Finally somebody has stepped up to the plate and made an oil designed for flat tappet cam engines! I know there are racing oils and high end boutique type oils that work for flat tappet engines but this stuff will be on the shelves at your local auto parts store and cheaper then the high end stuff.



http://www.castrol.com/castrol/genericarticle.do?categoryId=82915470&contentId=7032644

I hope they offer it in something other than a 20w50....

I hope they offer it in something other than a 20w50....


Im not sure if they are or not but it doesnt matter to me because I run 20W-50 anyway.

What happens with low zinc oil and flat tappets like I have right now?

That's an odd oil.

The 20W50 weight leads me to believe it's a re-bottle of their "racing" oil, which always HAD and still HAS plenty of zinc in it, since it's not legal for street use. I'll bet it's their racing oil with the additive package "tweaked" for street use. Still, I see no API certification on it. And the only cars they claim it's legal for are "classic" and "vintage" vehicles up to 1973. This looks like some clever legal wording to sell their racing oil into a limited section of the "street" marketplace. In short, I'm betting there's nothing new under the sun with this oil, other than the bottle it comes in.

That's an odd oil.

The 20W50 weight leads me to believe it's a re-bottle of their "racing" oil, which always HAD and still HAS plenty of zinc in it, since it's not legal for street use. I'll bet it's their racing oil with the additive package "tweaked" for street use. Still, I see no API certification on it. And the only cars they claim it's legal for are "classic" and "vintage" vehicles up to 1973. This looks like some clever legal wording to sell their racing oil into a limited section of the "street" marketplace. In short, I'm betting there's nothing new under the sun with this oil, other than the bottle it comes in.


I bet you hit the nail on the head with that one.

I'm curious as to the synthetic vs dino oils with flat tappet cams argument with this oil.

Cant't tell if it is new or not. But I do have a jug of 20W-50W Syntech in the shed... it is several (like 6 or so) years old....
I guess we could do a comparison of the labels....

before I had an oil pressure gauge, (back when I had hair, bell bottoms and a new cassette stereo) I thought I needed 20-50 oil.
But when I idled in gear with a hot engine at 60 lbs of pressure, I figured I was losing a LOT of power.
a SBC only needs 10 psi per 1,000 rpm according to Smokey Yunick and others.
So a hot idling engine in gear at 30 psi would be plenty.
I found that 10-30 worked out well.
30-35 psi at hot idle, 60 at speed.
5-30 might have worked too.

According to the figure below, I wouldn't be able to use oil that thick in the winter.

http://www.aa1car.com/library/oil_chart.jpg

5w40 would be more like it.

From what I understand something like a 5W40 isn't very chemically sound and breaks down very quickly

Lowend, can you elaborate on that? I was told by numerous users to run Rotella's 5w40.

It is difficult to make a multigrade oil where the grades are very different. I have not heard of them being of lower quality, but if someone can post some references, I won't have trouble believing it.

That's an odd oil.

The 20W50 weight leads me to believe it's a re-bottle of their "racing" oil, which always HAD and still HAS plenty of zinc in it, since it's not legal for street use. I'll bet it's their racing oil with the additive package "tweaked" for street use. Still, I see no API certification on it. And the only cars they claim it's legal for are "classic" and "vintage" vehicles up to 1973. This looks like some clever legal wording to sell their racing oil into a limited section of the "street" marketplace. In short, I'm betting there's nothing new under the sun with this oil, other than the bottle it comes in.
I say you got it 100% right!!!

I cut and pasted some links to wide viscosity UOA's that were done with reasonably high OCI's. It seems they hold up pretty well, even to 14,000 mile OCI intervals.


http://theoildrop.server101.com/forums/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=972397&an=0&page=1#Post972397

http://theoildrop.server101.com/forums/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=956539&an=0&page=2#Post956539

http://theoildrop.server101.com/forums/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=964175&an=0&page=3#Post964175

http://theoildrop.server101.com/forums/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=254711&an=0&page=3#Post254711

I've been adding a third of a bottle or so of good old STP to the 70 for several years now, Edelbrock's Performer cam is holding up well with 1.6 ratio rockers and 1 1/2 inch springs at 100 lbs on seat.

Delo or Rotella 15w40 is still a good alternative for a strong additive package. Even the Delo LE 15w40 (new stuff) still has over 1200 ppm zinc and phos.

I have been using Delo 5w40 in my cars (not the flat tapped 76) for the past year or so. I haven't noticed any ill effects, but I haven't gone to the trouble to analyze it. I did get a noticeable increase in fuel economy, which was a surprise.

I wouldn't be concerned about a 5w40 synthetic, but I personally would not run it past 5000 miles or one year.

Even though most of the engines I've built the last 5-years have been mostly rollers the weight or viscosity is all wrong.

Also, please tell me if I'm missing something here but Syntec would not be a good oil for the break-in of a new engine.

I'll stick to Rotella or Delo when dealing with flat tappets...

We break in every engine with 20/50 on the dyno. If the add pack on the Castrol measures up, it would be an excellent oil for break in.

That's an odd oil.

The 20W50 weight leads me to believe it's a re-bottle of their "racing" oil, which always HAD and still HAS plenty of zinc in it, since it's not legal for street use. I'll bet it's their racing oil with the additive package "tweaked" for street use. Still, I see no API certification on it. And the only cars they claim it's legal for are "classic" and "vintage" vehicles up to 1973. This looks like some clever legal wording to sell their racing oil into a limited section of the "street" marketplace. In short, I'm betting there's nothing new under the sun with this oil, other than the bottle it comes in.

I see nothing wrong with just relabelling the racing oil... if it just makes the oil more readily available than single-purpose 'racing oil' is, then great!!