I tend to agree. Stick to the recommended oils and you will be fine. I have read bad things about Royal Purple, so I avoid that brand, but Redline, Pennzoil Plat, Mobil 1. All good stuff. I ran Pennzoil Plat in my '09. Now I am using M1 0w-40 Euro. I saw lots of positive remarks and good UOAs for this oil.

1. Anything entitled "x aint y" is as likely to as scientifically grounded and rigorous as a cake recipe.

2. The bearing wear tests they use reveal little about internal engine component wear. Slap some heavy bearing grease on those things and they will survive the tests longer -- your engine, not so much.

3. Multiple independent UOA's on the same (or highly similar) engine, run under the same or highly similar conditions will give you better data on their performance characteristics.

4. At the end of the day, notwithstanding "snake oils" like Slick 50 (which makes use of small particles that have been found to actually accelerate engine wear...), most ASE oils will provide about equal protection, with variance mainly cropping up in regard to high power, long term application -- as in endurance racing, not daily driving, or in data on whether engines hold together for 200 K miles vs, say, 400 K miles, and also data on recommended OCI's, which large scale studies by the state of CA for fleet vehicles has shown to be about double what is typically recommended (the ol' 3500 mile rule-of-thumb) when synthetic over dino oil is used.

5. Do not make decisions on the veracity of claims on faith if they can be meaningfully and logically empirically investigated -- save that kind of speculation for whether or not to leave out cookies for Santa Claus -- make them based on your best assessment of the logic of the testing and merits of the gathered and analyzed data. These methods and data are not relevant to selecting engine oil -- period.

When you change your oil, send your used redline oil to blackstone for analysis. Change it to Mobil 1, then when you change again (after similar mileage/use pattern), send that oil to blackstone for analysis. Change to Royal purple, rinse, repeat.

:iagree:

Oil for all intents and purposes...Oil is oil. Don't listen to marketing listen to engineering. Marketing is gonna throw all these different numbers on wear stats at you for the sole purpose of confusion. Then 100k miles later you realize oh my engine is still running and I've been spending 80 bucks per oil change meanwhile the guy using mobile 1 ep down the road spending 30 bucks a change. His car is still running too. Wtf.

I'd never buy "Thrifty" oil for my car. I wouldn't when I was in high school and it said 30W right on it just like Castrol. Oil may be oil but I paid 4 times more for the name brand.

PYB x 3750-ish

:tup:

Why not? Have you ever herad of a petroleum company called "Thrifty Oil"? Probably not because "Thrifty" oil is bottled by Mobil or Shell or other ?????? and just put Thrifty's name on the bottle.

Mobil Oil refinery order desk:

"Hey, Jack! That batch of 500,000 quarts of oil, run 400,000 into our bottles and 100,000 into the Thifty's."

I buy whatever's on sale. Never had an engine failure yet due to an "inferior" oil in 40+ years of owning/maintaining vehicles.

No short cuts on the oil and oil changes....Think how much you Love your Z......

Lol, I love (saving) my money more. But hey, it's your $.

I just do not trust it. It is the or other ?????? that concerns me. A complete unknown. I assume then in 40 years you have used quite a bit of Thrifty oil as it is the cheapest, and no problems. Or what is cheaper than Thrifty if I might ask?

As long as you are using a good-quality oil/filter and change often, the differences are negligible for a DD. Some may be slightly better than others but even the "lesser" ones are more than good enough. I still like to put "the good stuff" in my car, but I don't get obsessive about it.

I run Mobil 1 Full Synthetic with a 1/2 quart of Lucas Oil oil stabilizer into my DD, non-tracked Z with 40K+ miles. I know the flaming is bound to start because I'm putting "snake oil" into my precious Z but I have a reason for it. :stirthepot:

Many moons ago I had a 1984 Honda Accord 4 door with 130K miles on it and I was running the full dose of Lucas Oil stabilizer which did in fact keep the small amount of smoke it was puffing at bay. Without my knowledge my oil plug fell off or was taken off sometime between my weekly oil level checks. I checked my oil level and it didn't even wet the dip stick. I looked under the car and saw that the drain plug was gone. The engine temperature never increased, the engine purred quietly the whole time and there weren't any oil puddles on my driveway. I continued to use Lucas Oil until about 225K miles when I gave the car away to a relative. I was running the cheapest oil on earth at the time since I was only in high school so I have to attribute the miraculous survival and longevity of the car to the Lucas Oil stabilizer.

:tup:

Andy Granatelli (STP) was one of the greatest hucksters of all time, and set the stage for many subsequent generations of oil-related hucksterism.

Are the 24 bottles of Slick 50 I purchased a waste? Is that what you are saying? Well? Are they????

:icon17:

Nah, it wasn't the oil stabilizer, it was just an old Honda. Those things never broke.

I'd keep them. They would likely work very well in your car that runs on water.

I like the way you think. :tup:

When I was younger and had less money, I used thrifty oils. Never had a problem. Now that I am older and wiser ;) I use name brands but I don't just stick to one brand. I buy the one on sale and use synthetic oil primarily because the oil change interval is far greater than dino oils.

If you pay attention to the results of "what's the best oil", you will note that there is no definitive best oil. That's because "oil is oil" as someone noted. They all lubricate and remove heat. Now if you want to race your car, you may want to put in a 'racing' oil but they only last for a few hundred miles because that's how they are formulated. For DD like most mortals in here, any oil, dino or sythetic, will give you many, many miles of motoring as long as you change it regularly. Me? I change mine once a year regardless of mileage. Synthetic oil doesn't need to be changed every 3750 miles and/or 6 months. It will go triple the distance of dino oil without issue. And if your oil turns dark, it's most likely a result of repeated heat cycling and not a bunch of 'dirt'. We have filters to protect the engine from dirt particles that are big enough to actually do damage to the engine. So, my advice? Take oil threads with a grain of salt. Use oil and change intervals recommended in your OM for the type of driving you do. Don't overthink oil!

:iagree:

If you stay away from the crappy oils and change your oil/filter often, the worst-of-the-good will only knock a few thousand miles off the life of your DD engine (150K?) - if that much. As pointed out, racing/tracking is another story.

:iagree:

I use Amsoil Signature series in mine. Main reason, I can get it at dealer cost (brother has an Amsoil Dealer's License, and there is a distributor right here in Orlando). I do pay more for it than say Mobil 1, but I tend to do that on my cars. Merely a personal choice, I'm not going to stand on some soap box and declare that my oil is superior to others.

walmart special on the 5 quart mobil one XP i use 12.5 quarts so i need something a little cheaper.

I run motul 5w30. Change it every 6 month or 3,500 which ever comes first. and an nismo oil filter

I just use whatever is the cheapest Brand Name 0W20 on the market and change it every 10,000 miles.

Anyone hear anything on Quaker State synth? That's what I am currently using, no issues so far

:tup:

Check the "oil nerd" thread -- I seem to recall there being some UOA's on the Quaker State synthetic...

I will say this much: After pouring over numerous UOA's for the 370 and 350 motors, and also sending my own samples to Blackstone for analysis, across users' UOA's Redline has performed really, really well, and surprisingly, showed better wear characteristics than typical favorites like Mobil 1.

So, FWIW, I've been sticking to Redline.

I like Redline.