Apparently changes have been made to the formulation of engine oils as far back as 2006.

These changes are detrimental to the life of our engines. Rob Manderson brought this to our attention in the February edition of the Flying Lady. The following is a review of the status of engine oils by Keith Ansell of FPP, Inc.:

OIL IS KILLING OUR CARS!!!!!

Note that this article was published in November 2006 and is offered here to provide background to the problem of changing oil formulations. More recent information can be found in the follow-up article located at the Continued... link which is also located at the bottom of this article.

By: Keith Ansell, Foreign Parts Positively, Inc

About a year ago I read about the reduction of zinc dialkyl dithiophosphate ( ZDDP ) in the oils supplied with API approval that could affect sliding and high pressure ( EP ) friction in our cars. The reduction of these chemicals in sup-plied oils was based on the fact that phosphates reduce the effectiveness and eventually damage catalytic converters and introduce minute amounts of pollutants into our atmosphere.

A couple of months ago I had a member of the Columbia Gorge MG Club bring a totally failed camshaft and lifters back to me that had only 900 miles on them!! I immediately contacted the camshaft re-grinder ( Delta Cam ) and asked how this could happen. They were well aware of this problem as they were starting to have many failures of this type. In the past, the lack of a molybdenum disulfide camshaft assembly lubricant, at assembly, was about the only thing that could create this type of problem. My customer has assembled many engines and had lubricated the camshaft properly. Then the bad news came out: It's today's "modern" API ( American Petroleum Industry ) approved oils that are killing our engines: Meaning all flat tappet ( cam follower ) equipped engines, as used in all BMC products, all British Leyland products, most pushrod engines prior to 1980, early Volvos, American high-performance engines and many others.

Next call: To a major camshaft supplier, both stock and performance (Crane). They now have an additive for whatever oil you are using during break-in so that the camshaft and lifters won't fail in an unreasonably short period of time. They also suggest using a diesel rated oil on flat tappet engines.

Next call: To a racing oil manufacturer that we use for the race cars (Red Line Oil). Their response: "We are well aware of the problem and we still use the correct amounts of those additives in our products". They continued to tell me they are not producing API approved oils so they don't have to test and comply. Their oils were NOT the "new, improved and approved" ones that destroy flat tappet engines! "We just build the best lubricants possible". Sounds stupid, doesn't it, New-Approved but inferior products, but it seems to be true for our cars.

To top this off: our representative from a major supplier of performance and street engine parts ( EPWI ) stopped by to "warn us" of the problem of the NEW oils on flat tappet  engines. This was a call that the representative was making only because of this problem to warn their engine builders! "The reduction of the zinc, manganese and phosphates are causing very early destruction of cams and followers". They are recommending that, for now at least, there must be a proper oil additive put in the first oil used on new engines, beyond the liberal use of molydisulfide assembly lube. They have been told that the first oil needs the additive but remain sceptical that the first oil is all that is necessary. Their suggestion is to use diesel rated oils such as Delo or Rotella that are usually available at auto stores and gas stations.

This problem is BIG! American Engine Rebuilder's Association ( AERA ) Bulletin #TB2333 directly addresses this problem.  I had a short discussion with their engineer and he agreed with all that I had been finding.

Next phone call was to a retired engineer from Clevite, a major bearing and component manufacturer. The first surprise was that he restored older British Motor bikes. The second surprise was that he was "VERY" aware of this problem because many of the old bikes had rectangular tappets that couldn't rotate and are having a very large problem with the new oils. He has written an article for the British Bike community that verify all the "bad news" we have been finding.

Comp Cams put out "#225 Tech Bulletin: Flat Tappet Camshafts". They have both an assembly lube  and an oil additive. The telling sentence in the bulletin was "While this additive was originally developed specifically for break-in protection, subsequent testing has proven the durability benefits of its long term use. This special blend of additives promotes proper break-in and protects against premature cam and lifter failure by replacing some of the beneficial ingredients that the oil companies have been required to remove from the "off the shelf oil".

Next question: Now what do we do?

From the camshaft re-grinders (DeltaCam) "Use oils rated for diesel use", Delo ( Standard Oil product ) was named. About the same price as other quality petroleum based oils. They have the ZDDP we need in weights we are familiar with.

From one camshaft manufacturer ( Crane ): "use our additive" for the first 500 miles.

From General Motors ( Chevrolet ): add EOS, their oil fortifier, to your oil, it's only an 8-ounce can ( This problem seems to be something GM has known about for some time! ).  The additive says for break-in only, some dealers add it to every oil change.

From Redline Oil: Use our street formulated synthetics. They have what we need! Early in 2007 they will be supplying a "break-in oil" specifically for our cars.

From Castrol: We are beginning to see a pattern emerging on older cars. It may be advantageous to use a non-approved lubricant, such as oils that are Diesel rated, 4 Cycle Motorcycle oils and other specified diesel oils. They will be supplying "new oils" specifically for our cars in early 2007.

For you science buffs: ZDDP is a single polar molecule that is attracted to Iron based metals. The one polar end tends to "Stand" the molecule up on the metal surface that it is bonded to by heat and friction. This forms a sacrificial layer to protect the base metals of the cam and tappet from contacting each other. Only at very high pressures on a flat tappet cam is this necessary because the oil is squeezed or wiped from the surface. This high pressure is also present on the gudgeon pin ( wrist pin ) in diesel engines, therefore the need for ZDDP in all diesel engines.

The Second part of the equation is Molybdenum disulfide (Moly). The moly bonds to the zinc adding an additional, very slippery, sacrificial layer to the metal. I found out that too much of the moly will create problems; lack of this material reduces the effectiveness of the ZDDP. The percentage, by weight is from .01 to .02%, not much, but necessary according to the chemists.

Now there is no denying that there is a problem, lack of ZDDP ( Zinc-Dialkyl-Dithio-Phos-phate ) in modern oils kills at least our cams and tappets. There seems to be no known alter-native.

Our cars are a small percentage of the total market and BIG Corporate, the American Petroleum Institute and possibly government have made decisions that are detrimental to our cars. This problem isn't going away. The trend today is to lighter weight oils to decrease drag, which increases mileage. Most of these seem to be the "Energy Conservation" oils that we can-not use.

Redline oil and others are suggesting a 3,000 mile break-in for new engines! Proper seating of rings with today's lubricants is taking that long to properly seal. Shifting to  synthetics be-fore that time will just burn a lot of oil and not run as well as hoped.

The "Energy Conservation" trend was first led by automakers to increase mileage numbers and secondly because the ZDDP and other chemicals degrade the catalytic converter after extended miles, increasing pollution. Most of us don't have catalytic converters and the mileage gains are not that significant.

Many oil companies may have products that will continue to function well in our cars. Castrol, Redline, Valvoline, Mobil, Shell, Amsoil and others have now commented on my original article and are making suggestions. Some companies are offering short lists of "acceptable" oils, others just one. One comp-any has responded without any substantive information in a two page "bulletin". By their account all their oils are superior and applicable. This is typical of many companies.

Some oil manufacturers are pointing to metallurgy, blaming poorly built cams and followers. This may have some validity but the bottom line is that there has been a big increase in failures with products that have been on the market for many years but are now having greatly in-creased failures. To me the bottom line is, if the lubricants are working there is no contact between surfaces, it shouldn't matter what the materials used in the products are, within reason.

On "modern" production cars, stay with the manufacturers' suggestions. For any car produced before about 1990 the owner needs to be aware that the factory suggested lubricant may have changed and may not be applicable. Flat tappet, stock, performance or modified may be affected. MGBs from 1975 to 1980 must choose to sacrifice the cam or the catalytic converter as an example of how difficult the decisions are becoming!

Yes, there is more! Castrol does understand our dilemma and is actively looking into what it can do to support our cars. We can soon expect to see products from them with specific application to classic cars. Red Line will be offering”break-in" oil soon after the first of the year. Shell's Rotella will be good until about June or July of 2007 with possibly nothing after that date. Delo ( Chevron ) will also be questionable after the new "CJ-4" standards come in the middle of 2007.

Now the important information, here are Oils that may be correct for our cars today:

(As reported by manufacturers by 2-18-07, NOTE: many have changed their recommendations over the last three months! )

 Castrol Syntec "Classic" 20W-50

( available after April, 2007 )

TWS Motorsport: 10W-60*

BMW:       Long Life 5W-30*

Red Line:  10W-30, 10W-40

( Synthetic oils )

Valvoline: VR-1 20W-50

( Conventional oil )

Amsoil:      20W-50 ( TRO ),

10W-40 ( AMO ),

15W-40 ( AME ) &

20W-50 ( ARO )

Mobil:        Mobil 1 5W-30

20W-50 ( Synthetic )

Chevron:   Delo 400

Shell:         Rotella

* full synthetic, available only at BMW dealerships

What we are doing at Foreign Parts Positively has been difficult to determine but with few options left, the following is what we are forced to do. Some of our choices have been based on the manufacturer's willingness to help and specific reports. This list will change in the next months with Castrol and Red Line adding products just for our cars.

• Break-in uses Delo 400 30W ( a break-in oil will be available from Redline soon! ) or Castrol HD-30 if it was produced before July 2006. We have some old stock of Castrol HD-30.
• Conventional oil is Valvoline VR-1 20W-50 or Castrol GTX-20w-50 if it was  produced before July 2006. We have some old stock.
• Synthetic oil is Red Line 10W-30 in newer engines or 10W-40 in older en-gines.
• Break-in is now 3,000 miles before changeover to running oil.
• 1-year or 18,000 mile oil change interval with Red Line synthetic
• 1-year or 2,500 mile oil change interval with conventional oil ( Valvoline VR-1 20W-50 ).

Thank you to Castrol, Redline, Christiansen Oil, Valvoline, Mobil, Shell, Standard Oil and Amsoil for input. We're sure this subject will continue: Please forward any new information on this subject that you may encounter.

We have received some very interesting ma-terial from "Mr Moly" that may be putting molybdenum disulfide ( MoS ) into this discussion. It seems that ZDDP plus MoS is the best from the oil companies' opinion but MoS by itself may be beneficial. Some racers swear by it. The literature seems to support "Mr. Moly's" position.

Update February 2008

Oil is killing our Cars, Continued...

"If you're currently putting mileage on your classic vehicle and using the latest API grade SM oil, you are almost certainly doing irreversible damage to your engine."

- William C. Anderson

‘New Oils and Old Cars'

Old Cars Weekly 48

In November 2006, I published the first of the "Oil is Killing Our Cars" articles and virtually all major engine builders and camshaft manufacturers are now admitting that we were right in condemning the new oils. These oils were causing at least 75% of cam failures ( American Engine Rebuilder's Association, pg. 8, Jan-Mar 2008 )!! Now with everyone admitting the problem, solutions are surfacing.

What is this all about? In the middle 1970's catalytic converters ( cats ) became mandatory on most cars. By the middle of the 1980's it was noted that cats had a limited lifetime. With the addition of computer controlled fuel delivery, oxygen sensors were introduced into the ex-haust system. Soon after this it was noted that one of the Extreme Pressure ( EP ) components of oil, ZDDP ( Zink-Dialkyl-Dithio-Phosphate ), caused deterioration of the oxygen sensors and cats. The auto manufacturers started to re-design engines so that they didn't need much of this additive and by 2005 all major oil manufacturers started to reduce ZDDP in their oils with the goal of meeting at least "SM", GF-4 classification. Most engines designed before 1980 were with flat tappet construction and were designed around and had to have ZDDP. As these "old" engines today use only a small percentage of the total lubrication oil consumed, the removal of ZDDP did not affect the majority of the oil market. Of the 500 million registered cars in the U.S. only 10 million are older than 1988 (2%).  Most well known companies therefore choose not to help people who own older cars, especially those with flat tappets. Those that are acknowledging our needs are limiting what is available and even what they offer may not be sufficient. The bottom line here is that if you are not using a lubricating oil with at least the necessary amount of ZDDP your car was designed to use ( flat tappet design or high performance hot rod ) you are damaging your engine.

Here's the number we need: Around 1,600 ppm. with 2,000 ppm being about the highest concentration of ZDDP ( Zink-Dialkyl-Dithio-Phosphate ), a minimum of around 1,300 ppm. Most of today's oils have reduced this chemical to near 650 ( 400 to 800 ) ppm and in most cases it seems their goal is to reduce it further! Another point: Zinc and/or Phosphate do not equate to protecting our engines. ZDDP is thecompound that protects our engines. Don't accept oils or additives that claim to have what we need if they give just zinc and/or phosphate numbers.

Differing ZDDP compounds have different temperature tolerance,  read the manufacturer's literature!

There seem to be only two major North American oil companies currently producing products for us and they are Castrol ( Syntec 20W-50 in the black bottle with "Recom-mended for Classic Cars" on the back ) and Valvoline ( VR-1 20W-50 ), both are about 1200 ppm or just at the minimum ZDDP. Joe Gibbs Racing Oil is now producing street oils that seem good for our engines and distribution of this product is just starting in North America ( 1600 ppm ).

Red Line Oil, a smaller manufacturer on the West Coast, is available at many racing shops, with 10W-40. Eastern States seem to be able to find Brad Penn Oil, Swepco and Hi-Z. Penrite Oil in Australia. Other small companies are starting to notice our problem and are bringing out new products.

Now comes The News! Two companies are now producing ZDDP additives that can be added to any oil! Rather than try to find oils that might protect our cars, you can now add a pre-scribed amount of ZDDP to your oil of choice. The more concentrated the additive the better. Be aware that the larger the dose of additive required to reach 1,600 ppm, the "carrier" in the additive will dilute your oil and reduce the oil's designed lubrication abilities.

First to come to market was a product called "ZddPlus". Kirban Performance, the manufacturer, has a web site www.ZddPlus.com that expands on what we have been learning over the last year and their approach to solving our problem. They are seemingly careful not to suggest any brand of oil and claim their product should be compatible with any company's products. There is no new information on this website but it answers many questions. They market directly on-line or through dealers. It comes in a 4 ounce bottle that is recommended to be added to 4 or 5 quarts of oil.

The second product is "Cam-Shield". A person that has been in the lubrication business for many years has developed this product and is a very experienced lubrication formulator for some of the largest racing programs from road racing to off-road. This product is very concentrated so it does not dilute your base oil. It comes in a bottle that has a built-in measuring device so that you can accurately dispense the product based on how much oil and what you need to add. This company markets through lo-cal dealers and on-line www.Cam-Shield.com. This company also does not suggest any single brand of oil. It comes in either 4 or 8 ounce bottles with a measuring device.

Of these two additives, "Cam-Shield" is the most concentrated, has two types of ZDDP for complete coverage, comes in a bottle that makes it easy to administer the correct dosage and is lower in cost per treatment.

Other products that contain ZDDP are EOS, Torco, Crane, CompCam and STP. These are not specifically formulated for our cars and have limited use. Some are specifically to be used only during break-in. There may be others.

So we have a final answer! We can now know, by adding the ZDDP that was mandated out of most oil, that we are not internally wearing away our engines at an accelerated rate by restoring the ZDDP that our engines were designed around.

I want to acknowledge and thank the companies, large and small, and the individual people who have written and called me with input on this subject from all over the world. Many were aware of this problem even before my first article was published. All these inputs are used and are appreciated.

 Keith M. Ansell

Foreign Parts Positively, Inc.

www.ForeignPartsPositively.com

19900 NE 189^th Street,

Brush Prairie, Washington 98606

What Oils are Best for Our Cars?

What oil to use with the additive I don’t think is a question that has a definitive answer. Most quality oils are similar enough that there are not great differences in the oils. I’ll share what I have learned, especially over the last years. By going into any auto supply store you can see, by the fact that there are many different brands and types of oils, that there isn’t one answer.

Synthetic, blend, or dinosaur juice? It seems that the quality of all major brand lubricants may well exceed anything most enthusiasts may need. Synthetics are the best; many people, including some manufacturers, will admit that conventional oils are adequate in most applications.

If your car’s owner’s manual recommends a single weight oil and/or non-detergent, what should you do? Great improvements in oil since your car was manufactured make those old recommendations no longer valid. One exception: If you have been running a non-detergent oil it might be advisable to stay with what you have been using until a new engine is built.

Engine manufacturers realized in the early 1970’s that the new multi-grade oils were superior and completely dropped recommending single grade oils. I recommend using the grade of oil recommended during the last production dates of your engine type if it includes a multi-grade. Lighter weight oils get more horsepower to the wheels and if properly used can increase engine life. The rule we use is that the oil pressure should be 10 Psi for each 1,000 Rpm of redline. i.e.: If the redline of your engine is 6,000 Rpm you should have 60 Psi, 50 Psi with a redline of 5,000, etc. If these numbers cannot be reached using a 20W-50 it probably is time for a new set of bearings.

If anything changes in the future I’ll put out new data. Now with the new additives and some new oils we have products that will keep our engines purring like they were designed to do! Just remember to have ZD-DP at or above 1,600 ppm for flat tappet engines!

Keith M. Ansell

Foreign Parts Positively, Inc.

www.ForeignPartsPositively.com

19900 NE 189^th Street

Brush Prairie, Washington 98606

360-882-3596