Originally Posted By: gpshumway
Originally Posted By: A_Harman
API specifications only limit Phosphorous content in 20 and 30-weight oils. 40 and above, there are no limits. So RT6 can have 1200ppm P and still meet SM and SN specifications. That said, I do believe RT6 is probably the most over-recommended oil on this site. Too many people want to put it in gasoline engines because of its high Phos content. Yes, it is dual-rated, but its primary rating is CJ4, meaning it is formulated primarily for diesel engines.
You've said this quite a few times recently. Would you mind sharing a bit more of your reasoning/evidence? As I said in my previous post, ILSAC GF-5 formulations from Castrol, Mobil 1 and others have large concentrations of Magnesium, just like RT6, and they're obviously not intended for diesels. Is their something other than your distaste for magnesium and your discomfort with an oil marketed primarily to the HD diesel market?
Here's a set of UOAs for a heavily tracked Nissan GTR, the latest is RT6 and the others are Redline.
LINK It sure seems like RT6 holds up well in this most demanding application. Not bad for $5/qt compared to Redline at twice the price. And that's why it gets recommended so often in the Subaru and older BMW communities. Not because we think it's the hottest thing since sunburn, but because it's a great oil at a great price and readily available.
Sure, you could buy Pennzoil Ultra Euro 5w40 or M1 ESP Formula M 5w40 and they'd be "more correct" for a gasoline application, but those are also mixed-fleet oils and they're hard to find and expensive. I've personally never seen any evidence that RT6 performs anything but excellently, nor do I have any reason to believe Euro-Spec 5w40 gasoline oils would perform any better in a gasoline car.
Interested in your thinking.
My concern with Magnesium-based detergents used in diesel-rated oils is that OVER TIME, if the engine is consuming oil through the combustion chambers, hard deposits will form due to burn-off of the detergent compounds. These hard deposits will make the engine prone to preignition when they get hot under continued high-boost operation. So there are some "if's" in there; if your engine is using oil and if you do a lot of track days, you may eventually have a problem with preignition and consequently burned pistons. So you want to save $5/quart on your oil changes and risk damaging an engine that will take $25k to replace? What price peace of mind?