@High Performance Lubricants sorry but I wanted to chase down several loose ends with hopefully a definitive answer; I’ll try to summarize as much as possible.
We’ve all seen and heard that moly is a friction reducer; there is plenty of documentation here already on that. One would
assume that with friction reduction, there would also be wear reduction. While some of us know that UOAs are not a valid wear measurement tool, there have been same engine type/ same owner samples that may show an oil with 2x/3x/5x for example more moly, yet the entire UOA can look essentially identical otherwise. This doesn’t make sense on its surface considering the trimer/dimer moly’s have plenty of proof that they are extremely “slippery”. Thoughts?
However, many who have gone to a high moly oil (Idemitsu, Redline, HPL, or even some who add MoS2 or Lubegard BioTech) nearly all mention their engines sounding “quieter”. We know that moly is a fairly hard metal; I’ve posited (WAG, really) that moly is maybe acting as a “shock absorber” as well and this sacrificial layer is somehow quieting the engine? Or is it possible that the moly is simply filling in some of the asperities between surfaces which then improves the amount of surface area experiencing hydrodynamic lubrication?
What’s HPL’s 10,000’ view on moly since your oils obviously use quite a bit of the good stuff, and any quick anecdotes on why high moly oils don’t
appear to offer any wear benefit even when analyzing single-engine trends over multiple UOAs? Thanks!!