Pennzoil Platinum / Ultra and ACEA

[Apollo14]

Maybe this has been spotted before, but I was looking through Pennzoil product datasheets for 0w20, 5w20 and 5w30 and saw that in the data table, they no longer claim Platinum meets ACEA specs. Platinum Ultra datasheets do list ACEA standards and in fact they are the most recent years.

However, in the text for Platinum product datasheets, they seem to have done a copy / paste from older versions. This may just have been laziness when putting the new datasheets together.

So I wonder if the ACEA performance level is now the difference between Platinum and Ultra and if it is, then I guess that Ultra competes more with Mobil 1 and perhaps Platinum has slipped to the standard of Mobil Super Synthetic.

 

[wemay]

If not on the bottle, it doesnt meet the spec - as far as I'm concerned, the customer shouldn't have to go digging for it.

 

[timeau]

Originally Posted By: Apollo14
0w20, 5w20 and 5w30 and saw that in the data table, they no longer claim Platinum meets ACEA specs.

5W30 - A1/B1, A5/B5
You are right, table is empty, but it is mentioned above.
But for 0W20, 5W20 and 10W30 I could not find ACEA specs either.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

PGB ss 5w30 meets dexos1. I'm running it and its a plenty good enough oil for current ILSAC spec in a mild tune engine.

 

[Apollo14]

Sure it is but the ACEA specs that M1 meets is superior to dexos for piston deposits.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Deposit resistance and propensity to not varnish is just one aspect of lubrication. It has to be balanced with proper lubricity and DP mobility.


Meeting spec and actual performace are not the same. If an oil is not ACEA targeted (like most ILSAC GFx why bother with ACEA approvals or certs?)

Back in the 70's and 80s some of the WORST performing audio amplifiers had the best specs - the designers were concentrating on the WRONG performance aspects.

In reality Valvoline 0w20 laughters M1 an d RDS in cleanliness in situ. Per my own observations.

 

[Apollo14]

The specs are already a collection of an overall performance criteria.

So if an oil already meets the approval levels you need and then goes on to meet other approvals which have greater performance levels for the same things, then you can reasonably expect actual performance to be better, but maybe not noticeable unless a lot of miles are run.

Eg if all you need is GF5 but you go for an oil that is also dexos1 approved, you get better wear and sludge protection. If you went with GF5 + ACEA, you get better wear, sludge and piston deposit protection.

Of course we only have this info at an aggregated level. We don't have the detailed test data, we don't have test data on individual engines run in different usage scenarios.

But that doesn't negate the information to the extent that we should start extrapolating a single observation into any kind of rule. Nor does it discount the idea that meeting specs that have higher performance levels in all probability translates to better performance.