Originally Posted by ChristianReske
Originally Posted by sloinker
100% synthetic, Hmmmm..
NOPE.
Motul have tried this fake adevertising in Germany, they were sued by annother oil company and lost on court.
They had to re-label all their products for Germany. Before, it was "Vollsynthetisch", no it is "Techno Synthese"
Since this time, members of the german oil forum are wonderung how INCREDIBLE stupid Motul was to try this in Germany.
Trying to sell Group III Oil as Group IV makes this brand very unlikeable to me.
Some strong choice of words there. If Motul were incredibly stupid what does that say about the District Court of Cologne who ruled in Motul's favour in May 2015? It was a year later before Motul lost on the plaintiff's appeal at Cologne Higher Regional Court.
Motul were not trying to market a group III oil as a group IV oil, they argued that the hydocracking process results in something that is artificially created, along the same lines as Castol's defence to the NAD and therefore the term fully synthetic was accurate. The plaintiff's argument was the the general public associated a fully synthetic with higher cost group IV PAO base oils and the judges in the Higher Court agreed. Which is an interesting point because I know four German engineers, all great guys and all working in the upstream sectors of oil companies (i.e. not dealing in lubricants) who don't know what constitutes a "Vollsynthetisches Motoröl" or even what is meant by a Grp III or Grp IV oil. There are obviously going to be exceptions especially on this forum and any German oil forum but I can't help thinking a statement in the District Court ruling better reflects public knowledge on engine oils - "....the consumers have no concrete ideas regarding the chemical composition of a fully synthetic motor oil. From the Chamber's point of view, it therefore does not matter to consumers whether an engine oil consists of base oils based on PAO or ester or has been created using the so-called hydrocracking process"
Having said all that, one could argue that good outcome of the ruling (whether you agree with it or not) is that you can clearly see on the tin which oils are Grp III based and Grp IV based. How many threads have we seen questioning the base oil of a particular engine oil?
Christian, you will also be pleased to hear (if you don't already know) Motul appealed against the Higher Court Ruling at the Federal Court in 2018 and lost. Ref : I ZR 157/16