Rotella line upgraded

[HerrStig]

Originally Posted By: benjy
prolly a group III from their GTL oil, depends on pricing compared to real group IV + V oils. as the existing supply of base oils from SOPUS is used up we will see more of the GTL oil from their multi-billion plant. looks to be going ahead with a plant in pittsburg pa, expensive to build the plant but prolly cheaper to make quality base oils from gas than refine the dirty CRUDE oils
"Dirty crude"? You know a lot about the refining process I can see. BTW the components of
real synthetic come from what, I wonder.

 

[alarmguy]

Originally Posted By: bmwpowere36m3
Originally Posted By: MotoTribologist
Originally Posted By: bmwpowere36m3
Fully/Full Synthetic is marketing... in the US a GrpIII or higher oil can be labeled "synthetic". Now whether a GrpIII is really a synthetic is for guys on BITOG to lose sleep over.

For some products, absolutely, but there are still plenty of full synthetic oils that use groups IV and V as their base oil.


?

"full" doesn't mean anything... In the US a SYNTHETIC oil can be GRP III, IV or V, period!


Lets EXPAND on this ...

IN the USA, FULLY SYNTHETIC OIL, can be ANYTHING and ANY kind of oil, from ANYTHING, as long as it performs similar to a TRUE SYNTHETIC.
GERMANY I believe has the most strict laws on this, meaning, synthetic oil can not be made from oil.

For goodness sake, in the USA, fully synthetic oil can be made from WHALE oil or corn oil as long as it performs like a real synthetic.
Conventional oils in the USA with the same ratings are just as good. Synthetic oils are cash cows of profits for oil companies.
and yes, marketing is an amazing subject.

(ps, I am not in anyway, saying USA synthetic oil which is made from motor oil is a bad thing, before someone gets their panties all twisted over my syn vs conv sentence )

 

[4WD]

Case in point on Qatar is the Qmax tanker. Built in S Korea - filled in Qatar - sent back to SK to sell them product.

 

[bulwnkl]

Originally Posted By: alarmguy
[...in the USA, fully synthetic oil can be made from WHALE oil or corn oil as long as it performs like a real synthetic.


If what you're trying to say here is that in America, performance is the primary focus, whereas in other countries arbitrary technicalities get greater emphasis, then I would tend to agree. I'm not sure your exact wording is quite correct, but the above idea I believe is.

 

[kschachn]

My opinion is that soon (if not already) the German labeling law will come back to bite them. It will arbitrarily and needlessly restrict the marketing of superior oils that do not meet the narrow definition prescribed by the law.

ExxonMobil has already shown many years ago that their Visom product was nearly as good as PAO and superior in some respects - especially when blended with PAO. Only a matter time as technology will progress to where the Germans will be left behind.

 

[JonfromCB]

What Labeling laws? Please provide links. (sound familiar?)

How are German labelling laws different than ACEA labelling?

Are you familiar with the API definition of "synthetic"? Or, perhaps you can tell us why you think oils labelled as "full synthetic" in the US contain no group IV or V base oils? ....bare with me, I'm not trying to be flippant. I'm contrasting EU and US labelling of oil. My point is there is NO API definition for "Synthetic". Why do you think that is? The answer is not that hard to research for anyone who really wants to know.

It's becoming clear you are an advocate for Group III oils. They are no doubt getting better and even meeting some of the parameters of PAOs. You can argue all you want about "labelling" and whether Group III oils are synthetic or not but the fact remains US labelling is misleading either by default or intention. There are some fantastic hydro-cracked group III oils....I'm not arguing that. The chemistry is where you and I seem to differ in opinion. Group III is a hydrocarbon molecule, albeit bound together by chemical process, but it's still processed mineral oil, a hydrocarbon molecule and not a synthetic molecule.

I personally respect that Europeans only label group IV and V oils as synthetic. It's honest labeling, and I fail to see how that is going to "come back to bite them"....as an example, BMW has been marketing Shell made GTL in the US successfully for two years now, in the same bottles they use in Europe, and the word "synthetic" is conspicuously absent from the bottle. Meanwhile and interestingly, Shell is not distributing their own blends of the same GTL motorcycle oils as they supply to BMW in the US. Meanwhile, that same oils is quickly becoming "the" premium and recommend brand for Eurospec 3 motorcycles around the world.

 

[JonfromCB]

Originally Posted By: HerrStig
There was NO lawsuit "you can Google". It was an FTC unfair trade practice dispute. You can Google that.


You can Nit-pick all you want. It started as a lawsuit. You are correct that it was not settled in court and you are correct that it was settled as a dispute.. but do some more research and you find It's very interesting because the lawsuit was settled after much involvement from oil companies, oil experts, chemists, the API and finally an inter-department of trade and commerece. In plain language it boiled down to an argument about Group III, hydrocracked oil actually being "synthetic" or not. The most interesting ramifications were with the API and it's removal of any definition of "Synthetic". If you really want to research how that changed labelling of oils in the US... Well,that's the real point isn't it? Perhaps now you can see why I was so abbreviated with the details in my previous posts that obviously stirred a lot of folks up. Again, I encourage you (and others) to get all the story and find out for yourself.

 

[kschachn]

No clue, call it a "requirement" then. But clearly something is different as opposed to the rest of the world (except Japan). It's not "EU" labeling, it is only Germany, correct?

And haha, I'm an "advocate" of Group III oils. No one has ever made that statement before, but OK I'll take it despite not being anything of the sort. I was interested in the actual process of severe hydrocracking but only from the perspective that I have a minor in chemistry and I have an overall interest in chemical processes and just chemistry in general. Your statement "Group III is a hydrocarbon molecule, albeit bound together by chemical process, but it's still processed mineral oil, a hydrocarbon molecule and not a synthetic molecule" is not correct, polyalphaolefins are also hydrocarbons and can be made from a gas as well as crude oil. The constant emphasis and focus on feed stocks is not appropriate since it is the finished product that is important.

Why is a defined definition so important to you? If an oil meets a specification and is labeled as such, why does the composition matter? You can't for a moment believe that it is impossible to make a poor performing PAO-based oil do you? I sure know I could if I tried to formulate an oil.

Your posts sound like an Amsoil salesman before they started using Group III. The constant emphasis on base stocks is akin to predicting the future performance of an oil based on a $30 Blackstone ICP analysis.

Originally Posted By: JonfromCB
What Labeling laws? Please provide links. (sound familiar?)

How are German labelling laws different than ACEA labelling?

Are you familiar with the API definition of "synthetic"? Or, perhaps you can tell us why you think oils labelled as "full synthetic" in the US contain no group IV or V base oils? ....bare with me, I'm not trying to be flippant. I'm contrasting EU and US labelling of oil. My point is there is NO API definition for "Synthetic". Why do you think that is? The answer is not that hard to research for anyone who really wants to know.

It's becoming clear you are an advocate for Group III oils. They are no doubt getting better and even meeting some of the parameters of PAOs. You can argue all you want about "labelling" and whether Group III oils are synthetic or not but the fact remains US labelling is misleading either by default or intention. There are some fantastic hydro-cracked group III oils....I'm not arguing that. The chemistry is where you and I seem to differ in opinion.

I personally respect that Europeans only label group IV and V oils as synthetic. It's honest labeling, and I fail to see how that is going to "come back to bite them"....as an example, BMW has been marketing Shell made GTL in the US successfully for two years now, in the same bottles they use in Europe, and the word "synthetic" is conspicuously absent from the bottle. Meanwhile and interestingly, Shell is not distributing their own blends of the same GTL motorcycle oils as they supply to BMW in the US. Meanwhile, that same oils is quickly becoming "the" premium and recommend brand for Eurospec 3 motorcycles around the world.

 

[4WD]

+1
Giving the oil companies the ability to mix GIII, GIV, and GV into a value and performance based product - and still market as synthetic - is what keeps us in $22 jugs (before rebate) pick a flavor - and that's all good.

For those who just have to have something "better" - shop hard and find the best deal. Sometimes I surf Amazon and eBay and just marvel at how many oil types are out there ...
I just passed up some 'elite' stuff for a jug of PUP on eBay - next fill on 3.5 eB ...

 

[JonfromCB]

You are correct that base stocks are important to me. While you emphasize it's the finished product that's important.
That brings us back to the OP topic of Rotella and it's use in motorcycles. Sure it meets many motorcycle API, JASO, and viscosity requirements and is fairly inexpensive. It'a also prone to shearing way before the 6K and higher OCI's on most newer motorcycles shared sump higher revving, higher output motorcycles.

Case in point, it's hard to argue that a Goldwing, with it's low rpm, low compression, water cooled motor isn't as easy on motor oil as any machine out there....yet, even a GoldWing starts to shear Rotella significantly before 5000 miles,..but to be fair it still provides acceptable protection for another couple of thousand miles. I used Rotella in my Wing, but after multiple UOAs, I only used it for 3500-4000 mile change intervals (because it started shearing badly). A lot of folks use it because it's cheap and lets be honest here...because it's labelled "full synthetic". Most people won't ever ride their machines more than 40 or 50 thousand miles so they don't care about any of this. There will also be those who dump Rotella in their Ducati's, KTM's, BMWs' and Aprilla's ....I say go for it and good luck. I'll use true synthetic group IV and V based oils in my bikes...and you can keep denying true synthetics have any superior physical or molecular lubricating attributes as compared to group III base oils. You get what you pay for my friend and the proof is in the performance...and the UOAs.

So back to the OP topic....none of you oil wizards have directly addressed the reformulation of Rotella...or discussed what oil you are going to switch too when Rotella truely switches formulas to the new HDEO API designations in December.