Old to some, New to others..Zinc

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acudanut

Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by acudanut » April 14th, 2018, 12:28 am

Don't forget to add Zinc to your oil. Flat Tappet Cams (Not roller type cams). Today's oil does not add Zink in oil, for our old engines. Without Zinc, your cams will not last 2-3K miles. Your cam will be flat in no time. This includes all engines 25 years and older. Thank you EPA.

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raymond
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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by raymond » April 14th, 2018, 8:21 am

Diesel engine oils still have a considerable amount of zinc in them. And they didn't eliminate zinc from passenger car motor oils, they did cut the amount in half though. If a motor starts burning oil, the zinc poisons modern catalysts in the catalytic converter of passenger cars. Modern gasoline motors used in automobiles use roller cams and thus do not need the level of zinc in the motor oil.

Some of the brands of motor oil to use are Shell Rotella, Chevron Delo, Mobil Delvac, John Deere Plus 50, or Phillips Triton.

One good side effect of using diesel engine oil is that it contains a lot of detergents and will keep the inside of your engine clean. The detergent package in passenger car motor oils has changed considerably in the past couple of decades as fuel injection has made soot and partially burned fuel at start up less of a problem. These are factors that still weigh in diesel engines.
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Fil Bonica
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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by Fil Bonica » April 14th, 2018, 10:06 am

The military changed oil for 151s before it went out of service.
30 weight was changed to 15w-40 at that time.
Been using Rotella diesel oil in my 151s for a long time.

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rickf
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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by rickf » April 14th, 2018, 8:41 pm

While the diesel motor oil does have zinc in it I don't think that is why the military changed. I think it was a simple matter of logistics, every other engine in the military service was a diesel and there was no detriment to changing so there was no good reason not to change. One less thing to inventory.
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1984 M1008
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kmam
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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by kmam » April 15th, 2018, 12:22 am

WOW - could not have been more timely. I have only done about 200km since the engine rebuild and on reading this went out after work today and bought some STP zinc additive which is now mixed in with the engine oil. If what is posted is correct this seems to me to be critical information and should perhaps be a sticky, maybe with other critical information to do with engines/rebuilds?

Anyway, thanks for the tip.

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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by rickf » April 15th, 2018, 9:23 am

It is pretty well known in the antique car circles about using the diesel motor oils for their high zinc content. I, personally, am not a fan of additives because you really do not know what is in them since they are not regulated like the brand name oils are. They may say there is X amount of zinc in the additive and in fact there is Y or even zero, how do you know? The branded oil companies can't afford to short change the chemical composition ans risk ruining a couple thousand high dollar diesel engines. Their oils are all checked by oil analysis at every oil change.
1964 M151A1
1984 M1008
1967 M416
04/1952 M100
12/1952 M100- Departed
AN/TSQ-114A Trailblazer- Gone

acudanut

Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by acudanut » April 15th, 2018, 9:38 am

The old Rotella 15/40 will have a CL-4 or CL-4 plus rating on the bottle. The new "reformulated" Rotella has a different rating and a sunburst logo on the bottle. It's still descent but the zinc/phos has dropped from 1400-1500 ppm down to 900-1000. Adding a bottle of the correct EP additive will get it back up to where it used to be if not slightly better. 2thumbs

acudanut

Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by acudanut » April 15th, 2018, 9:41 am

raymond wrote:Diesel engine oils still have a considerable amount of zinc in them. And they didn't eliminate zinc from passenger car motor oils, they did cut the amount in half though. If a motor starts burning oil, the zinc poisons modern catalysts in the catalytic converter of passenger cars. Modern gasoline motors used in automobiles use roller cams and thus do not need the level of zinc in the motor oil.

Some of the brands of motor oil to use are Shell Rotella, Chevron Delo, Mobil Delvac, John Deere Plus 50, or Phillips Triton.

One good side effect of using diesel engine oil is that it contains a lot of detergents and will keep the inside of your engine clean. The detergent package in passenger car motor oils has changed considerably in the past couple of decades as fuel injection has made soot and partially burned fuel at start up less of a problem. These are factors that still weigh in diesel engines.

"If a motor starts burning oil, the zinc poisons modern catalysts in the catalytic converter of passenger cars. Modern gasoline motors used in automobiles use roller cams and thus do not need the level of zinc in the motor oil."
****If your car is burning oil, you have other problems.****

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raymond
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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by raymond » April 15th, 2018, 12:32 pm

There is still some debate about the potential for damage to camshafts by lower zinc content. Some tests showed little or no wear on a standard engine, and some very slight accelerated damage on high performance engines with heavy valve springs run at high RPMs. The highest wear was on old English sports cars, which weren't exactly known for using hardened steels in many of their internal parts. As far as additives, I would trust well established brands like STP, Eastwood, Lucas, or Rislone.
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kmam
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Re: Old to some, New to others..Zinc

Unread post by kmam » April 15th, 2018, 4:41 pm

I figure it is worth using a zinc additive or a higher zinc oil (if I can locate one in Australia) rather than take a risk of damage after all the work and cost involved in rebuilding my engine. I added an over the shelf STP product figuring that should be a quality additive, the other available locally was Lucas but only on special order.
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