Amsoil 15 40 vs Rotella 15 40 syn. Or stick to conventional?

All we run is Archer oil in our motors, seems to hold up good and we get a free oil analysis for using this oil too.

 

You wont see a change. Your amsoil will be just as filled with soot as your rotella and im sure rotella is a lot cheaper. If you are already changing your oil every 10-12k thats probably overkill but it wont hurt anything except your wallet. Personally I like Lucas products but I cant say i have actually seen a definite improvement in anything

Just keep up your regular maintenance and you will be fine.

 

with a fresh rebuild you should stick with conventional oil for the first 60-70,000 miles because the added slipperiness (?) of synthetic could cause ring seating problems.....after it breaks in then use what ever you want

 

I was involved with an early test of synthetics in N14's, and it was done with oil sampling and the addition of a spinner filter, that I would REALLY recommend. The use of the synthetics was a failure in every way. It's overall costs were higher, the main and rob bearing had appreciable more wear. The engine was also filled with a very soft jelly.
Putting on a spinner filter and using Rotella 15/40 dyno oil is my recommendation.
I have seen every oil additive you can think of and do not recommend any of them, and I do not use any of them, one that was mentioned when used in a transmission was deemed to be the cause of the failure and warranty was denied.
Something else that is missed is a grease gun. buy one and use it they are cheap, and will save you a lot of money. Buy synthetic grease and do it once a week minimum.
Buy an extra magnetic drain plug and do plug swaps to get the fine metal particles out of the gear oils.
Those things will give you better mileage and save you money in the long run, as will washing the truck.
Washing the engine using Gunk citrus cleaner, not the foam, will help a lot with cooling. A clean truck under the hood and inside the frame, shows you are a trucker polished chrome, shows you are vane.

 

I think JohnP3 goes to an extreme in describing any down sides he may have perceived with synthetics. One question I would be inclined to ask is how "early" was that testing, what brand of oil, and was it a group III or a group IV oil base stock. He does make a good suggestion in using a Spinner centrfuge (or any bypass filter for that matter).

Now, are synthetics good? Yes. But how and where they are used and costs associated are the big issues. In trannies and diffs? Absolutely! Eaton extends their base warranty on these items to 750,000 miles by using synthetics.

Engines? That is a very gray area whether the added cost actually is worth it. Personally, I have used a 40% blend I get from my local supplier at a cost of $10 a gallon, delivered to my house free of charge and my used oil hauled away for free. The cost is good, but there is no real scientific proof that it is doing any better than a conventional oil. I do 25K mile oil changes and run used oil samples and my 730,000 mile ISX has engine wear numbers in line with engines with half the miles on them.

I dearly love Amsoil's fuel additive and other stuff for my other vehicles and such, but their oil was not worth the money for the results in my ISX.

Now let me really mess with every one... Virtually all the conventional base oil in the North American market comes from one company, Motiva (Shell). The vast amount of additive packages for that oil is made by Infineum. Every label on the shelf you see is blended with products from these suppliers and meets CJ-4 specs. Yep, that's right.... That Love's brand oil is just as good as Rotella, Delo, Delvac conventional oil. Group III synthetics are severely hydrostatics mineral oils and the Group IV synthetics are made from natural gas, which has a very uniform molecular structure. Most of the synthetics on the shelf are Group III. Amsoil, depending on the item, is primarily a Group IV, hence the very high cost.

If you are getting good results with a conventional oil, stick with it. Only go with a high end synthetic if you are going for long drain intervals, but don't forget the bypass filter or Spinner. Even then, each engine is different, and you might not get good enough results to justify the added cost.

Best place to get good information and ask questions of some very smart people is the www.bobistheoilguy.com forums.

 

Since I have always changed my oil at 10,000 miles. even after my inframe. I thought about going to wal-mart brand 15w 40 & saving a couple dollars per gallon.

 

If you are going to change at that interval, using Wally branded oil is about as good as any other. No use spending more. All that a person is doing by buying the big name oil is throwing money at them to run all that advertising in the truck stop rags, slap logos on race cars, and sponsor big name entertainment at truck shows. The oil is virtually the same. Check into it yourself. CJ-4 oil is a very strict blend that doesn't allow for much deviation. If it is a CJ-4 oil, it is fine, no matter the label on the jug.

 

I've been buying the Northland CJ-4 oil from a farmer friend of mine in bulk for years. Considerably cheaper than Rotella. It's the same oil John Deere uses (I'm told they buy their oil from Northland). Regardless, it does a fine job for me. Last overhead, the Cat tech commented on how clean everything was, said it looked like new in there.

 

Northland Oil has had a strong reputation in the ag community for decades. Good oil. Granhawler brought up the Archer brand of oil, that is another one that has a solid reputation in the ag community. It is simple, the big name brands are just that, big names. There is a lot of lesser name brands out there that perform on par with any one of the big boys. I use Allied Oil. If people would check with local oil suppliers, they could get almost killer deals on good quality oil. Checking at farm and home stores, auto parts stores, etc for deals as well.