America's Choice/Safety-Kleen oils?

[jrustles]

Experience with Safety-Kleen products around here seems to be sparse at best. It was sold as America's Choice, Walmart (Canada) Tech2000/SuperTech, and perhaps as Ecopower Synblend.

What's up with this stuff? I've always been a fan, trusting in SK's abilities to rehabilitate motor oil and the specs they meet, but I found an old .pdf of the SM rated AC lineup, 5w20, 5w30 and 10w30 and (just) noticed some 'outstanding' specs.

Look at that fantastic CCS Vis! I'd like to see it tested as a 0w at -35C!!

For the record, that's better than the already outstanding PUP 5w20 (which again speaks to the QSGB and PYB per PQIA also, but let's not touch that one) The VI isn't crazy and right in spec.

There is also one (odd, mind you) UOA on here of the 5w30 grade showing a proper 6 TBN remaining- http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1377589

These oils are mandated for government/military use (when available) and do indeed get used in their fleets and hold MIL specs. Anyone else think these are sleeper oils? They wouldn't use junk in mission critical applications, would they?

I have been unwittingly running this in the Pontiac LX9 and Mazda 1.8L all winter, needless to say, with great results. No start up rattle etc. I'm tempted to actually spend some sheckels to analyze it. Thoughts?

 

[PReal]

I'd like to see what you come up with.

I have 2 cases each of ecopower SM 5w20, 5w30 and 10w30...

 

[tenderloin]

EcoPower SN Chart

 

[earlyre]

I'm still trying to find a not extremely overpriced place to pick up their oil. fall before last, I found a shop near Ft Worth, TX (a few minutes from my brother's house) that carried it, and said i could buy just the oil from them, never mentioned the price.
when i get there, the counter jockey says" umm, yeah we should have some...scrounge around in the basement...did they say how much?", No.... so he fumbles around their PC, It ends up costing me $40 for a 5qt Jug (probably the same as if i'd just had them do the oil change)

I later emailed saftey-kleen to ask about sales to individuals, or perhaps expansion into retail sales... the response i got back was a resounding No.
No plans to sell at retail, best they could offer me was for me to call the area rep to see if he'd be willing to sell me a couple jugs.
it's good Oil, I'd love to use it again, they just don't wanna sell it to me.
if only Canada weren't so far away...
hard to justify the 3-4 hr drive to Windsor, just to go to walmart for some oil...
all though i wonder just how many 5 gallon pails i could fit in my sable....
5 gal is 20qts, car takes 5.5 qts, so 3.6 Oil changes per pail...
no... too far.

 

[Hootbro]

Canada seems to be the only place you can find this stuff at a retail level.

That being said, one of my neighbors is a fleet mechanic for the county and all they have used is Safety Kleen recycled oils and have no issues related to it. Matter of fact, the same neighbor has probably pilfered for the last 10+ years Safety Kleen oils for his vehicles at home and they all seem to be in good shape.

 

[HKPolice]

Valvoline NextGen uses recycled oil from SK and their NOACK is out of spec. The relatively good CCS is probably due to a higher concentration of these lighter chains in the oil which tend to burn off easily during use.

 

[123Saab]

Originally Posted By: HKPolice
Valvoline NextGen uses recycled oil from SK and their NOACK is out of spec. The relatively good CCS is probably due to a higher concentration of these lighter chains in the oil which tend to burn off easily during use.


From what I understand it was only the 5w-20 that was "out of spec".

 

[jrustles]

Originally Posted By: tenderloin
EcoPower SN Chart


Interesting the SN formula looks a bit more realistic. I'm going to call it a botched value on the SM PDS, for now. While 3700 isn't unrealistic per se considering Havoline Synthetic is ~3400 iirc. Seems to be tgtbt.

About nextgen, does Valvoline buy finished product from SK? I agree that their distribution model is a little strange, seemingly primarily aimed at govt and industry. I think they tried retail and it didn't work out. As a consumer, I wouldn't go out of my way to get it that's for sure.



I'm really curious about re-refining in general and the 'feedstock' used. They are collecting used oil from industry which was already refined lubricant with Gr1,2,3,4,5 all mixed together. Since there isn't much group 1 left at the retail level, a lot of the collected oil is already at the very least group 2. It's not unreasonable to assume there is a considerable amount of 3,4,5 in there.

Now I don't know how this might relate, but SK lubes oil density always seems to be on the higher side. An increasing density is usually seen moving up grades with mineral oil. Any ideas why that is? While the overall base oil achieves a certain viscometric profile, is the high 'diversity' of oil molecule chain sizes responsible for taking up "grid space", like sand within gravel, vs gravel alone?

Is their refining process the same or different than crude refining?

 

[Solarent]

Originally Posted By: jrustles

I'm really curious about re-refining in general and the 'feedstock' used. They are collecting used oil from industry which was already refined lubricant with Gr1,2,3,4,5 all mixed together. Since there isn't much group 1 left at the retail level, a lot of the collected oil is already at the very least group 2. It's not unreasonable to assume there is a considerable amount of 3,4,5 in there.

Don't write Group I out yet - it is still used in many products (not just engine oils) at least to some degree - including heavy neutrals like bright stock.

Originally Posted By: jrustles

Is their refining process the same or different than crude refining?


They explain their process on their website here. My understanding is that it is basically the same process but with the added steps of pre-treating for removal of water and waste. This pre-treating process is similar to that required for refining bituminous crude feedstocks. They produce Group I and Group II stocks from "reclaimed crude" feedstocks comparable to the quality of those refined from "virgin crude" feedstocks.

 

[NormanBuntz]

I'm big on recycling in my community, but I'd never use this stuff on anything I value.

 

[Solarent]

Originally Posted By: NormanBuntz
I'm big on recycling in my community, but I'd never use this stuff on anything I value.


Why not?

PS you might be using it without even knowing - most of Safety Kleen's base oil customers do not disclose their suppliers - and aren't required to.

 

[fdcg27]

We have SF picking up our drain oil at the garage at work.
They take a sample of each pickup in a bottle just like you'd use to send a UOA sample to Polaris.
If they actually test for coolant or other contamination, they must be pretty serious about the suitability of a load for re-refining. Presumably the bad stuff gets sold as or used as space heating fuel.
I'll find out whether we can buy this oil at work.
If we can, then I'm pretty sure that I could put a drum or two on the employer credit card, or just have it invoiced to us and then maybe a case or two on a personal credit card.
I have no use for this stuff, since I have more than enough oil stashed, but I might be able to buy some for pickup by another member, and we are a lot closer to Lima than is Windsor ON.