Idemitsu or Mobil 1

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: bulwnkl
I'm not quite following the thinking that Mobil would sell this product for a significantly lower margin than Idemitsu. Isn't that what is implied by the assertions that the Mobil product is simultaneously lower priced and more expensive to make?


I'm certainly not claiming it is less expensive, generally EP is the same price as other synthetics on the shelf. The difference is that its high PAO content makes it more expensive to blend than other oils being sold at that price.

 

[Starman2112]

I normally use Mobil 1 AFE 0w-20 in our Camry at 10k OCI. I was able to score 18 quarts of the Idemitsu at AAP dirt cheap and plan to start using it next OC. Do you guys see any issue with running it for 10k or should I go less?

 

[Bryanccfshr]

Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: bulwnkl
I'm not quite following the thinking that Mobil would sell this product for a significantly lower margin than Idemitsu. Isn't that what is implied by the assertions that the Mobil product is simultaneously lower priced and more expensive to make?


I'm certainly not claiming it is less expensive, generally EP is the same price as other synthetics on the shelf. The difference is that its high PAO content makes it more expensive to blend than other oils being sold at that price.


You are saying that Mobil is falling on a margin sword to give you a better product. I doubt the shareholders would be happy about this business plan. I doubt then very much that this is true.
Competitors actually do bench mark off of each other’s costs. Producing revenue streams and delivering value as a company requires it.

 

[PeterPolyol]

Originally Posted By: Danh

Idemitsu 0w-20 VI = 169
Mobil 1 AFE 0w-20 VI = 173
Mobil1 EP 0w-20 VI = 173


Thanks Danh. I remember Idemitsu's Honda and Mazda 0w20 products having a higher VI than any of those oils ~220. Interesting, the retail market 0w20 from both companies have lower VI vs their OEM blends (XOM TGMO)

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: bulwnkl
I'm not quite following the thinking that Mobil would sell this product for a significantly lower margin than Idemitsu. Isn't that what is implied by the assertions that the Mobil product is simultaneously lower priced and more expensive to make?


I'm certainly not claiming it is less expensive, generally EP is the same price as other synthetics on the shelf. The difference is that its high PAO content makes it more expensive to blend than other oils being sold at that price.


You are saying that Mobil is falling on a margin sword to give you a better product. I doubt the shareholders would be happy about this business plan. I doubt then very much that this is true.
Competitors actually do bench mark off of each other’s costs. Producing revenue streams and delivering value as a company requires it.


PAO is, on the market, more expensive than Group III, that's not up for debate. Mobil produces a significant volume of PAO in-house, so I doubt they are paying anything close to market prices for it.

If Valvoline or some other blending was blending both oils (since they don't actually produce anything) the cost to produce the Mobil 1 EP product would be significantly more. That's the same reason AMSOIL's group III products are significantly cheaper than their PAO-based "signature series".

 

[Bryanccfshr]

Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: bulwnkl
I'm not quite following the thinking that Mobil would sell this product for a significantly lower margin than Idemitsu. Isn't that what is implied by the assertions that the Mobil product is simultaneously lower priced and more expensive to make?


I'm certainly not claiming it is less expensive, generally EP is the same price as other synthetics on the shelf. The difference is that its high PAO content makes it more expensive to blend than other oils being sold at that price.


You are saying that Mobil is falling on a margin sword to give you a better product. I doubt the shareholders would be happy about this business plan. I doubt then very much that this is true.
Competitors actually do bench mark off of each other’s costs. Producing revenue streams and delivering value as a company requires it.


PAO is, on the market, more expensive than Group III, that's not up for debate. Mobil produces a significant volume of PAO in-house, so I doubt they are paying anything close to market prices for it.

If Valvoline or some other blending was blending both oils (since they don't actually produce anything) the cost to produce the Mobil 1 EP product would be significantly more. That's the same reason AMSOIL's group III products are significantly cheaper than their PAO-based "signature series".


There are a couple of pretexts that I simply do not accept.
1st that having PAO= better formulated oil. It’s not neccesarily true in all conditions and engines.
2nd that Mobil 1will always use this stream, because it’s the “best” .
It would seem that they reserve the right to shutdown the reactors and run off a different base stock whenever it becomes more economic. If they did not want to impress upon you the product superiority and not the basestocksuperiority Mobil 1 would simply advertise in bold letters on the containers , for people to see that this formula contains a lot of PAO. Something like
“Mobil 1. Made with PAO, and always will be!”
Why don’t they do that?

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
There are a couple of pretexts that I simply do not accept.


Great. Let's dissect those then.
Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
1st that having PAO= better formulated oil. It’s not neccesarily true in all conditions and engines.


Nobody has said that. The statement in this thread is that PAO is the more expensive base stock. That's factually correct, it is. While PAO has advantages in thermal stability and extreme low temperature performance, that doesn't make for a better "regular" lubricant automatically.

Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
2nd that Mobil 1will always use this stream, because it’s the “best” .


Nobody is claiming they do that presently. Mobil doesn't advertise this product as being majority PAO or any of the Mobil 1 product line. We stumbled across Mobil showing PAO percentage ranges in the MSDS sheets and were rather surprised that both M1 EP 0w-20 and M1 AP 0w-20 have such high percentages of PAO in their makeup. This is surprising due to the cost of that base oil.

Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
It would seem that they reserve the right to shutdown the reactors and run off a different base stock whenever it becomes more economic.


Mobil re-blends their products on occasion. We've seen quite the range of changes with M1 0w-40 for example. That doesn't mean that certain versions of that product haven't been more or less expensive than others to blend. That said, ExxonMobil is an incredibly vertically integrated company that produces the majority if not the entirety of the components their products are blended from in-house. Global PAO base oil prices then have little effect on them, since they produce their own.

Originally Posted By: Bryanccfshr
If they did not want to impress upon you the product superiority and not the basestocksuperiority Mobil 1 would simply advertise in bold letters on the containers , for people to see that this formula contains a lot of PAO. Something like
“Mobil 1. Made with PAO, and always will be!”
Why don’t they do that?


I'm not sure I get your point? The fact is that this particular Mobil 1 product is majority PAO. That makes it a more expensive product to blend than one that is based on Group III. That also makes it better in extreme cold than other products, which may or may not be relevant to somebody's situation. My point is that the product is a bargain for a majority-PAO based 0w-20 that can be found on the shelves at Walmart or Canadian Tire. You will pay significantly more for any other majority PAO 0w-20 like AMSOIL or Redline.

 

[Danh]

Originally Posted By: PeterPolyol
Originally Posted By: Danh

Idemitsu 0w-20 VI = 169
Mobil 1 AFE 0w-20 VI = 173
Mobil1 EP 0w-20 VI = 173


Thanks Danh. I remember Idemitsu's Honda and Mazda 0w20 products having a higher VI than any of those oils ~220. Interesting, the retail market 0w20 from both companies have lower VI vs their OEM blends (XOM TGMO)


Your memory is correct. Idemitsu’s “Zepro Eco Medalist Advanced Moly 0w-20” (whew!) has a VI of 220 and its successor (dexos1Gen2 product with the same name but no mention of Moly)has a VI of 208.

Like other makers, Idemitsu has a range of products with these being at the top and plain Idemitsu synthetic being the mainstream offering. The available Zepros are hard to find though Amazon has them for around $40/5quarts. I assumed the OP was considering the more-readily available product priced more like M1. For the curious, Amazon has links to the product data sheets for all the Idemitsu oils.

 

[fdcg27]

That is stunningly high fuel consumption. Even my old E350 van does better with an old-school 351W albeit updated for the mid-nineties with a then modern PCM, but it's still a taller, wider, heavier piece than the Sequoia.
You might check Toyota forums as well as fuelly to see whether this is typical consumption for the vehicle. There may be something wrong with yours.
If this is typical fuel consumption, there is no oil that will make any noticeable difference and M1 AFE is probably about as good as it gets in the 0W-20 grade anyway.
I'm sure that you knew going in that the Sequoia would not be a fuel economy champ.

 

[tig1]

Originally Posted By: PeterPolyol
Originally Posted By: Danh
Fwiw, regular Idemitsu 0w-20 seems to be a fairly typical Group III synthetic. They used to market a molybdenum-heavy “Zepro” version but this seems to have been superseded and was hard to find and pricey in any event.

Mobil1, on the other hand is c. 30-35% PAO in the 0w-20 AFE flavor and c. 65-70% PAO in EP. Even if you don’t think PAO matters, with Wal-Mart pricing Mobil1sure looks like the better choice to me.


Remember, it's not about the base stocks but the overall performance of the oil. Chasing a single base stock is a fools game

And M1 oils are not a single base stock.

 

[Balrog006]

Considering I got the AAP clearance Idemitsu for less than $4 per fill I’ll run it over M1 even if thru UOA’s I have to reduce my OCI some vs. M1 or Valvoline Syn

For the OP’s OCI premium M1 seems overkill , but if that’s where his comfort level and price point is more power to him. I’d look for a quality product at a lesser cost and have no worries.

 

[PeterPolyol]

I think it's fair to say that nobody can say for certain what percentage of what base stock they're getting in the bottle off the shelf at any given time. Yes reformulations happen all the time and sometimes blends initially use a more costly component to meet performance demands, where subsequent research is done to economize the cost while maintaining performance.
From the M/SDS, we can deduce that at the time of publication, M1 EP 0w20 contained a significant PAO component to the base oil. It makes sense that XOM could do this without (relatively) significant cost, as implied by OVERKILL.

Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
That said, ExxonMobil is an incredibly vertically integrated company that produces the majority if not the entirety of the components their products are blended from in-house. Global PAO base oil prices then have little effect on them, since they produce their own.


This fits with the overall story. Most other blenders need to buy their materials from producers such as XOM, and they're paying much more than it would cost XOM to source from themselves. That said, I don't think XOM or any blender, is in the business of giving out 'freebies' when they could sell that same PAO for a higher price. XOM also has three tiers of in-house PAO to play with, SpectraSyn classic PAO, SpectraSyn "Plus" and SpectraSyn Elite mPAO. I have my doubts about the higher-tier PAO bases being 'poached' from sales channels to third-parties into their own retail product, but anything is possible.

 

[fdcg27]

Originally Posted By: Balrog006
Considering I got the AAP clearance Idemitsu for less than $4 per fill I’ll run it over M1 even if thru UOA’s I have to reduce my OCI some vs. M1 or Valvoline Syn

For the OP’s OCI premium M1 seems overkill , but if that’s where his comfort level and price point is more power to him. I’d look for a quality product at a lesser cost and have no worries.


If I had cashed in on the AAP clearance and gotten Idemitsu 0W-20 for four bucks a jug, I'd be using it as well.
M1 AFE with MIR and various store deals can end up being pretty cheap, though.
How does $6.69 net with M1 oil filter grab ya?
Got some at that cost and have it in two cars ATM.

 

[Balrog006]

Originally Posted By: fdcg27
Originally Posted By: Balrog006
Considering I got the AAP clearance Idemitsu for less than $4 per fill I’ll run it over M1 even if thru UOA’s I have to reduce my OCI some vs. M1 or Valvoline Syn

For the OP’s OCI premium M1 seems overkill , but if that’s where his comfort level and price point is more power to him. I’d look for a quality product at a lesser cost and have no worries.


If I had cashed in on the AAP clearance and gotten Idemitsu 0W-20 for four bucks a jug, I'd be using it as well.
M1 AFE with MIR and various store deals can end up being pretty cheap, though.
How does $6.69 net with M1 oil filter grab ya?
Got some at that cost and have it in two cars ATM.


I am running out some of those rebate deals on Mobil Super Syn and Valvoline currently, so yes for those $ I’d run them as well as they’re cheaper than just about any bottle of blend or full syn out there.

 

[nate95023]

Originally Posted By: fdcg27
That is stunningly high fuel consumption. Even my old E350 van does better with an old-school 351W albeit updated for the mid-nineties with a then modern PCM, but it's still a taller, wider, heavier piece than the Sequoia.
You might check Toyota forums as well as fuelly to see whether this is typical consumption for the vehicle. There may be something wrong with yours.
If this is typical fuel consumption, there is no oil that will make any noticeable difference and M1 AFE is probably about as good as it gets in the 0W-20 grade anyway.
I'm sure that you knew going in that the Sequoia would not be a fuel economy champ.


13-15 mpg is all this tank is going to give me and I knew this when I signed on the dotted line. I wasn't going to buy another make SUV with much better milage because in 10 years I know this thing won't give me any issues. I was being an [censored] to think that any oil will give me another 1-2 mpg.

 

[fdcg27]

Originally Posted By: nate95023
Originally Posted By: fdcg27
That is stunningly high fuel consumption. Even my old E350 van does better with an old-school 351W albeit updated for the mid-nineties with a then modern PCM, but it's still a taller, wider, heavier piece than the Sequoia.
You might check Toyota forums as well as fuelly to see whether this is typical consumption for the vehicle. There may be something wrong with yours.
If this is typical fuel consumption, there is no oil that will make any noticeable difference and M1 AFE is probably about as good as it gets in the 0W-20 grade anyway.
I'm sure that you knew going in that the Sequoia would not be a fuel economy champ.


13-15 mpg is all this tank is going to give me and I knew this when I signed on the dotted line. I wasn't going to buy another make SUV with much better milage because in 10 years I know this thing won't give me any issues. I was being an [censored] to think that any oil will give me another 1-2 mpg.


Hope springs eternal and it never hurts to ask whether an oil might help with fuel consumption.
I just don't see that it will.
If you do the math, over ten years this Toyota better need nothing more than one set of brakes as well as one set of tires to make up for both its premium price and its dipsomaniacal fuel use.
At your rate of use, any Ford or GM SUV would hold up for ten years with no issues while offering both more power and better fuel economy.
May this Toyota serve you as well as you believed it would going in.