minutes so I'm not really sure what would be learned other than you've clearly got more money then you know what to do with. You've offer a silly wager.

 

I used to own a water chemistry/environmental lab and I had an AA spectrometer.

Some of the airplane guys and I used to try to make some sense out of the numbers on an oil sample from various sources.

What I found was that on repeated samples, the numbers were all over the place. Maybe my technique was off, but we made an attempt to centrifuge the particulate matter, digest it into an acid solution, and then by calculation get a volumetric PPM on the original oil sample. Just the oil/particle sludge by itself would not make it through the nebulizer on my old Perkin-Elmer machine; and I just did chromium, copper, iron, and a few others. It takes a special and expensive source lamp for each and every metal ion you want to measure.

I had the distinct idea that what you got for results were just as much a random proposition of what kind of particulates got into that sample as it were a linear expression of actual engine wear...but, as I say - this was just an amatuer experiment by a water treatment lab owner who was not in this business.

BTW, did AA (Atomic Absorption spectrometry) just survive as a term for this kind of metal test by default? I thought most modern labs used a Plasma Emission type spectrometry for this...

 

My 2nd fav. Jackie Chan movie, and favorite JG movie