Amsoil Synthetic Diesel 15W40 Oil

[jayhaitch]

Amsoil recommends changing to their oil at the first OEM recommended oil change, whatever it is for that vehicle. They also do not recommend using their extended drain intervals if starting to use Amsoil after 100,000 miles of regular oil. Makes sense. Get your blood pressure down BEFORE you have your first stroke

Shell Rotella T synthetic is a group 3 oil. Very good oil, but highly refined petroleum oil, not group 4 PAO oil. It's synthetic like Castrol/Quaker State synthetic, not Mobil 1/Amsoil/Royal Purple PAO basestock. Thank you DP for the Redline info. I didn't know they used group 5 oils. Again, makes sense since they market themselves predominately to racers.

I'm approaching the 50 hour 'change all fluids' point of my GC2310. I've purchased Amsoil Series 3000 5w30 diesel oil for it. The factory 10w30 was NOT what the engine liked at -30 C with no block heater...... BTW, block heater is on order

 

[hill]

The portion in bold, it seems to me, is not a good testimonial to synthetic oil. Ease of metal removal and superior lubrication are at opposite ends of the spectrum.

Agreed. and the fact that synthetics are usually not recommended for use during what could be called 'a design high wear period' - the breakin of piston rings is another testimonial to the synthetic oil's superior lubricating quality.

 

[Z71]

My 2005 CTS came factory filled with Mobil 1. I ran that for the first year and about 7500 miles (store car in winter and drive GMC). I changed to 0W-30 Amsoil and now have about 24,000 miles on it. It never used a drop of oil since new and only change it once a year.

According to someone I know who works for GM powertrain, engines are not run in at the engine plant or the assembly plant. Modern engine materials don't need any elaborate break in. They may pull a engine and dyno it for testing purposes but the only time they are fired up is on the final assembly line, about 5 min from coming off the line. Every vehicle is run on a dyno to past emissions tests and for other checks so by time the reach the dealers lot they likely have over 1 hr or run time. I toured the Corvette Assembly plant. They drive the recently fired up car off the assembly line to the alignment setting rack, from there it goes to the dyno room where they hook up the test equipment thru drivers window, accelerate the vehicle to a speed of 60 mph (testing is approx. 5 min) running a bunch of test (can't recall the name for this), all of sudden the brakes are slammed hard, the engine comes down to idle, a red/green style traffic light go from red to green, the doors to the enclosed room open and they drive the car (as another comes in) off to water testing and out the door to the train or car haulers. I was surprised to see how hard they run the new engine on the dyno.

The plant tour guide confirmed that the engines are first fired in the assembly plant birthing station. They allowed the ladies in the tour the chance to fire them up and then gave them a 'birth certificate' saying they gave birth to a new ZO6.

To run every engine would not be feasible. The engine plants turn them over with water pressure as a means of quality control. Starting every engine would be very costly in pollution control etc.

According the powertrain engineer (30 yrs with GM) the reason they use synthetic oil is because it can withstand the heat better than minerals oils and with the Corvette they were seeing increased warranty concerns with the new engines as customers tend to redline them immediately. They realized a dramatic reduction is warranty costs with engines after switching to synthetic oil. That allows them to make significant design improvements in the vehicle without having to install huge oil coolers.

I have several bud's with diesel trucks, 2 of them SDF350 7.3L and they run Amsoil 15W-40 AME. Both change oil aprrox. every 15,000 miles. One I know has about 150,000 miles on the Amsoil (2000 dually 4x4) and the other I am not sure of. These 2 trucks have been all over the USA, one guy is retired and likes to haul his 5th or M/C to the warmed climates in the winter. The other guy is a custom furniture maker and he goes to many show events all over the USA with his 2004 Furd. Get a load of his prices. Birdseye-Connection birdseye maple furniture

 

[kenmac]

You can't break an engine in with synthetic , synthetic won't mix with dino, if you go with synthetic you can't go back to dino, synthetic causes oil leaks. I'm sure there are many other bogus tales tales out there that I haven't heard .

 

[BobG_in_VA]

You can't break an engine in with synthetic , synthetic won't mix with dino, if you go with synthetic you can't go back to dino, synthetic causes oil leaks. I'm sure there are many other bogus tales tales out there that I haven't heard .

I didn't say you can't break an engine in with, syn...I just wouldn't. You may do as you please...BobG in VA

 

[kenmac]

Bob , I wasn't pointing a finger at any one. I was just stating what I have heard folkes say about synthetic fluids

 

[IH3444]

Lifted from another thread, in the Ferrari forum.....don't know if it's true or not, reads interesting.....

"A bit of information directly from a shell engineer. Note that at the end he states that the base stock in Rotella T 5w-40 synthetic (available at walmart for $14 a gallon) ,Shell Helix(Ferrari dealer $16 a quart), and Ferrari's formula 1 oil cocktail is the exact same thing minus different additives. Is the highly rated Rotella T synthetic 5w-40 another credible alternative to overpriced Helix? After all, the Rottela t does meet and far exceed all current testing standards (SL, Sj, etc) not to mention an incredible viscocity index of 178 degrees c (mobil 1 0-40 is 168 c).

"It is true that ROTELLA T Synthetic is Group III (not PAO) based, but you must keep in mind that not all Group III base oils are created equal. ROTELLA T Synthetic is made with Shell's XHVI base oil, which unlike other Group IIIs does not begin as distilled crude oil, hence of all Group III base oils, XHVI is truly the only one that can legitimately be called "synthetic." XHVI is a wax isomerate, meaning that it is made from the slack wax removed from distilled crude in normal solvent dewaxing. This slack wax is catalytically transformed (isomerized) and hydrofinished into a chemically pure base oil which rivals PAO in virtually every category. There are other "synthetic" oils out there based on Group III, but Shell's is unique in that it uses XHVI base oil. Chevron and Petro-Canada produce Group III base oils that come close to XHVI, but even though these oils are all hydroprocessed and utilize the same type of isomerization technology employed in the making of XHVI, they are not the same thing. Only XHVI is made from pure petroleum slack wax and its CAS number is 92026-09-4. The CAS number for the more typical all-hydroprocessed Group III base oils is 64742-54-7. If you want to know what your "synthetic" oil is made from, take a look at the MSDS and look for these numbers. (The CAS number for PAO is 68037-01-4).

In brief, don't be so quick to dismiss Rotella T Synthetic as just another "synthetic pretender." It's made with the same base oil as Shell's Helix Ultra, and everytime you see Ferrari win a Formula 1 race, that's the oil in the engine.""

 

[DieselPower]

Lifted from another thread, in the Ferrari forum.....don't know if it's true or not, reads interesting.....

"A bit of information directly from a shell engineer. Note that at the end he states that the base stock in Rotella T 5w-40 synthetic (available at walmart for $14 a gallon) ,Shell Helix(Ferrari dealer $16 a quart), and Ferrari's formula 1 oil cocktail is the exact same thing minus different additives. Is the highly rated Rotella T synthetic 5w-40 another credible alternative to overpriced Helix? After all, the Rottela t does meet and far exceed all current testing standards (SL, Sj, etc) not to mention an incredible viscocity index of 178 degrees c (mobil 1 0-40 is 168 c).

That would make them completely different oils then. The additive package in engine oil is as important if not more important than the oil base stock in modern oils. Change one additive in a oil and it is completely different with different operating characteristics, performance, and life expectancy. One of the main differences between a good oil and a superior oil is the additive package and the countless hours that go into designing that blend.