Maybe OT Type of oil

I use Rotella 15/40 HD engine oil in my one ton Dodge diesel that I use to haul my tractors with. The cost of Rotella is higher then other brands and I have been told other brands are just as good, like Napa for example. I tried Napa and had a slight top end chatter and had to add between oil change, never had this with Rotella. I only tried other oil the one time. I change oil, oil filter, and fuel fiter every 5,000 miles. I was wondering what oil others use.

I used Rotella 15w40 when I got my 01 Dodge new. Always before I'd used Quaker State HDX in straight 30. It seemed that Rotella was 'the brand' to use so I changed all my engines over to it. In 2004 I went back into a Case engine that I'd been in the year before (bent pushrod.... something about ether... but thats another story). Less than 200 hours on a complete out of frame overhaul and there were already deposits under the valve cover that I didnt like. Looked like a Valvoline engine from the 70's. So........ I talked to my fuel supplier who is also a full line oil distributor. What he told me was Shell spends a lot of money on a lot of advertising that some other companies dont. If you've got money going out you have to cut something somewhere and his statement was Rotella just meets the specs, no more, no less.

I told him my complaint and what he recommended to me was to go with either Chevron or Exxon. Since he's an Exxon dealer it was a little cheaper. Later on Exxon and Mobile merged and the discontinued the the Exxon labelling. Added a fancy little spout to the Mobile and raised the price almost a buck a gallon (but still a buck cheaper than Rotella).

Last fall I was looking at oil and he recommended I at least consider Conoco. I've used their hydraulic fluids for years and had good service. Seems that most of the fleets around here that he supplies had changed to it. By the gallon it was within pennies of the other stuff but by the barrel, WOW. Under $300 a barrel for 55 gallons. Rotella was $450, most of the others right around $375-$400 a barrel. In a normal year I use right at barrel of engine oil and a couple of barrels of hydraulic fluid so its foolish for me to keep buying plastic bottles. Im a Conoco farm now. How does it hold up? Not sure yet, a lot of stuff hasnt even been changed yet. What has been in and out came back as good as any other on oil analysis and better than most. Nearly all the additive materials were as high or higher than the Mobil and wear (iron, aluminum, and silcates) was right on the money where I expected it. The one thing I have noticed is it soots a lot quicker than some of the others. My take on that would be its scrubbing some of the crud out of there that some of the other brands were missing but thats just a guess.

Don't guess with oils, bu@@ered a GM 6v53 because I used oil suitable for diesels, only problem the GM needs fly ash.hence the boom.
Stick to the Oil suppliers chart for your model.Penny wise pound foolish.insert cents/dollars.

I run Amsoil. Really expensive initially but cheaper in the long run. You can go at least 15k between oil changes and that is guaranteed by Amsoil. It is a true full synthetic. I gained 1 mpg in the diesel and 1/2 mpg in two different Youkons. A bit easier cold weather roll over too which means easier starting. I suggest you at least check it out.

had machineshop rebuilding engines for 30 years.I think rotella oils is some of the best out there.most all farmers in the area use it religiously in everything they own for decades. thats about all i know about rotella..I have allways used mobile one in my gas engines and i like it very well.The school bus fleet of 300 use 30w texaco for decades,As a state inspector now,i see mostly texacoo in the bus fleets for what thats worth. lucas

Agreed.

The ash in good dino diesel oil is the reason it should not be used in gas engines.

I work for a large truck fleet. When we went from chevron an exxon oil to shell rotella oil, the oil consumption dropped a barrel a month
Ran rotella in a farmall 450 for 25 plus years and when i pulled it apart it was as clean as the day it was built. stick with shell rotella.
Chevron is a cheap oil
None of the truckers I know use amsoil. Well a couple I knew did and when the engine took a dump, amsoil wouldnt stand behind it.

I use CIH No.1 15-40 from my Case dealer in my Dodge dsl. It specs better than rotella and is about $9.00/gal. The 5.9 is a Case/Cummins engine and if No. 1 is good enough for warranty in tractors and combines it ought be plenty good for my pickup. Personally I think rotella is a good example of salesmanship and is overrated as a product.

Over many decades, the Pentagon has tested oils.

Major Gas brands do well, popular drug store brands do not.

I have a 7220 CIH magnum with 20,000 on the motor, it as clean as a whistle inside.
How does your oil supplier know how much money shell spends on advertising? Did his exxon rep tell him that? lol
You buy cheap and that is what you get...cheap

If Rotella is what you started with I would stick with it. I have a first generation dodge and when I first bought it back in 1996 I talked to some truck drivers and they all said Rotella T is the best way to go, and now with 330 thousand miles I have never had any problems. In fact I took it to a local diesel shop here a few months ago just to get it checked (in time, valves adjusted, ect,ect) out and they said it was one of the tightest engines they had seen with that many miles. I did need new Injectors but that’s a whole different discussion! I changed to a different brand once and didn"t like how it got dark so fast and it just didn’t seem to hold up as well. The way I see it is if you go ask just about any truck driver they will tell you that Rotella is the way to go and if they trust it to go for millions of miles then why shouldn"t I!

Well, we run OTR trucks and the cost of oil, well everyone knows! We decided based on another company we know results, to start moving up 5k per change to 25k / 500hrs and run test. We looked at different test results from our lab we use, and found the best results over all was Mobile Delvac 1300 extended life. We are now saving by 2.5 on oil changes and are seeing no issues over time. One issue on Synthetics is Cummins and Cat did not start building engines with seal and gaskets to support using the syns till 2003 if I remember correctly. Back in my Engineering days in automotive, GM wear tested the syns and the worst one was Amsoil, so I always wondered why people pay 2-3 times more for a product that is not as good as the Mobile 1, which is what we use in autos.

All one has to do is look at the signs. Pilot doesnt give away wall space, Shell pays dearly for that. Same with the magazine ads, free pocket knives, jackets, caps, calanders, etc. I've got a bucket full of free Shell stuff they sent me over the years since I'm a rebate junkie. I tend to agree with you on buying cheap, thats one reason I dont buy the generic oils. But, as long as its a major refiner, and in fleet service, and meets the OEM spec I dont see a problem. I put a lot more faith in what the lab tells me on oil analysis as to whats left when it gets changed. Thats one reason I check every engine and fluid power system every change or every year (on stuff like final drives that dont get changed annually).

Thats amazing, with any oil product for a 20,000 hour engine to be completely clean. Why were you in it?

Discussing oil and oil change intervals? Maybe we should stick with less controversial topics such as religion and politics.

I run Valvoline in my cars, trucks, and Farmall 300 (more tractors to come in the future hopefully). I think Valvoline is mile better than Penzoil. My truck knocked and ticked more with Penzoil.

huh!?

For the most part any engine newer than 1960's has seals (non hemp seals) that are compatible with good modern synthetic oils (like AMSOIL). There may be off brand synthetics that aren't seal compatible but I doubt it. In almost all testing (3rd party), car, truck or motorcycle AMSOIL always beats Mobil 1. That said Mobile-1 usually beats a lot of others. However, Castrol GTX (regular NON synthetic) beats Mobil 1 for volatility testing. It is also (at wholesale $) the same or less than Mobile 1 at the store but definitely not 2-3x more.

Penzoil and quacker state both are wax based oils so they cause a build up in an engine. My self I use Valvoline also or O'Reilly's brand oil which by the way is Valvoline just in a black bottle that says O'Reillys on them. Valvoline is under contract to bottle it for them so probably the same oil just different bottle

use any of the HD diesel oils.. shell rotella, chevron delo or mobil delvac are all good HD oils for diesels... they are sold at most wal-marts, all truck stops and most all auto stores...

also you can get royal purple hd diesel oil, mystic 5w50 diesel oil, and many others but...but... did I say but make sure they meet the cj-4 specs for HEAVY DUTY USE. Do not use a mobil car oil, a pensoil car oil, a chevron car oil.. are you starting to get the ideal that car oils do not have all the addtives to fight wear and acid build up that heavy duty diesel oils must have.

heavy duty diesel oils can be run in cars and work extreamly well except for the heavy duty additves tend to coat the hot parts of the engine which include the catylitic converters and thats not a good ideal. So these hd oils are actually tooo good for light duty cars with converters.

I asked a guy at an oil testing lab which oil was the best and which was the worst. He couldn't be real specific because of liability but did say that it pays to buy the more expensive name brand oil. It doesn't have to be synthetic but oil from the major refineries have better additives. There are only about 3 companies in N. america that make the additives for oil companies. The place I went can usually tell who makes the OEM oil by the test results. Apparently in the US, there are some stores with their own oil label but even though it says they meets API and SAE specs., it was never tested or approved. Dave

Needed an overhaul

I usually buy the Shell Rotella oil in the 2 1/2 gallon jugs for $25 dollars. How much cheaper do you think you can buy your oil? The Rotella T is usually the cheapest oil at the store. Even the Wal Mart brand super tech is about the same if not more money most of the time. Where do you live that Rotella is more?

ANY....of the big "3",, Shell rotella,Chevron delo or Mobil delvac API rating CI4,CJ4 will protect your engine [u:2a912bbfff]well[/u:2a912bbfff],there proven oils that just plan work,take your pick you cant go wrong with any of them.

most time you will find that the oil's at your Case,ford,john deer,etc dealer is tied into at some point from from the blenders i mentioned up top with the base stocks/additives used.

for instance i know john deers plus-50 15w40-(witch by the way is a very very good oil)has Mobil base stocks in it.

I get this kind that has done good for me for years, I think the brand name is Dwayne. Its a real dark oil so I figure it must have a bunch of good additives in it. And I get it for free from all kinds of people. They go hey, you need some Dwayne oil, I got some to get rid of. I take all I can cause between the burning and the leaks you can never have to much extra oil.

I have over 110,000 miles on my 2001 F-250 7.3 Powerstroke. I've used Rotella since day one, and change oil every 5,000 as recommended by Ford. I have virtually no oil consumption between changes. Everything that I've heard and read says that any oil meeting the specs will give good service, but I'm sticking with what I've had success with. I ran Delo in Detroit 671s in shrimp boats for over 25 years and had good service. I wouldn't hesitate to go with any of the big three, but I'm leery of offbrand oils as I don't know the source in many cases and I'm not going to chance it. I'll pay the little bit extra for peace of mind. My two cents worth. C.L.

Why wouldn't they stand behind it... I would like to know the reason as I am curious.

cummins had documented the seal problem.. in the late 70s silicon seals where becoming the fad and they found out the hd oils actually removed the silicon from the seals and the seals would prematurely harden and start leaking early. End result was that the seals where changes slightly and the problem went away. The hd detergents actually leached the silicon out of the seals. hd diesel oils are designed for a design use of 10,000 miles between oil changes with an engine life of a million miles... the oil is fortified so that if you miss a change, it will survive for 20,000 miles with out the thickening that light duties oils do. Although it carry more dirt with the detergents, the additive package should still keep acids under control. However remember that the more soot and dirt it carries, the higher the wear rate becomes. If your willing to do periodic oil analysis, you can safely extend oil changes, particularly on newer engines and light run engines, wear the oil analysis will also tell you the change oil sooner on older engines, or engines run very hard. Cummins also developed a special line of oil filters under its fleetguard brand name. some of the extended run filters have 3 types of filters, or even 4 filter sections... a conventional filter, a water/moisture asorbing filter, an centrifical section, and a small particle section. These filters extend engine life and oil filter changes. These filters are optional filters to regualar filters for some of the cummins engines.. like my fl3000 filter is a special part filter over the the standard filter. Its now superceeded by a newer filter.