540 RAT

Check out this oil test that was done for an Austrailian car magazine, its quite an eye opener. See how your favorite oil compared.

http://www.animegame.com/cars/Oil%20Tests.pdf

Aardwolf

Interesting. The Royal Purple test was !

vettef6

Too bad we don't have Royal Purple in Germany, I would give it a try.

HDfixer

Wish that they would have tested Amsoil. It has beaten Royal Purple in every test that I have seen.

KeyWestJack

I have seen so many people here bash the stuff. What gives?

emo-vet

hi there guys,
in 2006 # 108 edition,march of " street Commodores " bye Express Publications ,they had a oil test done out of all the major synthetic oils (18) of them infact and out Shell helix, Penzoil,Titan,Motul,gulf western,mobil1,modil syn 1,penrite,Elf,red line,valvoline, e.c.t the royal purple 10w40 and royal purple racing 51 came out on top as far as ware and tare is concerned.
it had the least amount of piston scarring after the test !!!
the scar length was 1-1.5 mm,example mobil1 had a scar of 8 mm...
from what i have seen , the royal purple is not as bad as some of you make out to believe when i asked the questions about royal purple quite some months ago.
regards
shae

95wht6spd

Did you follow and read the link? It sounds like you are describing the exact test.

This is very interesting, I have heard good things about RP, until reading on the CF about it. It does very well in this test, but like the article mentions, there are other qualities of an oil, so it may not be the best overall for long term use, I don't know.

emo-vet

yep you are rite,its the same test!
it took too long to down load the test on my old sh8it computer,so i thought stuff it,im not waiting any longer.
so i went ahead and post up what i read some time ago.
regards
shae

engle1147

The purple may test better but I'll still use Mobile 1 10W30 full synthetic....works fine....and I've never had a problem.....I go about 6,000 to 7,000 miles between oil changes and change the oil filter only every other time......so I'll stick with what has worked for me on my '89 C4 for the last 237,000 miles.

comp

my Durablend is better than i though

Corn Flakes

Independant testing dont mean $hit to me. All the oil companys are going to bash on each other. They are all out for the same thing. Money. They could care less as long as they make you think there high priced oil is good. Use the brand your most comfortable with. Oil companys probably pay these guys to do the test to make there oil better than someone elses. I think they are all full of .

Red Tornado

cheap valvoline 5w-30 regular dino oil is what i've been buying for a couple years now.

540 RAT

Oil film strength is primarily determined by an oils additive package, that's why you see such a wide variation in film strength between different brands of oil, even with the same viscosity. Royal Purple's proprietary "Synerlec" extreme pressure additive, is likely the best on the market.

The oil wedge action that many of us think of regarding rod, mains, and cam bearings, takes place mostly in those areas. That is, areas where you a round shaft spinning in a concentric bearing with a reasonable clearance for oil to form that wedge to keep the parts seperated. And you only have that, once oil pressure is established, you DON'T have it on start-up. During start-up and in most other areas of the engine, you see oil shearing action (as was done in the test), not the wedge action. That's why the test WAS VALID for our engines.

Anyway, here is a summary of the test:

1. ROYAL PURPLE Racing Oil full syn 20W50 withstands 295,722 psi

2. ROYAL PURPLE Street Oil full syn 10W40 withstands 131,432psi

3.VALVOLINE DURABLEND semi-syn 10W40 withstands 23,858psi

4. PENNZOIL semi-syn 10W40 withstands 9,200psi

5/6. Tie RED LINE full syn 5W40 withstands 6,389psi

5/6. Tie MOBIL semi-syn 10W40 withstands 6,389psi

7. SHELL semi-syn 15W50 withstands 2,920psi

8. SHELL full syn 5W40 withstands 2,567psi

9. CASTROL full syn 0W40 withstands 2,011psi

10. MOBIL 1 full syn 0W40 withstands 1,540psi


Oil film strength is what protects an engine from wear and/or failure by preventing metal to metal contact.

You can see that cold viscosity alone didn’t really factor in all that much, because #2 was 10W40, while #7 was 15W50. You can also see that full syn vs semi-syn didn’t factor in much, because #1 and #10 were both full syn. So, looking at this chart, you just have to decide what you are willing to live with.

Mekanic

I would like to know when this was written..

95wht6spd

But what about long term use in an engine? I would think the synthetic would hold up better (not break down as much) over long term real use with heat, dirt, and friction. This test was with oil right out of the bottle, to play devils advocate, would they hold up the same over time? I would have liked to see them test each oil after they had been in a car for 3k, 5k, 10k miles. Would the results have been different? (think sprint vs marathon)

C66 Racing

Similar thread running over in the C3 section. TheoUK has some interesting thoughts on the validity of this test that are worth reading (his comments start at the top of page 2):
http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=1788112

mseven

I guess if you buy into the above results you better swap to 20-50...hell go straight 60 racing.
Regardless, I think results like that are scewed by using weights not intended for most street applications. Don't you think that a 40 weight of any sort is a bit much for most driving conditions/applications let alone on a fresh motor?

Kool88vette

Car mgazines will write good articles for their paid advertisers. After all the advertiser are supporting the magazines. Test results can and are manipulated all the time by so called independent labs. Some oil companies donate money to the labs or indirectly fund them and control them. The results usually mysteriously favor the the oil company funding the research. So you can't alway believe everything you read. I can't believe that Royal Purple is that much better that all the other synthetics. I think this test was really a good marketing plan. Not only does it bash Mobil One, it's biggest competitor, it also makes Royal Purple look like it will make your engine run like new for a million miles. I think it's good oil but, I also think something is fishy.

Matt383

RP.
Close Personal experience.
I am going to be a little vague here in the beginning just to protect some people from legal issues.

A good buddy races a Nationally known car seen in magazines etc all the time.
One of his sponsors last season was RP.
Got the stuff FREE due to sponorship.
Raced every weekend changed oil after every event using RP.
(USED another SYN before and I am not going down THAT comparison road either)

Last winter during engine tear down and rebuild an extraordinary amount of wear was observed on Cam, cylider walls, etc that was not ever observed in previous winter tear downs using the other oil.
The only difference was the change to RP.

Based on THAT alone I stay away from RP.
My two cents.
Flame suit on.

Matt383

rws.1

The "scar test" is a grease test....
you can't put grease in your engine... it won't flow...
That is why engine oils have different test methods...