Originally Posted By: burla
Originally Posted By: FlyNavyP3
Sounds like you've been on forums where someone is making a mountain out of a mole hill.
That would be me. I had Redline fix my lifter tick, and subsequently over 5 years we had about 20 guys also end their 5.7 lifter ticks on Redline oil. We kept track, and it is about 80% success rate. The last guy committed to trying many different oils and in the end, he gave up on Amsoil SS 5w30, PUP 5w30 and some other oils because only Redline 5w30 keeps his 5.7 quiet.
Furthermore, we had the last 6 lifter Cam failures, as in the Cam lobs wore to the nub all with Hemi's, all trace back to engines that used oils that have zero moly. The last 6 in a row! So it is all recorded over on Ram forum, maybe some guys here would consider it or tell how Redline either worked or didn't for the Hemi ticks, but the facts are the facts and it has 4 solid years worth of backing, now going on 5.
So the question should be why did this happen? The working theory is it is Molybdenum in Redline because most of the ticks disappear only after 500 miles, if it was the base oil or esters, it likely would have ended the tick sooner?
Or is this not enough evidence to convince people of Bob's that these are facts, not a big enough control group?
I'm going to approach this in stages.
We just don't have enough information here to make an informed argument for or against your claims. Your micro cross section on your Forum board is also a poor sampling of the overall production of Hemi engines produced, probably accounting for less than 1% of all engines produced from introduction to current. Parts fail in service, people seek information in internet forums, and this explains the heightened awareness to the issue in your Forum and likely skews the incidence of reporting. What was the mileage, maintenance interval, operating conditions, climates etc. of the trucks reporting camshaft failures? If the owner of those trucks with a documented failure wasn’t the original owner of the vehicle how can we account for services and usage prior to their ownership, how are we determining that NO moly was in the oil of the engines that failed, no moly ever? Not even in the factory fill? Are we to assume that just one oil change (or two or three) using oil without a Moly additive caused the failure? Because if that was the case shouldn’t we be seeing a significantly higher failure rate? Are they openly and honestly reporting their maintenance (or lack thereof)? The fact remains that millions of these engines are on the road, the majority of them are services in independent garages and quick lubes, a smaller portion are dealer serviced and a microscopic percentage of them are serviced with Redline. Are we to believe that if everyone ran Redline oil that there would NEVER be a camshaft (really a lifter failure) failure?
Ticking only stops after 500 miles:
The assumption that it takes “time” for the Moly to do its job and quiet the valve train noise but not time for the ester base stocks to work doesn’t add up. If anything it takes time for the ester base stocks to remove deposits much like it takes time for a moly tribofilm to be deposited and provide benefit.
Camshaft failures in a roller cam engine:
Roller camshafts fail by going flat for only a few reasons. The PRIMARY factor in a roller CAMSHAFT failure is a failure of the associated roller LIFTER. Once the lifter no longer rolls, or rolls at an angle (either due to an axle failure, bearing failure, body or link bar failure) the loading on the camshaft exceeds the structural strength of the camshaft lobe and metal begins to shed, same scenario for when the lifter roller wheel is no longer rotating (or rotates at a rate slower then it’s linear travel across the camshaft lobe) once the lifter is actually sliding along the camshaft, rapid (and catastrophic) wear of the lobe will occur. This is a failure of the LIFTER not the camshaft, one just leads to the other. If the noise that the users was hearing was a result of a failed lifter, no oil would save the engine from the damage that was occurring, it would not fix itself in 500 miles. The only explanation I can offer is that the noise is related to the hydraulic metering and lash adjustment occurring inside the lifter which could possibly be influenced by different oil. The failure of a component is likely just that, a failure that was going to happen due to faulty manufacturing or improper maintenance.
Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE Redline oils (I use them in my own vehicles), but I can’t make the connection to the bold claims stated here. Moreover I don’t believe that there is a widespread issue with valve train in Hemi engines, likely a few isolated incidents.
