Not Impressed with John Deere Plus 50 so Far!

JohnBrowning · May 19, 2005

I put this oil in my wifes Lasaber. It has a 3.8V6 with about 126,000 miles on it. It does not normaly burn any oil. It did use a little bit of Walmart 5W30 like 1/2 quart. It has been run mostly on Delo 400 15W40 and Chevron 10W30 since I have had it. I have tried other oils and they were all good. The J.D. Plus 50 15W40 has consumed 1.5 quarts in about 3000 miles! So I am not impressed with oil at all. I have since toped it up with Castrol Syntec 5W50 that I had on hand.

So to date it has only had consuption issues with two oils Walmart 5W30 and J.D. Plus 50 15W40.

The oils I have run that have worked well are listed below.

1)Delo 400 15W40
2)Delvac 1300 15W40
3) Chevron Supreme 10W30
4)MotorCraft Premium HD Diesel 10W30
5)Rotella-T Synthetic
6)M1 10W30

Since I toped up the oil with the Castrol Syntec 5W50 it has been fine. This car has never burnt more then 1/2 a quart in 6 months of use let alone 1.5 quarts in 3000 miles!!!! I think this might not be a very good oil. I will keep an eye on things to see if this is a new trend.

TallPaul · May 19, 2005

I wonder how Cummins-endorsed Valvoline Premium Blue HDMO would work for you.

segfault · May 19, 2005

My parents have a diesel Deere lawn tractor. Come to think of it, even with what little use it sees, it typically consumes 1/2 quart or so over a season (50-100 hours, the oil is changed annually.)

messiah4linux · May 19, 2005

I had car once that loved to drink Castrol Syntec 5w50. 1 quart every 1500 miles.

I would switch back to Castrol dino 5w30 and consumption would stop. I could go 3000 miles no consumption.

Currently I have a vehicle that lokes to drink the Rotella 5w30. About a quart every 1000 miles. Switching back to a dino oil like Mobil DC 5w30 and it will stop. Right now I'm experimenting with MC 5w20 just to see if it will drink it.

haley10 · May 19, 2005

JohnBrowning, I have a relative that is a Deere dealer, but I'm using Delvac 1300S in the PSD.

Is it a duel rated fleet oil?? CI-4/SL??

Can't imagine why the Buick would consume like that.

My Buick consume 1/2 qt. or less with anything I've tried in 5K.

Guess I won't be trying the Deere oil, especially not in the Power-Stroke Diesel.

T-Keith · May 19, 2005

Are you sure it wasn't an error is checking? It's easy enough to happen. I've never had one of my 3800s use more then a quart in 300 miles. Never tried that oil brand either.

-T

bulwnkl · May 19, 2005

That's wierd. It's a nice illustration, though, of how different oils work in different engines. My Subaru will use Rotella T synth very quickly (>1 quart/1,000 mi), but is using very little of the JD Plus 50 (~1 pint in 1,500). It used even less dino 20W50 when I tried it 2 summers ago, but that is a different animal.

JohnBrowning · May 20, 2005

No, I am sure it is not an error! I had to remark the dipstick when we bought the car. GM put the wrong dipstick in and their was a TSB for it. I was not going to pay GM out of warranty to put a new indicator in it. SO I remarked after filling it up with 4.5 quarts of oil and a primed filter.

Like said before it has never used enough to be noticed on the dipstick other then the one time I ran Walmarts brand of 5W30 in it.

The car had been sitting about 9 hours and I checked it it 4 times because I could not belkive it. I then began adding a 1/4 of a quart at a time until it read full in the drive way. I then rechecked it. The wife was going out of town for the weekend so I checked everything very carefuly. I also rechecked the level after here roughly 1000 mile round trip and no oil was consumed and the level is perfect!

My Father in law has over twenty tractors. He has a mix of diesel J.D.'s, J.D. Combines old J.D. two cylinder gas models and a host of other brands like Oliver,Farmall etc...

The oil came from his properly maintained 55 Gallon drums of J.D. Plus 50 15W40 Mixed Fleet oil.

I checked for new leaks put found none! THe oil pan does weep a bit but nothing major. Their is a TSB to replace the oil pan due to wrinkles in the lip/flange area of the pan. For some reason GM has forgotten how to do progressive stamping/forming operations. It weeps so little that again over a 6 month time frame you can not detect any loss on the dipstick. It is just enough to let dirt stick to the bottom of the pan.

If it had not been such a massive amount in a vechile that seldom burns any oil I would not have even reported this!I have never seen a vechile that has a track record of next to zero consuption exibit this type of oil loss. So I thought it was worth reporting!

haley10 · May 20, 2005

Any ideas as to who really formulates this oil? JohnBrowning can you tell from the bulk drums?

Hard to believe it's not just a re-labelled standard HDEO.

haley10 · May 20, 2005

quote:

Originally posted by haley10:
Any ideas as to who really formulates this oil? JohnBrowning can you tell from the bulk drums?

Hard to believe it's not just a re-labelled standard HDEO.

Sorry to reply to myself, but never mind.

After a bit of research, I'm thinking this oil is pretty much Chevron 15W-40 bulk. Has similar characteristics if you look at the voa's. I'd say made by Chevron. The additive package looks totally robust!

WI70W31 · May 20, 2005

Thanks for reporting your findings JohnBrowning. The oil looked good on paper, but apparently isn't a great choice in this application.

haley10 · May 20, 2005

quote:

Originally posted by WI70W31:
Thanks for reporting your findings JohnBrowning. The oil looked good on paper, but apparently isn't a great choice in this application.

The VOA's do look extremely good and if it is still supplied by Chevron in the USA, I can't imagine any low quality base oils being used.

I wouldn't run it in my Buick. I run GC

.

It does on paper look like a killer HDEO though, so I'm confused.

salesrep · May 20, 2005

This may give some insight with the jd plus 50 and oil consumption.
We recently did an independent study on a variety of off the shelf engine oils with various tests.
One said test that was conducted is the Orbahn shear test which is used to evaluate the percent visc loss of multi-grade oils resulting from degradation of the engine oil's visc index improvers.
One of the results of visc losses too great due to poor shear stability can be increased oil consumption or leakage.
To meet api CI-4 Plus, mack,DD power guard,acea e7-04 an SAE 15-40 must stay in grade ( Kinematic viscosity of 12.5 cSt@100 C).

Of the 17 oils tested seven (7) did not meet min requirements (despite whaat the td sheets may or may not say).

Jd Plus 50 being the worst.

cST@100 C unsheared
14.77
cst@100 c sheared
10.52
Visc % loss
%28.10

[ May 21, 2005, 01:25 PM: Message edited by: salesrep ]

haley10 · May 20, 2005

Thank Salesrep, I think you just cleared this up for us all. I will "not" be running it in the Ford PSD, since JB's Buick is about as easy on oil as it gets. PSD owner's might really not be happy with this one.

unDummy · May 21, 2005

Salerep, do you have a link to the data?
Or, can you tell me what other 6 oils I should avoid? the 10 that passed?

This isn't the 1st time that oils failed testing. I vaguely remember a few years ago that 'audits' performed on certain oils weren't as good as expected. This actually caused some oils to be recalled off the shelves.

JohnBrowning · May 21, 2005

Just so you guys know I was so blown away by the oil consuption I just stared at the car for a few seconds in disbelief. If you have ever walked out to the parking lot to wear your car used to be and just stared at the empty space for a few seconds you know what I mean!

salesrep · May 21, 2005

7 that failed.
john deered plus 50
cat deo sae
valv prem blue 2000
cenex superluber
royal purple
castrol syntec 4x4
citgo 600

10 that passed.

Schaeffers supreme blend 700
valv prem blue
delvac 1300
penz ll
delo 400
shell rotella t
cenex 518
farm oyl sae
case ih #1
lucas mag

Chris142 · May 21, 2005

quote:

Originally posted by salesrep:

10 that passed.

Schaeffers supreme blend 700
valv prem blue
delvac 1300
penz ll
delo 400
shell rotella T

HMMM. Those here on this board really do know their oil!

Doug Hillary · May 21, 2005

Hi,
salesrep - please enlighten me as to where this "independent test" fits in with reagrds to regards to;

ASTM Standards and,
CEC Testing Standards

Thanks
Doug

Bio-T · May 21, 2005

Some of the VOA's and the independent testing gives numbers that are digestible, but meaningless to pick one test of one item and declare a pass/fail of the oil.

The only true test is the UOA of this oil in varying engines and conditions. If I run RP, and someone runs Delvac 1 and I have lower wear in a different engine, the numbers are only meaningful in my engine. And a trend can start to be established for my engine. And the same for the Delvac 1 in another type engine.

So a pass fail on one ASTM test, means absolutely nothing, except sales info. I establish a pass/fail on my engines by UOA's, period.

One of my best UOA's on my 01 diesel was on Schaeffer's 15W40 and on my gas engine was Red Line 5W30. But in some one elses engine they may see different results.

Not Impressed with John Deere Plus 50 so Far!

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