Valvoline NextGen conventional 5W30 WRX

[skyactiv]

Finally got around to registering so thought I would post this.
My car is an 07' Subaru Impreza WRX with a stage 2 modified engine. It puts out
248 horsepower on an all wheel dyno. I used an OEM blue Subaru oil filter.
There are 2 UOA's with 3881 miles. The NextGen one is dated 6/16/11.
The UOA dated 9/16/2008 is Valvoline Synpower Synthetic 5W30 when my car was stock.

 

[skyactiv]

Should add the UOA dated 08/21/07 is Valvoline Synpower synthetic 5W40 TDI wannabe oil and the one dated 02/05/08 is ConocoPhillips synthetic blend 5W30 if I remember correctly.

 

[chubbs1]

I really am liking the NextGen. Great oil.

 

[skyship]

Interesting set of results, as it's always good to see some different oils in use. The engine is in good condition, although the TBN and insolubles figure would confirm a 5K mile OCI is about all that is reasonable with the oils in use, without a TAN to cross check the TBN figure. A longer life oil filter could extend the OCI as the insolubles are high enough at present, although the last oil lacks enough detergents to be good for long OCI's. It only uses Calcium based detergents and 1500 ppm is not much, as the VOA figure will be even lower.
The second oil used was the only one producing slightly higher wear figures, even though it was the only oil with Moly and had more Boron and Zinc than the others. If you want two more oils to try that are easy to find in the US, Castrol GTX 5/30 or Edge 5/30 would be good to see, as none of the oils used so far seem to be producing low enough insolubles figures in my opinion.

 

[skyship]

Only just noticed that the Con Philips Dino blend sheared out of grade, so not only did it produced higher wear metals but it finished up in the 25 camp. I think I will stick to products from Castrol, Mobil, Shell or Liqui Moly.
I wonder if any of the UOA oils can stay in grade much beyond 5K miles, although if this engine has 5/20 approval that might not be a limiting factor. If it has to use X/30's then an X/40 might be better for a longer OCI, or one of the 10/30 long life full synthetics.

 

[volk06]

Originally Posted By: skyship
Interesting set of results, as it's always good to see some different oils in use. The engine is in good condition, although the TBN and insolubles figure would confirm a 5K mile OCI is about all that is reasonable with the oils in use, without a TAN to cross check the TBN figure. A longer life oil filter could extend the OCI as the insolubles are high enough at present, although the last oil lacks enough detergents to be good for long OCI's. It only uses Calcium based detergents and 1500 ppm is not much, as the VOA figure will be even lower.
The second oil used was the only one producing slightly higher wear figures, even though it was the only oil with Moly and had more Boron and Zinc than the others. If you want two more oils to try that are easy to find in the US, Castrol GTX 5/30 or Edge 5/30 would be good to see, as none of the oils used so far seem to be producing low enough insolubles figures in my opinion.

Originally Posted By: skyship
Only just noticed that the Con Philips Dino blend sheared out of grade, so not only did it produced higher wear metals but it finished up in the 25 camp. I think I will stick to products from Castrol, Mobil, Shell or Liqui Moly.
I wonder if any of the UOA oils can stay in grade much beyond 5K miles, although if this engine has 5/20 approval that might not be a limiting factor. If it has to use X/30's then an X/40 might be better for a longer OCI, or one of the 10/30 long life full synthetics.


Stop with your non sense!
You can't base an oci off of a guess with the TBN as the TBN rentention is NOT linear. You also can't just a oil based on its metallic additives in a VOA. There are a lot of compounds that are organic will not be picked up on a VOA. Quite a few SN oils get to a tbn around 2 and stay there for thousands of miles, like the new M1 line up.

You need to quit picking things out without looking at the whole picture. Do you know why the COP blend sheared out of grade and produced higher numbers? 1-2 ppm million is within lab variability. You can't say which is "better".

 

[skyship]

If you bothered to read my post I did say you need a TAN to figure out what is happening at low TBN, which is why Blackstone should follow the other labs and issue a mild warning once a TBN falls to below one third of the VOA figure.
The only significant under performance was by the second oil used, although without a repeat UOA of the same oil it is not bad anyway, just interesting in comparison with the other oils. It might well be just summer to winter differences, although the next oil did cut the wear metal figures in half, which is of real interest and well past your lab variability.
When picking a best oil you have to use the data available, not the advertising and it appears the only real result is the winner is not the Con Phillipo Dino blend, which must be using a poor quality base stock unless the OP went racing.

 

[buster]

Interesting, I can't tell if the SN Valvoiline oils are using Moly still.

I've seen UOA's with it and without it.

Either way nice report.

 

[skyship]

Missed out that the second oil used sheared to the equivalent of a SAE 22 in grade terms, which is quite a drop for a mid 30's oil in 4K miles.
I think the OP should try Edge 5/40 or GC 0/30 with an M1 EP filter, then you might be able to double the OCI without fear of shearing or the insolubles.

 

[volk06]

Originally Posted By: skyship
If you bothered to read my post I did say you need a TAN to figure out what is happening at low TBN, which is why Blackstone should follow the other labs and issue a mild warning once a TBN falls to below one third of the VOA figure.
The only significant under performance was by the second oil used, although without a repeat UOA of the same oil it is not bad anyway, just interesting in comparison with the other oils. It might well be just summer to winter differences, although the next oil did cut the wear metal figures in half, which is of real interest and well past your lab variability.
When picking a best oil you have to use the data available, not the advertising and it appears the only real result is the winner is not the Con Phillipo Dino blend, which must be using a poor quality base stock unless the OP went racing.


I did read your post, you said TBN and insolubles confirm a OCI of 5K without a TAN. I didn't know group II+ and Group III Yubase were bad base stocks.... Granted that UOA is from 5 years ago. Have you read Daves article on what is normal? What is an under performance when talking about being normalized?

 

[skyship]

The UOA confirms a 5K OCI is OK at present, but the TAN is needed to see if the lowish TBN is a problem or not for extending the OCI. It probably is OK, but the insolubles look a tad high for such a short OCI, which is why I think a different oil and filter is needed to extend the OCI past 5K miles. The wear figures are good, it's just a matter of staying in the SAE 30 range and allowing more room for insolubles in the filter, although a better X/40 oil with more detergents and dispersants would help, as 1500 ppm for Calcium is low.

 

[volk06]

Originally Posted By: skyship
The UOA confirms a 5K OCI is OK at present, but the TAN is needed to see if the lowish TBN is a problem or not for extending the OCI. It probably is OK, but the insolubles look a tad high for such a short OCI, which is why I think a different oil and filter is needed to extend the OCI past 5K miles. The wear figures are good, it's just a matter of staying in the SAE 30 range and allowing more room for insolubles in the filter, although a better X/40 oil with more detergents and dispersants would help, as 1500 ppm for Calcium is low.


How does being a 20w or 30w affect a filters capacity for insolubles? Also, newer SN oils haver lower calcium levels due to the use of organic (non-metallic) additives so they won't show up in a VOA. Take PU for example, the VOA looks almost identical additive wise to PP but yet it has superior cleaning abilities. You simply can't only judge an oil by its CA level anymore. Most are using organic additives or newer metallic additives that the typical UOA/VOA don't test for. The newer trend is lower CA with higher MG levels for tbn retention. (Thats not the case with VWB though) How would a xw40 help in this case?

 

[bourne]

Originally Posted By: buster
Interesting, I can't tell if the SN Valvoiline oils are using Moly still.

I've seen UOA's with it and without it.

Either way nice report.



The only PCMO from Valvoline that had moly in its addpack was Maxlife. Not sure if the reformulated one has moly in it or not. Nextgen Maxlife and Full Syn Maxlife still have a nice healthy shot of moly.

 

[skyship]

I would have thought you understood the difference between the oil grade and detergents. The oils used are shearing down rather too far for an extended OCI, so a different full synthetic would be better and it might be good to move up a grade if the engine is not OK for the equivalent of the mid 20's, because the final viscosity will probably be down to the teens by 10K if a 5/30 is used.
If the oil does not contain much Calcium it should have more Magnesium based detergents, but in a few cases of more expensive oils there might be other detergents in use, which is one reason why it would be good to see the TBN / TAN relationship.
More detergents and dispersants help to reduce the insolubles figure which is high for a short OCI, so again a better oil is needed for an extension beyond 5K miles, the other more sensible option might be a better long life oil filter.
There are only 2 reasons I can see for not extending to 10K miles and both might be resolved by changing to a major brand fully synthetic 5/40, BUT it would be better to use a long life oil filter, as I suspect the insolubles curve might reach the maximum.
The OP's engine is shearing the oil a lot for 4K, which is why I think a major brand full synthetic would be good, if it wasn't for the low viscosity figures a conventional would be fine.

 

[volk06]

Originally Posted By: skyship
I would have thought you understood the difference between the oil grade and detergents. The oils used are shearing down rather too far for an extended OCI, so a different full synthetic would be better and it might be good to move up a grade if the engine is not OK for the equivalent of the mid 20's, because the final viscosity will probably be down to the teens by 10K if a 5/30 is used.
If the oil does not contain much Calcium it should have more Magnesium based detergents, but in a few cases of more expensive oils there might be other detergents in use, which is one reason why it would be good to see the TBN / TAN relationship.
More detergents and dispersants help to reduce the insolubles figure which is high for a short OCI, so again a better oil is needed for an extension beyond 5K miles, the other more sensible option might be a better long life oil filter.
There are only 2 reasons I can see for not extending to 10K miles and both might be resolved by changing to a major brand fully synthetic 5/40, BUT it would be better to use a long life oil filter, as I suspect the insolubles curve might reach the maximum.
The OP's engine is shearing the oil a lot for 4K, which is why I think a major brand full synthetic would be good, if it wasn't for the low viscosity figures a conventional would be fine.

So now your instead of actually answering my specific questions you insult my intelligence? Where in any of my posts do I ask what the difference between weight and detergents are? I simply asked HOW does being a 20 WEIGHT or 30 WEIGHT oil have a difference on a oil filter capacity. Once again just beating around the bush with any actual facts. How do you know that the oil wasnt actually cleaning something? It very well could have been extra wear but the UOA proves that wrong. If the oil has the same detergents, it should not make any difference in the filter capacity whether or not it was a 20w or 30w. This oil did shear some in a short OCI but for the current OCI how did this oil fail? What are you measuring your results against? For the OCI it had great wear results, isnt that what people are after the most? If the oil sheared but yet still provided adequate protection, is that a oil failure? Look at the synpower 5w30 UOA, it had higher calcium but yet higher insolubles for the OCI. According to your logic, that oil performed worse even though it was a full synthetic?

 

[skyship]

Originally Posted By: bourne
Originally Posted By: buster
Interesting, I can't tell if the SN Valvoiline oils are using Moly still.

I've seen UOA's with it and without it.

Either way nice report.



The only PCMO from Valvoline that had moly in its addpack was Maxlife. Not sure if the reformulated one has moly in it or not. Nextgen Maxlife and Full Syn Maxlife still have a nice healthy shot of moly.


You don't have to have Moly for an oil to perform well and the major oil companies seem to be moving more to Moly free oils. I do like to see Boron in a non Moly oil, although one of the best conventional oils Castrol GTX 5/30 does not have Moly or Boron.
A lack of Zinc is much more interesting as the oil folks always try to use as much Zinc as permitted by the API or ACEA Cat related limits.
Many of the best newer full synthetics like Liqui Moly Synthoil High Tech 5/40, similar Mobil and Castrol synthetics do not contain Moly.

 

[volk06]

Originally Posted By: skyship
Originally Posted By: bourne
Originally Posted By: buster
Interesting, I can't tell if the SN Valvoiline oils are using Moly still.

I've seen UOA's with it and without it.

Either way nice report.



The only PCMO from Valvoline that had moly in its addpack was Maxlife. Not sure if the reformulated one has moly in it or not. Nextgen Maxlife and Full Syn Maxlife still have a nice healthy shot of moly.


You don't have to have Moly for an oil to perform well and the major oil companies seem to be moving more to Moly free oils. I do like to see Boron in a non Moly oil, although one of the best conventional oils Castrol GTX 5/30 does not have Moly or Boron.
A lack of Zinc is much more interesting as the oil folks always try to use as much Zinc as permitted by the API or ACEA Cat related limits.
Many of the best newer full synthetics like Liqui Moly Synthoil High Tech 5/40, similar Mobil and Castrol synthetics do not contain Moly.


How can one of the best oils, in your opinion, like GTX be a good oil with such low calcium levels and no boron? The oil is almost idential to VWB with the low calcium/high sodium additive package like this UOA. Just trying to understand your logic and view point.

 

[BillyTheKid]

This thread has taken a turn off course. What I would like to see if someone post these strong results on the Subaru forum someone posted a link about the other day where some idiots were claiming T6 were spinning bearings or something.

 

[skyactiv]

Originally Posted By: BillyTheKid
This thread has taken a turn off course. What I would like to see if someone post these strong results on the Subaru forum someone posted a link about the other day where some idiots were claiming T6 were spinning bearings or something.


There are some WRX's that have cracked the oil pickup tube resulting in series engine damage but it's rare.
I'm guessing the spun bearing problem exist more on the older 02'-05' WRX's that used the old 2L engine. The older WRX don't like 5W30, often consume it, add an owner who doesn't check his/her oil religiously and presto, spun bearing. My WRX is now consuming a pint between changes.