Follower scar oil tests (2018)

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SteveA said:
Motul looks like the best option in France.

The 300V Le Mans 20W60 looks like my best performance option so far, and is readily available via Amazon if pricey at around 17€ litre.

Since I use 3.25 litres and change after 2 meetings, and use a fair amount of top up to replace what I get in my catch tanks (maybe 200ml per 20 minute track session or a litre per race meeting) so I need about 20 litres for a full season with one bike!

So I have hopes that the less expensive 7100 20w50 V twin oil is good too, at around 12€ litre.

I live in the sticks so local suppliers are tricky to find.

And this isn't really a sport for pensioners!
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Steve, you don’t race in cold weather, you ‘only’ race the bike (no 4000 mile trips across deserts), I assume you warm it up before red lining it, you change the oil every 2 meetings...

Based on your use and Jim’s results, why not use Castrol R?
 
I have got Mobil 1 v-twin for around 8 bucks on sale at NAPA and at Rileys auto parts.

Of course now Mobil 1 has super-syn 20-50 v-twin oil available for 33 bucks a qt. It will probably replace the present v-twin oil sooner or later.
 
Fast Eddie said:
Steve, you don’t race in cold weather, you ‘only’ race the bike (no 4000 mile trips across deserts), I assume you warm it up before red lining it, you change the oil every 2 meetings...

Based on your use and Jim’s results, why not use Castrol R?
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Because I used it in my first race season with the first incarnation of this bike and ran the big ends....Rode a borrowed Kawasaki Z1000 in March at Castle Combe in the early '80s, when the thing finally fired up it dumped a sump full of Castrol R40 all over the rear slick!

Whatever it smells like, rational or not, I hate the stuff with a passion! And OIF, I might never get the stuff out of it!

And in the '70s a good cooking straight 40 or a 20w50 was all you needed for lubrication! After the R40 I never had oil related issues!

VMA rounds in March are in the south, so yes I should manage to avoid snow! In the UK I pretty much gave up racing before May! But VMA races are up to 25 minutes, which knackers me and generates a lot of heat in the oil and burns my delicate parts....OIF remember!.

Race meetings are normally set up these days to keep you waiting far too long to access the track, such that I have no fear the oil is warm enough. And I almost never let rpm drop below 2000....

Maybe with the right oil I could change after 3 meetings?
 
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Fairy Nuff Steve!

Ref you other point, IMHO you should definitely be able to use a good synthetic for more than 2 meetings...
 
it consis
comnoz said:
Yeah, It made a big difference in the Mobil 1 V-Twin test but no difference in the Royal Purple XPR test.
The Mobil 1 now consistently beats the Royal Purple now that I am running the tests at a controlled temperature.

It just depends on how far down I had pushed the baffle. At least I only used the baffle for a few of the tests and then I found a better way of controlling the mist.
But I still have more tests to re-check.
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Mobil One consistently beats Royal Purple in pressure, temperature, or both?
 
ewgoforth said:
it consis

Mobil One consistently beats Royal Purple in pressure, temperature, or both?
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If the temperature is kept between 220 and 230 which is easy to do with my tester with either of these oils then the Mobil 1 beats the Royal purple in follower pressure at failure.

But the Royal Purple creates less friction and heat than the Mobil 1
 
Well it looks like I am going to be having crow for dinner this evening.

I picked up a bottle of 15W50 Mobil 1 car oil today and spent a good part of the afternoon testing and comparing it to 20W50 V-Twin oil.

All I can say is, this is not the Mobil 1 15W50 oil I tested and tried to use 20 years ago that left me with such a bad taste.

At controlled 220 degrees of oil temp the results of the two oils were almost identical. Well within the margin of error.

When I turned the oil temp down to 180 degrees the v-twin oil held 272 lbs. of follower pressure vs 241 lbs for the car oil. Likely a result of the higher viscosity at lower temp of the V-Twin oil.

But when I turned the oil temp up to 320 degrees the 15W50 held 103 lbs where the 20W50 V-Twin oil would only hold 75 lbs.

In comparison the highest performing MPT oil held 106 lbs. at 320 degrees controlled oil temp.

These results came from multiple runs at each temp for each oil.

So yes, I would say the 15W50 SN rated Mobil 1 is suitable for use in a Norton.

EDIT

A little further looking. The 15W50 car oil I tested is the new Supersyn Advanced Fomula oil. It was the only Mobil 1 15w50 oil they had at the local parts store. It cost 18 dollars and change.
 
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Jim, would you expect the Redline 20W50 Motorcycle Oil to perform about the same as the 20W60 you tested?

Would you expect the formulations of these products to be relatively stable over the years, or will we need to set up a fund to finance re-testing every so often?

I really am enjoying actual data (with graphs!) you're providing to make a decision by. What a refreshing fact based approach to understanding and action.

Thanks! David
 
Fast Eddie said:
Steve, you don’t race in cold weather, you ‘only’ race the bike (no 4000 mile trips across deserts), I assume you warm it up before red lining it, you change the oil every 2 meetings...

Based on your use and Jim’s results, why not use Castrol R?
Click to expand...

SteveA said:
Because I used it in my first race season with the first incarnation of this bike and ran the big ends....Rode a borrowed Kawasaki Z1000 in March at Castle Combe in the early '80s, when the thing finally fired up it dumped a sump full of Castrol R40 all over the rear slick!

Whatever it smells like, rational or not, I hate the stuff with a passion! And OIF, I might never get the stuff out of it!

And in the '70s a good cooking straight 40 or a 20w50 was all you needed for lubrication! After the R40 I never had oil related issues!

VMA rounds in March are in the south, so yes I should manage to avoid snow! In the UK I pretty much gave up racing before May! But VMA races are up to 25 minutes, which knackers me and generates a lot of heat in the oil and burns my delicate parts....OIF remember!.

Race meetings are normally set up these days to keep you waiting far too long to access the track, such that I have no fear the oil is warm enough. And I almost never let rpm drop below 2000....

Maybe with the right oil I could change after 3 meetings?
Click to expand...
Castrol R - the oil we love and hate. Castrol R is undoubtedly a tremendous lubricant (confirmed yet again here in Comnoz’ oil scar test), while simultaneously being a royal PITA in terms of smell, tackiness, gum, gel and the other attendant shortcomings. The product easily oxidizes and forms gum, and unless you’ve dealt with it firsthand it is difficult to put into words how challenging it is to remove from internal engine parts. After some hard thrashing in an engine, typical non-polar part cleaning solvents (think Stoddard solvent) will not solvate it so a more polar solvent (acetone, MEK, lacquer thinner) is required to clean it from parts and even then it seems to have a stickiness that is tough to get rid of. And of course it is no treat working with large volumes of such solvents even when outdoors.

Castrol R40 is also incompatible with mineral oils. Note the label warning on a bottle of R40 regarding blending with mineral oil.

Follower scar oil tests (2018)


The image below shows a small vial with R40 and Mobil 1 V-twin oil present in approximately equal volumes. The left picture is after R40 had been added to the vial containing Mobil 1, where due to being higher density poured right through the Mobil 1 and ended up as the bottom layer without any mixing. The middle image shows the vial after agitation to facilitate mixing of the 2 oils which resulted in formation of a turbid incompatible mixture. The right most image shows the same vial after resting for ~ 30 minutes where small droplets of R40 are forming in the lower part of the vial as R40 phase separates from Mobil 1. So clearly the bean and mineral oils don't like each other.

Follower scar oil tests (2018)


Regarding Steve’s comment about oil in frame (OIF), once you put R40 in that system, it may never come clean again without some extraordinary cleaning effort.
 
napanorton said:
Jim, would you expect the Redline 20W50 Motorcycle Oil to perform about the same as the 20W60 you tested?

Would you expect the formulations of these products to be relatively stable over the years, or will we need to set up a fund to finance re-testing every so often?

I really am enjoying actual data (with graphs!) you're providing to make a decision by. What a refreshing fact based approach to understanding and action.

Thanks! David
Click to expand...

The 20w50 and 20w60 are probably similar.

I would like to try the Red line Race oils. They would hopefully be a step up.

And I would expect the oils that are not API labeled to be pretty stable [for better or worse?] but the API stuff gets updated regularly. [for better or worse]
 
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comnoz said:
Well it looks like I am going to be having crow for dinner this evening.

I picked up a bottle of 15W50 Mobil 1 car oil today and spent a good part of the afternoon testing and comparing it to 20W50 V-Twin oil.

All I can say is, this is not the Mobil 1 15W50 oil I tested and tried to use 20 years ago that left me with such a bad taste.

At controlled 220 degrees of oil temp the results of the two oils were almost identical. Well within the margin of error.

When I turned the oil temp down to 180 degrees the v-twin oil held 272 lbs. of follower pressure vs 241 lbs for the car oil. Likely a result of the higher viscosity at lower temp of the V-Twin oil.

But when I turned the oil temp up to 320 degrees the 15W50 held 103 lbs where the 20W50 V-Twin oil would only hold 75 lbs.

In comparison the highest performing MPT oil held 106 lbs. at 320 degrees controlled oil temp.

These results came from multiple runs at each temp for each oil.

So yes, I would say the 15W50 SN rated Mobil 1 is suitable for use in a Norton.
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Blimey Jim... the plot thickens...!
 
I know this is a Norton forum but could you also give a recommendation for air cooled bikes that share engine and primary oil. I have a 750 Bonneville and a Trident.
 
comnoz said:
The 20w50 and 20w60 are probably similar.

I would like to try the Red line Race oils. They would hopefully be a step up.
Click to expand...

Jim Red Line is to date the one most likely to shake my monograde habit , but yesterday had an interesting conversation with a man who used to build Merlin Engines . RR used to use stuff called AV40. The witches brew of yesteryear may not be what is used by the WW11 warbird fans in the US but there are a lot of them and it might be interesting to find out what oil they use and see how it compares
 
Might use Aero shell. It is recommended oil by Lycoming and Continental for their air-cooled, flat tappet, piston engines... ;)
 
I got an answer back from Mobil oil [quick]

Their 15W-50 car oil has 1200 zinc and 1300 phosphorus.

They said the 800 ppm cap on zinc and phosphorus for SN rated oils does not apply to high performance oils [or diesel oils.]
 
Interesting that the Mobil 1 with zinc and phosphorus at those levels had much higher film strength than Redline which carries nearly twice as much zddp as I recall. (2200?)
It has been stated that there is an optimum level for ZDDP and it is around that 1200 ppm mark.
Not sure of the science behind that.

The Mobil 1 15-50 at $20 a gallon gives a low cost option for people who change oil frequently and put on a lot of miles.

Glen
 
htown16 said:
I know this is a Norton forum but could you also give a recommendation for air cooled bikes that share engine and primary oil. I have a 750 Bonneville and a Trident.
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Mobil One Vtwin formula is supposed to be wet clutch safe.
 
DevonNorton said:
Jim

Yes Motul 20W60 300V Le Mans is readily available in the UK and as they are a French company should be okay in most of Europe.
UK supplier for example https://www.opieoils.co.uk/p-866-mo...60-ester-synthetic-racing-car-engine-oil.aspx

Also Torco TR1 20W50 Premium Blend is available in the UK.
Example UK supplier https://www.nimbusmotorsport.com/products/view-product/torco-tr-1r-premium-blend-racing-oil/

Donation made towards this excellent project.

Andy
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The local Ducati shop where I buy my filters and Amsoil vtwin oil sells Motul 300v 20w50 not 20w 60. I wonder how different they are. Sounds like I'll probably switch to Mobil One 15w50 since my bike sits around a lot more since I have kids. I want to use something I'm willing to dump out if the bike wet sumps. I tried draining into a clean drain pan a couple times, but I worry about the oil picking up dirt when I do this.
 
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