Redline Leaking Advice

[carock]

I was just talking to an old mechanic friend of mine who still works on 60's european cars. We had always known that switching to Redline ( highly desirable in aircooled cars) could cause leaks. He has found that gradually adding Redline oil, say 25% on the first oil change, 50% the second, never leaks. He also thinks it is best to add a little Redline through the break in process, as this has prevented any leaks from developing when the car goes to 100% Redline.

 

[Steve S]

300,000 miles on a '79 Ford F150 300 cid 6 cylinder running Mobil 1 Amsoil and Redline without any seal leaking. I would heed the advice of your mechanic friend because he works on the stuff!!!

 

[Alcibiades]

If the mechanic's suggestion works, then...it works. Follow the advice. I don't see how Redline would cause a leak, though. Doesn't it make more sense to say that it finds leaks more easily than other oils? But then I've heard this about Mobil and Amsoil as well. None of that, however, changes the fact that adding it slowly may prevent leaks. Perhaps it has to do with the esters slowly swelling the seals over time?

 

[ewetho]

Just make sure that the breather system on you car is up to the task. Had a old modified 71 SuperBeetle and would leak a little oil but would mist redline all over the engine via the breather. Conventional oil just some seepage from the pushrod seals and oil sump gasket. Redline motor covered in oil in 30 miles. Rad smooth as butter but oil everywhere.

My issue was too much compression and it desperately required a breather box connecting the valve covers and and oil fill and larger recovery box.

 

[JohnBrowning]

Really Old cars had very poor seal technology that could react in many different ways to esters! If he has had good results by slowly increaseing the percentage of ester based oil then follow his lead! In modern cars that have healthy seals their is no need to go about switching to synthetics in this way!

 

[carock]

I was an early adopter of Redline. I think I started in 1977 or 1979, I could remember wrong. Ron and I worked on British, French, and German cars. Occasionally, we would get a car that gushered after we put Redline in it. My Lotus Elan was one of the victims. Because of the frequent rebuild schedule of a Lotus, I was soon able to get new seals in the car, some of our customers were not so fortunate. Converting back to conventional oil always solved the problem within 2000 miles. We persisted in using Redline because our racing engine teardowns showed unmistakeable improvements in engine wear compared to Valvoline conventional oil.