kubota oil I got is not cj-4 rated

[94BULLITT]

Gotcha.

Some guys are concerned about what has been taken out of the newer C_ diesel oils, esp. the ones that are dual (S_) rated. Some people are not happy about things like ZDDP being reduced/eliminated, and add it back to newer class oils if they can't access the old stuff - like PoorMansCat.

In theory, the newer certs should be backwards compatible. The catch is who loses if your old engine dies a premature death ? EPA - nope, Tractor Manuf - nope, State tax dept - nope, etc....... just the guy who is now minus an old engine.

Lots of debate in the oil forums like BITOG.... the new oil is not quite a bad as I originally thought, but the debates rage on, and the cost of betting wrong is non-trivial, at least to my bank account.

I don't remember the problem levels, but there is such a thing as too much ZDDP - you have to watch how much you are adding, if you are doing it manually.

Zinc dithiophosphate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Rgds, D.

I see your concern. You probably would be best off running oil that only met the older certifications then.

I know that valvoline makes VR1 "racing oil" for gas engines with high zinc still. Joe Gibbs and some other companies make it too. Maybe someday they will make it for diesels.

I just looked and the Vavoline VR1 meets CF. http://www.valvoline.com/pdf/vr1_racing.pdf

 

[3930dave]

I don't drive one, but a datapoint that's been nagging at me concerns VW (Jetta, Golf).

There's been cases of camshafts getting wiped out on post-emmisions (2007+) tdi motors. As VW has been building diesels "a while" now, and in volume, that is a little surprising.

I haven't heard the root cause of this problem. If you don't own a VW, it would be nice if it was just a bunch of bad cams..... what is nagging at me is whether or not it is a deficiency of the newer diesel oils.

Lots of variables.... VW owners (or for that matter, dealerships) may have been dumping in off-spec oil, as one possibilty.

Post 2007, oil specs have become a lot more complicated - OP's reminder is timely.

Rgds, D.

 

[The Fred]

I haven't heard the root cause of this problem. If you don't own a VW, it would be nice if it was just a bunch of bad cams..... what is nagging at me is whether or not it is a deficiency of the newer diesel oils.

Off topic but the ONLY VW engines that waste cams are the BRM series of engines from 2005-2007 and what happens is the lifter bucket or cam follower starts to wear thus taking out the camshaft. It is a well known fact that the BEW engine (exactly the same engine with a less aggressive camshaft profile) never has cam wear issues. I don't care what kind of oil you use or how often you change it at about 150,000 miles the cam will need replacing. I have changed many.
2008 up VW engines went to roller style cam followers stopping the cam wear issue for good.

http://www.myturbodiesel.com/images/misc/cam/cam16.jpg

I feel this is simply an engineering/metallurgy problem, extreme pressure.

Fred

 

[3930dave]

Off topic but the ONLY VW engines that waste cams are the BRM series of engines from 2005-2007 and what happens is the lifter bucket or cam follower starts to wear thus taking out the camshaft. It is a well known fact that the BEW engine (exactly the same engine with a less aggressive camshaft profile) never has cam wear issues. I don't care what kind of oil you use or how often you change it at about 150,000 miles the cam will need replacing. I have changed many.
2008 up VW engines went to roller style cam followers stopping the cam wear issue for good.

http://www.myturbodiesel.com/images/misc/cam/cam16.jpg

I feel this is simply an engineering/metallurgy problem, extreme pressure.

Fred

Thanks for the explanation, makes sense.

This is why guys with old school (non-roller follower) hot-rod motors are paranoid.

Does that time frame correlate with ZDDP levels dropping in oil ? I'm thinking yes, but I don't know the VW oil spec/history well.

Rgds, D.

 

[The Fred]

VW knew they had a problem because this is one of their only engines that utilizes cam bearing shells in the cylinder head; maybe there is a bunch more pressure over the nose of the cam profile. None of their other engines use cam bearings that I am aware of. VAG is pretty smart and spends many hours testing engines and engine oil.

Anyway no sense over-thinking engine oil. Too much ash pollutes DPFs and CATs thus the new designation. Just wait until one of you guys needs a new DPF on your tier4 rig that is off warranty; a new DPF/CAT for a VW TDI (09 and up) is well over $3500 bux. I can't imagine Kubota will give one away with their stupid high parts prices.

I tell people if they voted for clean air then be prepared to pay for it. New regulations mean big prices to repair. Ever see a DPF equipped truck in Mexico or the Carribean islands? NOPE. I see plenty of bias ply tires in Mexico still but not around here.

Fred

 

[PoorMansCat]

yes.. several years ago, automotive oils went thru the same changes... removing most of the high pressure additives. Shortly afterward, slipper type camshafts started failing. Some aftermarket camshaft manufacturers quit building slipper type cams all together, others had to go thru major metalurgy and manufacturing process changes to get their camshafts to live with the new oil formulas.
My little 5.9l Cummins is one of those with a slipper type camshaft, thats why I want to supplement the newer CJ rated oil. The EPA nor the oil manufacturer care whether my camshaft fails or not, its up to me to protect it.

 

[BGigHarbor]

I went back and traded my non cj-4 kubota oil. Interestingly, half the 2.5 gal jugs were marked cj-4 and half not. A mix of new and old labels according to the parts guy and all the same Kubota part.

A bit of a headache for him. But since I am already paranoid about possible costs for a new dpf down the road, I am going to be totally **** about running cj-4 rated oil.


Maybe I should start a new thread, but one thing I've searched in the truck forums for but haven't really found much of an answer is whether a synthetic oil would contribute less ash to the dpf.

For example, I know from experience that a good synthetic chainsaw mix oil burns much cleaner than the dino oil. Remarkably so even.

But since I read that the oil dilution in cars and trucks (fuel from the regen cycle) can top 10 percent, I will probably be changing my l5460 (dpf and turbo) oil more often that the kubota spec and thus make the extra expense of synthetic oil more painful. But if the dpf would last even a little longer on synthetic it would easily pay for itself.

Oil's really cheap compared to a new dpf. It would be interesting to get a quote on a new Kubota dpf from a dealer. Can't find any parts lists online with prices.

I did my first two oil changes with Kubota oil from the dealer just to keep as many variables constant as possible to set a baseline for my tractor, but will certainly go to another brand of oil at some point.

 

[3930dave]

I went back and traded my non cj-4 kubota oil. Interestingly, half the 2.5 gal jugs were marked cj-4 and half not. A mix of new and old labels according to the parts guy and all the same Kubota part.

A bit of a headache for him. But since I am already paranoid about possible costs for a new dpf down the road, I am going to be totally **** about running cj-4 rated oil.


Maybe I should start a new thread, but one thing I've searched in the truck forums for but haven't really found much of an answer is whether a synthetic oil would contribute less ash to the dpf.

For example, I know from experience that a good synthetic chainsaw mix oil burns much cleaner than the dino oil. Remarkably so even.

But since I read that the oil dilution in cars and trucks (fuel from the regen cycle) can top 10 percent, I will probably be changing my l5460 (dpf and turbo) oil more often that the kubota spec and thus make the extra expense of synthetic oil more painful. But if the dpf would last even a little longer on synthetic it would easily pay for itself.

Oil's really cheap compared to a new dpf. It would be interesting to get a quote on a new Kubota dpf from a dealer. Can't find any parts lists online with prices.

I did my first two oil changes with Kubota oil from the dealer just to keep as many variables constant as possible to set a baseline for my tractor, but will certainly go to another brand of oil at some point.

If your sump is not small, you may want to get oil analysis done to assess the fuel dilution level - a big enough sump can justify the cost of the testing to stretch the OCI.

I don't drive anything new enough to worry about this yet, so there is plenty I don't know about SAPS levels in oils.

It seems the Europeans are further down this road - some oil companies will offer Low, Mid, and High SAPS "Euro" oils. I think I've seen a table somewhere that defines the SAPS levels for Low/Mid/High, but don't recall at the moment where that is now....

You can try feeding your Kubota specs to tech support at the oil companies, they may have a product you could use, at least after the warranty is up.

If not already, check out BITOG (Bob is the oil guy.com) as a place to start and advance your research.

Rgds, D.