Not to be a mean spirited comment but this subject is constantly talked about. Zinc levels and all major wear additives in ALL oils (gas & diesel) are being reduced significantly and will be completely eliminated for envinronmental reasons. You guys are gonna have to get away from "Flat Tappet Cams" and start using Hydraulic Roller cams. These are stock replacement parts with no modifications required. You have none of these oil issues and will get considerably better performance. Synthetic oils are also rapidly replacing hydrocarbon based oils again, for the same reasons. If you talk to the major cam mfg's, they are also moving away from making "Flat Tappet Cams" because of the oil quality issues as their liability continues to be in question when the cams go flat. Again, not a mean spirited reply just trying to help move progress along... This aspect of "Traditional Hot Rodding" will also have to progress as Times are a Changin ! Happy motoring !!
MUSTANG6147 diesel EGR engines came out in late 2003. I have a 2004 EGR ***mins outside in the driveway
I don't think progress is the main subject here. It's gonna be kind of hard to find a hydraulic roller for a nailhead Buick, early Olds engine, Y block or ?????????. I think as long as old cars and race cars (no roller cams in NASCAR, right?) are around, there will be specialty oils like Brad Penn and Joe Gibbs to keep them going. Larry T
What they did before then was make oils with High Levels of Zinc & Phosphorus. But the manufacturers asked for and got lowered levels due to contamination of Catalytic Converters so the newer oils are not appropriate for older flat tappet motors. This is fact. And for all of you that RAVE about Brad Penn, You might want to read the new issue of Car Craft where they sent break in oils to an independent lab and Brad Penn came out with dangerously low levels to what is considered acceptable (around 1500 ppm), in fact it was barely above the standard for the NEW oils which is 800ppm. Just something to think about
Don brings up a very valid point. The key word here is " independant " lab testing. The manufacturers often find " friendly " testing labs or use thier own labs and publish the results which more often than not are misleading. I try to strive for no less than 2100-2300 PPM in my engines for break in of flat tappet cams. You can check your ZDDP additives and the manufacturer must have available a MSDS or Material Safety Data Sheet. Here the amounts will be listed, they have done the work for you, then its just simple math. TR
Lucky3 you prove a good point but im with Larryt counter point. For instence what will i do for my cadillac 365 who will make roller cams for these i dont believe they were ever made so some oil companies will have to keep up the work to supply us rodders. The way i see it as long as we the consumers demand the oils we need for our engines some one out there will produce it. Even if we couldn't go to the local parts house and buy it we might have to buy by the case online, but yet we would still have the oils we need. For this 350 im swaping im going to use the comps cams engine break in additive with non-detergent 30w oil for the first 1000 miles.
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