Infineum on Multi-vehicle ATFs

[Ken2]

Infineum is one of the huge worldwide lubricant additive makers, owned by ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch/Shell, based in London, and on a par with Lubrizol, Chevron Oronite, and the few other biggies.

Their latest mag, "Infineum Insight," has an article on ATF. They say that there are 35 different OEM service fill ATFs in the North American market. Paraphrasing, they say that all ATFs use very similar fluids except for the anti-shudder requirements. Modern automatic transmissions allow the locked torque converter clutch to slip at low speeds (less energy loss than non lock-up). Inadequate durability of the anti-shudder additive wears out in use and causes the stick-slip condition called shudder.

Infineum is touting their T4705 antishudder ingredient for blending of multi-vehicle ATFs to cover most transmissions, including Asian transmissions, in the North American market.

So, maybe there will be some very good multi-vehicle ATFs on the market very soon.


Ken

 

[MolaKule]

Supposedly, the T4705 retains dynamic friction characteristics 5-7 times longer than any previous additive.

Dynamic friction retention characteristics has been the weak spot, IMHO, with UATF's in the past.

 

[MolaKule]

Thanks, I saw that as well.

The T4705 has been used in the Japaneese market for some time to cover the HFM fluids for the myriad of Japanese transmissions.

 

[G-MAN]

There may be something to this. It took 3 or 4 e-mail exchanges, but I finally nailed Mobil down on the issue of ATF+4 for Chryslers. They said they would not be offering any Exxon or Mobil branded ATF+4 because their own internal testing shows that Mobil 1 Multi-Vehicle ATF and Mobil Multi-Vehicle ATF perform just fine in Chrysler applications calling for ATF+4.

I guess I should have asked if that meant they were going to discontinue making ATF+3, but I didn't want to push my luck. hehe