HELP What oil to choose (GC or Amsoil)?

[Rick]

Ok Canadian Tire now sells Amsoil 5W-30 10W-30 they are 9.15 a quart and S2000 0W-30 at 12.50 a quart. On the back of the bottle it sayes it will pour at -60F. Now at wallyworld I can get GC at 6.66 a quart and it sayes it will pour at -40. Now the question I ask is what is the better oil out of these. I want the best cold starting for my engine since I won't be able to plug it in all the time and I also want to reduce startup wear at -35 that it can get here.
Thanks all for your help.

[ December 06, 2003, 01:34 PM: Message edited by: Rick ]

 

[Rick]

I also forgot to add will the carquest premium filter be ok with what ever oil I choose and be able to go 12,000KM max that I will do with any oil in the engine? Since what ever option I choose here will be expensive I want to keep it in for as long as I can go without UOA.

[ December 06, 2003, 01:04 PM: Message edited by: Rick ]

 

[Alex D]

For a GM V8, I would buy the GC.....if it's a Ford SOHC V8 I would get S2K oW-30.

 

[Patman]

The Carquest premium is an excellent filter, made by Dana and it's identical to Wix/NAPA Gold.

As far as your choice in oils, it's up to you, both are very good, but obviously Amsoil has proven itself a bit more. Nobody has tried extended intervals with GC yet (highest is 6900mi, on my sister's car) so we can't say for sure if it'll be good, but all signs do point to it being capable of at least getting to 10,000 miles without a problem (sludge monsters or turbos excluded possibly)

 

[TSoA]

quote:

---

Nobody has tried extended intervals with GC yet

---

Nobody? SLX LL-II is used in Europe for the manufacturer-recommended 60,000km OCI.

I just dumped mine at 7400 miles.

Did you mean no extended drain UOAs on this board?

 

[JohnBrowning]

Amsoil is a proven product with a long track record of turning out top notch products. Castrol on the other hand has a track record of doing the bait and switch. THey have also lied and over charged customers for the product they sell. Even if Castrol is putting out a good product you have to watch them closely!

 

[Rick]

Ok thanks all for the great input. So far from the uoa from patman and others. Considering the cost I'll stick with the GC for now and do 10,000km. Yes castrol has changed there formulations in the past but that is why we have this board and the great people that are willing to spend money of voa's and uoa's. So I'll just keep checking, so hopefully with the voa's and uoa's that come in we will find out if GC does get changed. If so this will be the last for castrol with me and I'll just go to Amsoil.
Thanks all

 

[jsharp]

JB pointed to the scary aspect of using GC for extended drains. Here's what I'm afraid will happen - through UOA's you determine that the current GC will make X miles with some safety margin. All is good for a few months. Then Castrol determines the new really inexpensive way to make GC is to cheapen everything about the oil but the green dye. So much for your low wear oil. And unless you keep doing UOA's with every change, you'll never know until you notice your engine is full of sludge or worn out prematurely...

 

[RF Overlord]

In response to what jsharp said, I'm also curious as to why, of the 14 popular oils I've researched on the web, Castrol is the ONLY one that doesn't publish their product specs...

 

[Jelly]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jelly:

Originally posted by RF Overlord:
[qb] In response to what jsharp said, I'm also curious as to why, of the 14 popular oils I've researched on the web, Castrol is the ONLY one that doesn't publish their product specs...

---

http://www.castrolhdl.com/Products/Default.Asp

Go to engine oils and click on the product name...makes you wonder why they don't do it for their PCEO line??

 

[Patman]

quote:

---

Originally posted by TSoA:

quote:

---

Nobody has tried extended intervals with GC yet

---

Nobody? SLX LL-II is used in Europe for the manufacturer-recommended 60,000km OCI.

I just dumped mine at 7400 miles.

Did you mean no extended drain UOAs on this board?

---

Yes, that's exactly what I mean. I do realize that this oil has proven itself in Europe to be a very good long drain oil, but I just didn't want to come right out and say for sure if it would handle long drains, since someone else would then come in and ask me for proof, via UOAs posted on this board. I am confident that GC 0w30 can handle long drain intervals, but in comparison to Amsoil I'm not exactly sure how it would do. I have a feeling they might be pretty close, but still wonder if Amsoil wouldn't show lower wear numbers. So far nobody on here has any UOAs in the same car running both oils to compare.

 

[Patman]

quote:

---

Originally posted by jsharp:
JB pointed to the scary aspect of using GC for extended drains. Here's what I'm afraid will happen - through UOA's you determine that the current GC will make X miles with some safety margin. All is good for a few months. Then Castrol determines the new really inexpensive way to make GC is to cheapen everything about the oil but the green dye. So much for your low wear oil. And unless you keep doing UOA's with every change, you'll never know until you notice your engine is full of sludge or worn out prematurely...

---

I don't think this is going to happen. Castrol Europe wouldn't pull a stunt like this, so as long as the oil sold here continues to say Made in Germany on it, I think we'll continue to get a high quality product. If it does switch back to being made in the USA someday, that's when I would start to worry, since they probably would not use the same base oil or additive pack anymore.

It is so common on here for people to say they don't want to use this oil for fear it's formula will be changed. But the same could be said for many oils, and if you're doing UOAs you'll be able to see if something changes anyhow. I'll take my chances and continue using it until I see evidence that it's no good. So far it's working for me, and I sure like it's low price.

 

[oilcanboyd]

dont you think that if castrol cheapens their german castrol oil that it will lose its ACEA A3 designation.

 

[jsharp]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Patman:

quote:

---

Originally posted by jsharp:
JB pointed to the scary aspect of using GC for extended drains. Here's what I'm afraid will happen - through UOA's you determine that the current GC will make X miles with some safety margin. All is good for a few months. Then Castrol determines the new really inexpensive way to make GC is to cheapen everything about the oil but the green dye. So much for your low wear oil. And unless you keep doing UOA's with every change, you'll never know until you notice your engine is full of sludge or worn out prematurely...

---

I don't think this is going to happen. Castrol Europe wouldn't pull a stunt like this, so as long as the oil sold here continues to say Made in Germany on it, I think we'll continue to get a high quality product. If it does switch back to being made in the USA someday, that's when I would start to worry, since they probably would not use the same base oil or additive pack anymore.

It is so common on here for people to say they don't want to use this oil for fear it's formula will be changed. But the same could be said for many oils, and if you're doing UOAs you'll be able to see if something changes anyhow. I'll take my chances and continue using it until I see evidence that it's no good. So far it's working for me, and I sure like it's low price.

---

I really hope you're right. I decided to run it and I'll do a UOA at 7500 miles to see how it worked vs. the M1 in my Toyota, and probably then run another longer interval if it looks like it will hold up for longer drains.

After the "synthetic" symantics scam they pulled though, I just don't trust Castrol. One other thing with GC and I guess time will tell on this. I bet we're looking at a group III base oil with some group V in this product. No way would they raise their cost of goods much over the US Syntec and keep the price constant. If I'm not mistaken that's what US Syntec is. Someone correct this last point if I'm wrong about it...

 

[jsharp]

quote:

---

Originally posted by oilcanboyd:
dont you think that if castrol cheapens their german castrol oil that it will lose its ACEA A3 designation.

---

Who knows. M1 0W-40 is ACEA A3 and it's one of the worst oils in their line IMO...

 

[JohnBrowning]

Just for the record I have gone on record as wanting to try the GC. I have yet to be able to find it. I have tried three 4 different Autozones in Michigan and none of then have had the Germany stuff!I check every two weeks on payday since the first posts about this gren oil. One Autozone was very close to Canada the other three were about 300 miles from Canada. At this point it is too lated to even try it! I already have my winter oils in both vechiles and I do not run 30Wt oils in the warm months! The only exception would be if I broke 7500 miles before winter was over!

The low volume distribution also worrys me! I am open to try it but doubt that I would make this my regular oil of choice!