Amsoil's December Magazine - Fuel Economy Study

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I figured this is the appropriate forum section to post this in, if i'm wrong, mods please move to the correct section.

Posting pics of the Magazine articles and will state my opinion below.

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Having read the whole study, i've come to the conclusion that the test is severally flawed with many reasons...


  • two different trucks
  • two different drivers
  • too many variables in driver error to accurately calculate fuel consumption
  • test truck received a SECOND FLUSH
  • A dyno with controlled weather conditions was NOT USED


Looking at the baseline and test results, the before / after numbers of the test truck using Amsoil are so small that i'm shocked how any actual and TRUE numbers were pulled from this.

The fact that the test truck received a SECOND flush of all the fluids alone could account for the 6% difference. I feel that it could have gotten the same results with a SECOND flush of conventional lube, since the second flush would help to further remove / clean the internals, helping everything run more efficiently, resulting in improvements.

I feel that a dyno and lab controlled testing is the only way to truly spot the difference. Old engines with 750,000 miles of wear should not be used as the testing equipment. A new block that is fully broken in should be used.

It's the same with Royal Purple and their silly oil tests.
They take a car with old synthetic oil of another brand and run it on a dyno, taking HP readings. They then change the oil to RP and run another dyno which results in more power, claiming that it's their oil which is the cause.

^The same can be had by simply changing the used oil with new oil OF THE SAME BRAND!!
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Anytime an increase in fuel economy is mentioned here be it from changing oil to adding something to the gas tank it is quickly challenged here. This is no different, Amsoil paid for the testing, then stuffed it into their own publication. I'll believe some of the members claiming fuel economy increases before I believe some article from an oil company pushing product.

BTW I agree their testing is flawed! Any oil company could have done the exact same testing then pushed their results.
 
Agreed. I mean, we know synthetic performs better then conventional. Nothing new here.

Now if they got a 6% difference with their synthetic vs another synthetic, THAT would be interesting but in reality, the difference between the two would be 1% +/- since both are high quality lubes and would perform almost identical.
 
Amsoil also let some noob claim in their magazine that moly is a solid and bad for engines. Amsoil has very tacky and sketchy marketing sometimes.
 
Being a former trucker driving in a fleet of thousands of trucks, the company I used to work for would be using this stuff if it was true. Everybody would be using it and they wouldn't have to advertise it because a 6% increase in fuel is about $25 a day in savings.
 
It just makes me want more data points.

BTW, Everyone's marketing has questionable ethics.
Marketers over sell their wares, engineers over engineer their wares.

Unfortunately It's the world we live in.
 
Originally Posted By: Artem
Having read the whole study, i've come to the conclusion that the test is severally flawed with many reasons...


  • two different trucks
  • two different drivers
  • too many variables in driver error to accurately calculate fuel consumption
  • test truck received a SECOND FLUSH
  • A dyno with controlled weather conditions was NOT USED


Looking at the baseline and test results, the before / after numbers of the test truck using Amsoil are so small that i'm shocked how any actual and TRUE numbers were pulled from this.

The fact that the test truck received a SECOND flush of all the fluids alone could account for the 6% difference. I feel that it could have gotten the same results with a SECOND flush of conventional lube, since the second flush would help to further remove / clean the internals, helping everything run more efficiently, resulting in improvements.

I feel that a dyno and lab controlled testing is the only way to truly spot the difference. Old engines with 750,000 miles of wear should not be used as the testing equipment. A new block that is fully broken in should be used.

It's the same with Royal Purple and their silly oil tests.
They take a car with old synthetic oil of another brand and run it on a dyno, taking HP readings. They then change the oil to RP and run another dyno which results in more power, claiming that it's their oil which is the cause.

^The same can be had by simply changing the used oil with new oil OF THE SAME BRAND!!
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How can you conclude that the test was severely flawed when they followed the standard SAE J1321 test procedure? This is the procedure defined by the SAE to test fuel economy of in-service vehicles.
 
Well then the testing procedure is bogus. I can achieve a 6% difference in my fuel consumption average by simply letting off the gas 200 feet sooner then test run #1 and bam! 6% difference and i didn't change a thing with the car!
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A vehicle should be strapped to a dyno AFTER receiving 2 or 3 oil changes of conventional lube having the engine idle for x amount of time between changes to circulate the oil and leave a good film on every part. THEN begin testing.

Same with lube #2. Do a few oil changes, running the engine x amount of time to insure the oil has plenty of time to do it's thing and leave a good film on all the internals. THEN strap the car to the dyno and begin testing.

That way it's 100% accurate and the oil inside is 100% concentration of oil #1 and it's formulation vs 100% concentration of oil #2 and it's formula.

It makes sense to me.
 
Originally Posted By: Artem
Well then the testing procedure is bogus. I can achieve a 6% difference in my fuel consumption average by simply letting off the gas 200 feet sooner then test run #1 and bam! 6% difference and i didn't change a thing with the car!
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A vehicle should be strapped to a dyno AFTER receiving 2 or 3 oil changes of conventional lube having the engine idle for x amount of time between changes to circulate the oil and leave a good film on every part. THEN begin testing.

Same with lube #2. Do a few oil changes, running the engine x amount of time to insure the oil has plenty of time to do it's thing and leave a good film on all the internals. THEN strap the car to the dyno and begin testing.

That way it's 100% accurate and the oil inside is 100% concentration of oil #1 and it's formulation vs 100% concentration of oil #2 and it's formula.

It makes sense to me.


+1 Anyone can easily skew mpg test results just by warming up an engine longer, coasting, or changing shift points. Unless I was there to actually see the test for myself I'll never be a believer.
 
Originally Posted By: A_Harman
Then fire off a note to the SAE telling them that their procedure is flawed.


Amsoil ran the test the SAE didn't. If the SAE published those results it would carry more weight, odds are that isn't going to happen. So we have to A$$UME Amsoil followed procedure. What are the odds of the SAE calling them out? Does anyone know? It would help me to learn more that's for sure.
 
Originally Posted By: buster
Amsoil also let some noob claim in their magazine that moly is a solid and bad for engines. Amsoil has very tacky and sketchy marketing sometimes.


Didn't amsoil claim for years that moly wasn't good for engines but now put it in their oil. Don't get me wrong. I like the product for the price. If I had to pay retail I'm not sure if I would like it as much.
 
Originally Posted By: Pablo
Why wouldn't MPG be improved if a lower viscosity lube is used in the engine, tranny and differential?


It should be, shouldnt it? Makes sense.

What is interesting to me is that when Chevron was trying to push isosyn 15w-40 Delo a few years back, they proved in an SAE paper that there was negligible difference between running their oil and Delvac 1.
 
Look closely at the test data. You could get the same type of results just by having the same driver in the same truck without changing anything, just doing a bunch of test runs.

The problem with these tests is not just the variables in driver/truck. The problem also is the way they can interpolate the results. Notice the arrows where it is says "acceptable 2 percent range". That means that they ignore values that they don't like when they do the "increased mileage" calculations. If I do my own calculations without this fuzzy math, the "test vehicle" with Amsoil actually got worse mileage (5.771 gal.fuel consumed) than the control vehicle ( 5.629 gal consumed) with Texaco.

Just as way of showing more about J1321, this is an example of a test run by PAVE that showed a 3.04% variance just by changing the thermostat. http://www.evanscooling.com/assets/pdfs/Type-II-Fuel-Report-for-Evans-final.pdf
 
Originally Posted By: Pablo
Why wouldn't MPG be improved if a lower viscosity lube is used in the engine, tranny and differential?


Exactly my point. the same can be had with lower viscosity CONVENTIONAL oil, in this test.
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Originally Posted By: Artem
Originally Posted By: Pablo
Why wouldn't MPG be improved if a lower viscosity lube is used in the engine, tranny and differential?


Exactly my point. the same can be had with lower viscosity CONVENTIONAL oil, in this test.
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Then drop it down to 0° F.
 
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