Valvoline VR1 20W-50 vs. Brad Penn 20W-50

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Big Dave

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Wanted to get some opinions from the board regarding Valvoline VR1 20W-50 vs. Brad Penn 20W-50 Racing Semi-Synthetic.

I'm using the Valvoline VR1 in my '89 Porsche Carrera which has a 3.2L air-cooled engine and 15,300 miles. For those who don't know...it has a 12+ quart oil capacity.

The Brad Penn has my interest for my next OC as it is a synthetic blend and appears to have higher levels of ZDDP that is helpful on these older engines.

Open to anyone's opinions.

David
 
The Brad Penn racing oil is the old Kendall GT-1, so it gets my vote.
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Between the two brands I would choose the Valvoline simply because it is a much better established company with a long track record backed up by modern R&D facilities. Brad Penn is the little company that bought what used to be the Kendall refinery when the Kendall brand itself got sold down the river. Not knowing much about the current incarnation of Brad Penn I would go with the better establshed Valvoline brand.

Claims of being a "synthetic blend" are simply marketing noise these days. If vendor CP produces an oil by mixing Group I and Group III basestocks it can call that oil a synthetic blend. Vendor AV might hit the same or better base oil performance criteria by using a high quality Group II base stock, which cannot be called a synthetic blend. In fact, the "blend" might have overall inferior properties to the "conventional" oil ... or it might not. We have no way to know.
 
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Brad Penn is the little company that bought what used to be the Kendall refinery when the Kendall brand itself got sold down the river. Not knowing much about the current incarnation of Brad Penn I would go with the better establshed Valvoline brand.

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That is inaccurate. The Bradford refinery is operating with the same R&D facilities it had when it was Kendall. When Witco sold the Kendall brand name, the American Refining Group bought the refinery and all the rights to the various Kendall oil formulas, and these formulas have been tweaked to keep up with current API service categories in the ten years that ARG has been producing them under the Brad Penn name.
 
I've heard nothing but great things about Valvoline VR1 and Valvoline in geneneral. Good oil! They apparently have top notch R&D.
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I want to know if you can get Brad Penn oils in Australia. I have sent several emails to them with out any reply!
 
I'm also wanting to know more about the VR1 20w 50 racing oil. We only have Valvoline XLD 20 w 50 and I'm pretty sure you would not use that for racing. The ONLY Valvoline racing oil we have is there Racing 50 a 25w 60 SH.

By any chance can anyone direct me to a TDS on the VR1 20w 50?

Does anyone know of anyone bringing it in to Aus?
 
The closest Brad Penn distributor to me is about 70 miles. I called them today to get a price on the Penn Grade 1 20w50: $2.75 per qt in cases of 12 quarts.
 
OK G-man, American Refining Group is the relatively small company which sells it's products on the retail market at Brad Penn as well as doing private label and bulk refined products business. By comparison to Ashland/Valvoline they are still a tiny little niche company and I would still be inclined to use a Valvoline product over Brad Penn absent some decent amount of real data about Brad Penn. Still having the same R&D facilities which were used to cook up Kendall oils decades ago isn't especially impressive today.

Their website says: "Penn Grade 1® Racing Oils come from the oldest continuously operating refinery in the USA (former Kendall Refinery)." Hmmm, I'm not sure it is an advantage to produce your product in the oldest factory of it's kind in the country.
 
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OK G-man, American Refining Group is the relatively small company which sells it's products on the retail market at Brad Penn as well as doing private label and bulk refined products business. By comparison to Ashland/Valvoline they are still a tiny little niche company and I would still be inclined to use a Valvoline product over Brad Penn absent some decent amount of real data about Brad Penn. Still having the same R&D facilities which were used to cook up Kendall oils decades ago isn't especially impressive today.

Their website says: "Penn Grade 1® Racing Oils come from the oldest continuously operating refinery in the USA (former Kendall Refinery)." Hmmm, I'm not sure it is an advantage to produce your product in the oldest factory of it's kind in the country.

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Let's see...with your logic you better stay away from Amsoil, Redline, Royal Purple, and Schaeffers--none of which actually refine their own base oils, BTW. (Come to think of it, Valvoline doesn't even refine their own base oils. They're just a blender, too.)

Judging the quality of a product based on the size of the company is a fallacy of the highest magnitude. If such a correlation existed, GM would be making the finest cars in the world.
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I would run Brad Penn any day over VR1 for 3 reasons:
1) I live 40 miles south of the refinery
2) Brad Penn is made from 100% pure Pennsylvania crude oil. (Home state pride kind of thing)
3) I ran it in my bike for 20 miles and drained it out because my transmission wasn't shifting right.
 
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Same problem, Brad Penn distributor is 150 miles round trip.

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I called 'em up this morning and asked if they would UPS me a case, and he said 'no problem.' So I've got a case of the 20w50 on the way to use in my Harley. The UPS charges will be less than I'd spend on gas to drive up there to get it.

Penn-Grade 1 20w50 is a true syn-blend, being made from Group I (Heavy Neutral and Bright Stock) plus PAO.
 
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udging the quality of a product based on the size of the company is a fallacy of the highest magnitude. If such a correlation existed, GM would be making the finest cars in the world.

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Getting back to the original topic, another reason to choose the Penn-Grade 1 over VR1 is the VR1 (according to the MSDS) is made from nothing but Group I. The Penn-Grade 1 has a good dose of PAO in the base oil blend. I suspect the PG1 thus uses less VI improver than the VR1, especially since they are also using Bright Stock in the base oil blend. The VR1 doesn't even have Bright Stock; it's all Heavy Neutral.
 
Personally I'd take Schaeffer's over either one of the two. My engine builder commented that when he switched from Kendall to Schaeffer's, he eliminated the problem he'd occasisionally get with cam bearings in the Chevy V8s.

I wouldn't run Valvoline in a lawn mower.

Just my 2 cents.
 
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