Pennzoil Ultra Platinum 0W-20, 2021 Ram 1500 3.6L E-Torque Pentastar w/ 63,381 miles, 11,313 Mile OCI

[Bill7]

View attachment 223467Just another data point. I wasn’t able to find PUP, so I’m running PP 0w20 this time. I asked about how they think they compare, and they said it should work fine. Just FYI, the oil life meter said I needed to change at almost exactly 10k, and I ran 1,300 past that for science because they recommended to try 11-12k last time.

Seems like I’m good to 11k. I’ll stick to no more that and do another UOA in 20-30k miles.

Ford has speced their F-150 engines for 5W-30 despite the higher CAFE fines Ford might have to pay.

You might want to consider to switch your Dodge RAM to 5W-30 for the higher High Temperature / High Sheer protection.
Just google HTHS wear graph.

If you are into extended oil changes with Pennzoil, Pennzoil very recently changed their formula and marketing to make their oils 15,000 OCI capable. Of course their marketing has a lot of fine print, but the newer formula might be a better fit for your use case.

 

[buster]

This one of those UOA's where if you kept doing this for thousands of miles it wouldn't surprise me if your engine starting consuming oil due to ring deposits. PP/PUP don't have the solvency to dissolve the deposits and can only mitigate them through oxidation control and detergents, which isn't enough IMO. Just my .02.

 

[demarpaint]

On paper, that X2 0w20 M1 looks great. But I gave it a 5k run and it came back with higher iron than typical for my engine. Still within normal levels, but I was a bit surprised at that.

I may run another round to see how it does and rule out some kind of anomaly.

Did you do a UOA on the first or second run with it?

 

[IndyFan]

All Mobil 1 motor oils have cleaning ability. Although you can't measure wear using a UOA (ironically even lubrication specialists are sometimes tempted to do so), the higher iron might be from dislodging some deposits in your engine. What engine did you run it in? What oil did you use previously?

IMHO Mobil 1 is the leader in motor oils. For the price, it doesn't get any better. HPL builds on that because Dr. Leslie Rudnick works for HPL and formulates their lubricants. He previously worked for Mobil, and he is regarded as The Godfather of Synthetic Oil. And then it is also the cost factor: @High Performance Lubricants is a Industrial Lubricant Blender. They don't target the consumer market. Their target customers are fleets. Many of the blends I suggested above where created for BITOG.

As for Pennzoil:

PUP is not the same as PP. PUP is focused on providing exceptional wear protection, while PP uses a standard Dexos 1 Gen 3 licensed additive package. I like PUP a lot, but I don't care much for PP. I also like PP Euro L 0W-30 and LX 5W-30, and PP Euro 5W-40 & QS 5W-40. These are all exceptional oils.

I agree, but I run mostly Mobil 1 anyway, so I'm not sure there was much to clean up. Most of my OCI's are with Mobil 1 EP, in which I have very high confidence. My 2018 has a round of Shell RGT 0w20 in it right now. It will go back to Mobil 1 for the next round, which will probably wind up being in the Fall. Unless I find some crazy clearance deal, it will be Mobil 1 for here on out.

I wouldn't be opposed to trying the X2 again. But I think the EP is probably just as good.

Interestingly, I remember the X2 being a little greenish in color and having a slightly different smell.

 

[The Lube Guy]

I agree, but I run mostly Mobil 1 anyway, so I'm not sure there was much to clean up. Most of my OCI's are with Mobil 1 EP, in which I have very high confidence. My 2018 has a round of Shell RGT 0w20 in it right now. It will go back to Mobil 1 for the next round, which will probably wind up being in the Fall. Unless I find some crazy clearance deal, it will be Mobil 1 for here on out.

I wouldn't be opposed to trying the X2 again. But I think the EP is probably just as good.

Interestingly, I remember the X2 being a little greenish in color and having a slightly different smell.

I highly recommend Mobil 1 ESP 0W-30. It's very good oil, and there won't be any negative impact on your fuel economy, but anti-wear protection should improve.

 

[twX]

Just another data point. I wasn’t able to find PUP, so I’m running PP 0w20 this time.

Are you sure the latest UOA was with PUP and not PP? The formulation seems to be a lot closer to PP.

Boron ended up at only 10 ppm, and some of that would have been from the previous fill. PUP starts out with ~180 ppm boron, and while it does disappear from the oil over time and this was a long OCI, I've never seen it get down to 10 ppm.

The moly, phosphorus, calcium, and magnesium levels are also more consistent with PP than with PUP. These elements don't disappear from the oil like boron does. VOAs from PQIA put Mo and Ph at 53 ppm and 589 ppm for PP 0W-20, almost exactly the same as your UOA. VOAs for PUP 0W-20 tend to show around 91 ppm Mo and 691 ppm Ph.

 

[187Penguin]

Your iron has settled to 4ppm per 1000 miles the last two UOAs. You need to find your first UOA from Blackstone. They would have said on those comments how many miles the Universal Averages on the right column are based on. If we do some math there, we can get an idea if 4ppm per 1000 miles is normal for this engine. Or you can email BS and ask them for the most up to date value.

Here ya go!

Pennzoil 0W-20 MOPAR Factory Fill, 2021 Ram 1500 3.6L E-Torque Pentastar, 3,007 Miles

Just got this back from Blackstone and thought I would share. 2021 Bighorn 1500 4x4 3.6L E-Torque Pentastar Factory Pennzoil 0w20 fill Sample taken 4 months almost to the day from purchase 3007 Miles 155 Total Hours, 65 Hours Idling 90 Hours Driving Oil Life meter showed 56%

bobistheoilguy.com

 

[187Penguin]

Are you sure the latest UOA was with PUP and not PP? The formulation seems to be a lot closer to PP.

Boron ended up at only 10 ppm, and some of that would have been from the previous fill. PUP starts out with ~180 ppm boron, and while it does disappear from the oil over time and this was a long OCI, I've never seen it get down to 10 ppm.

The moly, phosphorus, calcium, and magnesium levels are also more consistent with PP than with PUP. These elements don't disappear from the oil like boron does. VOAs from PQIA put Mo and Ph at 53 ppm and 589 ppm for PP 0W-20, almost exactly the same as your UOA. VOAs for PUP 0W-20 tend to show around 91 ppm Mo and 691 ppm Ph.

100% positive it was PUP. I did the change myself. I always use PUP, but the Podunk parts store was sold out, so I just grabbed PP this time because I was doing a 400 mile drive the next day and didn’t wanna let it go any further.

 

[himemsys]

Here ya go!

Pennzoil 0W-20 MOPAR Factory Fill, 2021 Ram 1500 3.6L E-Torque Pentastar, 3,007 Miles

Just got this back from Blackstone and thought I would share. 2021 Bighorn 1500 4x4 3.6L E-Torque Pentastar Factory Pennzoil 0w20 fill Sample taken 4 months almost to the day from purchase 3007 Miles 155 Total Hours, 65 Hours Idling 90 Hours Driving Oil Life meter showed 56%

bobistheoilguy.com

So the iron is definitely higher than average (3.98 vs 2.36 ppm per 1000 mi). But I still don't think it's at an area of concern yet. I would continue to monitor and see if it stays steady or climbs.

The copper is way below average (0.27 vs 2.78 ppm per 1000 mi).

You might email BS and ask for updated Universal Averages as those are now 3 years old.

 

[hemioiler]

So the iron is definitely higher than average (3.98 vs 2.36 ppm per 1000 mi). But I still don't think it's at an area of concern yet. I would continue to monitor and see if it stays steady or climbs.

The copper is way below average (0.27 vs 2.78 ppm per 1000 mi).

You might email BS and ask for updated Universal Averages as those are now 3 years old.

I always wondered, are the average values in the very far right column an average that they see across all UOA's for that engine (regardless of mileage), or do they actually give everybody an average value specific to the mileage that that car/truck ran in that specific UOA?

 

[fantastic]

I always wondered, are the average values in the very far right column an average that they see across all UOA's for that engine (regardless of mileage), or do they actually give everybody an average value specific to the mileage that that car/truck ran in that specific UOA?

Yes, it's regardless of mileage but I do remember someone may be it was @himemsys said the extremes are excluded to not throw off the averages. It's for all engines of like. The center avg's are for you.

Here's their readout pdf
https://www.blackstone-labs.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Understanding-Engine-combined.pdf

 

[himemsys]

I always wondered, are the average values in the very far right column an average that they see across all UOA's for that engine (regardless of mileage), or do they actually give everybody an average value specific to the mileage that that car/truck ran in that specific UOA?

They have mentioned a couple of times on their podcast that for their Universal Averages, they only use samples that are past break-in and don't show any issues.

Also, the UA are for an engine type. If the engine type has been used in multiple models and years, they are all combined and averaged, after they've removed the ones that show issues or aren't past the wear-in stage.

 

[hemioiler]

So it's not all that helpful then, some guys are doing 5000 mile intervals and some are doing 10k.

 

[himemsys]

So it's not all that helpful then, some guys are doing 5000 mile intervals and some are doing 10k.

That's where averaging comes in. A bunch of 10k runs with iron at 2 and a bunch of 5k runs with iron at 1 will both tell you that iron is averaging 2ppm per 1000 miles. Now average these across hundreds or thousands of the same engine type and you get a very good idea of typical wear metal levels for that engine and a nice benchmark for comparing your own results to.

 

[Bill7]

That's where averaging comes in. A bunch of 10k runs with iron at 2 and a bunch of 5k runs with iron at 1 will both tell you that iron is averaging 2ppm per 1000 miles. Now average these across hundreds or thousands of the same engine type and you get a very good idea of typical wear metal levels for that engine and a nice benchmark for comparing your own results to.

Wear metals are so insignificant either way. The big worry is something a UOA can't measure: Sludge, varnish accumulation and piston ring's getting stuck with gunk due to extended OCI.

 

[hemioiler]

That's where averaging comes in. A bunch of 10k runs with iron at 2 and a bunch of 5k runs with iron at 1 will both tell you that iron is averaging 2ppm per 1000 miles. Now average these across hundreds or thousands of the same engine type and you get a very good idea of typical wear metal levels for that engine and a nice benchmark for comparing your own results to.

The problem isn't the averaging of wear metals, it's that we don't know the other variable: what's the average mileage that the engine is running on an oil change?

They give me an average of 21 ppm for iron for my engine. Ok, nice, but how many miles was that averaged on? Because my mileage isn't necessarily the same as the average so I can't make that comparison to the average to see how I'm doing.

I'd rather them convert it to the "per 1000 miles" value.

 

[himemsys]

The problem isn't the averaging of wear metals, it's that we don't know the other variable: what's the average mileage that the engine is running on an oil change?

They give me an average of 21 ppm for iron for my engine. Ok, nice, but how many miles was that averaged on? Because my mileage isn't necessarily the same as the average so I can't make that comparison to the average to see how I'm doing.

I'd rather them convert it to the "per 1000 miles" value.

Blackstone will give you the average mileage the first time you do a UOA for a Unit ID. And you could always email them and request updated numbers (and mileage) for any unit you've had them test.

If you read the report that @187Penguin linked above in post #28, you will see in Blackstone's comments "based on ~7200 miles of oil use".

 

[hemioiler]

Blackstone will give you the average mileage the first time you do a UOA for a Unit ID. And you could always email them and request updated numbers (and mileage) for any unit you've had them test.

If you read the report that @187Penguin linked above in post #28, you will see in Blackstone's comments "based on ~7200 miles of oil use".

Interesting, I looked back to my first UOA and sure enough, average iron is 22 ppm at approx 10,000 kms. That was 4 years ago.

Appreciate the info! I missed that the first time around.

 

[Plum Bob]

I would use a higher HTHS oil. Walmart has:

Pennzoil 5W-30 Euro L
Castrol 5W-30 A3/B4
Mobil 1 ESP 5W-30

 

[187Penguin]

I would use a higher HTHS oil. Walmart has:

Pennzoil 5W-30 Euro L
Castrol 5W-30 A3/B4
Mobil 1 ESP 5W-30

M1 ESP has been highly recommended. All things being equal, what’s the difference between M1 ESP and M1 ESP X2?