Some thought on recent posts/calamities......

Figure out maintenance issues and discuss modifications
Post Reply
User avatar
TommyXP
Staff
Posts: 1279
Joined: Sun May 15, 2011 6:49 am
Location: Marine City, Michigan

Some thought on recent posts/calamities......

Post by TommyXP » Sun Sep 30, 2018 12:46 pm

In reference to the following 3:
"Sudden Death on the Expressway":
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=6560&p=15337#p15337

"Oil leak at weep hole":
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=6561&p=15332#p15332

"Burning oil, 0.15L per 300 miles, mpg unchanged":
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=6563&p=15329#p15329

Gonna ramble on here and try to express the thought of a vague Idea/notion, and not being a technical writer will be glaringly self-evident.....

I have the feeling that all the above are related to OIL more-so than mechanical failure. ~7 years ago when I obtained my first SH I did a lot of research (interesting term) concerning OIL and determined upon Rotella T-6 which I now even more adamantly highly, highly recommend.
Today I couldn't remember exactly what brought me to that choice/conclusion, and in 'light' of the above 3 mentioned cases I was inspired to re-research why I specifically chose that oil and I am going to hopefully condense and distill all the various info I presented my minds-eye to and which qualifies my 'feeling' regarding suspicion of oil-type in the 'possible' involvement of the 3 above posts.

First off T6 is relatively cost-effective for a full synthetic oil at ~+$20.00 a gallon.
Rotella T6 is marketed as it MUST as a DIESEL oil especially for 'fleet operations' (high use/mileage) BUT can be used in gasoline engines. The reason for this appears to be that back in 2010 the frigging car mfg'ers discovered that they could lower their emission values by removing MOST of the zinc (best lubricant) and phosphorus (detergent) from the engine oil. It also had less effect upon cheap catalytic converters and the 'down-line' sensors by doing so. Around 2010 the mfg'ers also (most) switched over to 'rollers' on their cams and had less need for zinc to lubricate the type of cam that we SH owners now possess.

Today's gasoline engine oils now have very little detergent and <300ppm of zinc (emissions!)........T-6 has 1200ppm of zinc + detergent. I am uncertain if all pure synthetics have these high contents of zinc and phosphorus as they are marketed for gasoline engines in today's market and probably MUST meet the 'new' guidelines demanded by the nefarious .gov in conjunction with their business partners......Using T6 in a car 'might' result in high emissions BUT that is of no concern to us SH owners....BTW, the Mazda Racing Team are huge, huge fans of T6! Google and Read 'em......

I postulate that even though "Sudden Death" was running "Supertech 10W30 Full Synthetic" ($16.00 for 5 quarts!), but I would be willing to bet that the zinc content is low, as it must be, to meet today's standard for "marketing" gasoline engine oil (again:emissions/sensors).......I don't know and getting into ALL the different oil specifications today is to much for me to include in an otherwise full platter of Idea's to research that are far more important than the 'things' of matter in this limited, finite dimension .
Close inspection of the cam, lifter and valve stem might indicate and verify my speculations (lack of zinc). Knowing he never checked his valve 'clearance', though seems to me, something would have given indication BEFORE this catastrophic failure.
Some technicians I noticed speculating that in the near future engine mfg'ers will be marketing their own specific oil 'formulation' to use in each of their own engines to beat/juggle various emissions standards!

As for "Oil Weep" above, and using "Honda oil HP-4" (a synthetic 'blend')....what caught my eye was his statement : "Just got done changing all the parts. Very dirty in there." I haven't been everywhere yet within, BUT everywhere I have been looks BETTER than new with T6......

As for "Burning Oil" above, who is losing oil in no obvious manner, he appears to be using the same oil as "Oil Weep" and I speculate that certain aspects of his oil are mysteriously disappearing through wear due to a lack of zinc.....

I took the Time to express these speculations merely as 'food-for-thought' and for the potential sake of members of this micro-Forum, as a result of mulling over these recent 'problems' while doing other things........As expected in important matters: do your own research.

Take what is worth keeping; and with a breath of kindness: blow the rest away.........
Freedom is not something you are given. Its something you take.

lazyguy
Member
Posts: 72
Joined: Tue Aug 13, 2013 3:15 am
Location: Lehigh Valley Pa.

Re: Some thought on recent posts/calamities......

Post by lazyguy » Tue Oct 02, 2018 9:04 am

I know a lot of people use Rottella T6 and I even have a left over quart on the shelf, Mobil Del-vac is another diesel oil thats used in motorcycles although not a synthetic I use that in my KLR-650. I'm not a big fan of synthetic oil as I believe it should be changed just as often as regular oil so it just costs more in my opinion.
I started using manufacturers oils with my first scooter seeing it was only a quart so cost wasn't an issue. You may have a point about zinc though. Hard to believe oils the cause but ya never know :?:

Post Reply