Originally Posted by BMWTurboDzl
Originally Posted by wemay
How would M1 vs Castrol, who are blending to the same VW approval make the test different?
Any company blending for VW, does so to VW's spec. If it was substandard to VW's approval requirements, it wouldn't get approval. So if they switched to M1 because of quality issues with Castrol yet Castrol is still approved, that would make the approval process dubious.
Switching over contractual issues makes more sense to me since again, Castrol still retains VW approval meaning it meets all VW requirements.
I still can't find any proof Mobil1 blends the current VW motor oil. We keep saying it does based on the bottle shape, but after looking at this video, where the VW and Ford bottles are...exactly the same yet the oil inside comes from different companies, it tells me we really don't know.
Unless theirs information out there i haven't seen.
It's almost always contractual or for marketing reasons. For example years ago I read that companies were trying to move away from BP (Castrol) because of the bad press revolving around the Deep Water Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I really think that's why BMW left Castrol for Shell.
The VW bottle in the video isn't the M1 bottle. It's older stock. Perhaps Castrol blended for both Ford and VW in Europe?
Agreed, on all counts.
With regards to the bottle though, the post above my comment mentioned that VW has moved on from Castrol to Mobil1. In the past, other posts and threads were started with this as the subject matter. The new [black] bottles very much look like Mobil1 so the logical leap is that Mobil1 now makes the VW branded motor oil. I used this video as an example that this logic may not hold true. The Ford and VW bottles in this video are exactly the same...down to color. Yet, the presenter mentions them being from two different companies....VW being Castrol BP.