VOA Castrol GTX HM 10W-30

[NissanFan]

Note: This analysis was done on the leftovers on an old open quart for poops and giggles. I believe the quart might have been at least 2 years old.

Castrol GTX HM 10w30

V40 79.04
V100 11.98
VI 148
TBN 6.31

Ag 0
Al 1
Ca 2538
Cd 0
Cr 0
Cu 0
Fe 1
K 1
Mg 9
Mn 0
Mo 2
Na 4
Ni 0
P 749
Pb 0
S 3330
Sb 1
Sn 0
Ti 0
V 0
Zn 819

Questions on this come to mind, The additive package seems pretty unextraordinary. Also seems to be on the higher end of a 30 weight for viscosity, no? Wouldn't this be a good thing? I was trying to find a newer VOA on the same oil from Castrol for comparison sake to see if the formula changed, but couldn't find one. I might consider having one done. One thing I found interesting though, is that this older HM oil is very similar in elemental analysis to the regular GTX 5w30 VOA I posted earlier except that S is higher by about 1000 ppm. And, yes, probably a stupid comparison to make, but just something noticed.

 

[Triple_Se7en]

Add-pack looks pretty weak - in comparison to the Mobil-1 HM 10w30.

 

[INDYMAC]

Is that "S" as in Sulfur?

 

[JAG]

Yeah, S is Sulfur.

What a terribly low TBN it has.

 

[NissanFan]

I also noticed that the TBN wasn't as high as I would have expected from a HM oil, though, I guess what really counts is how well it maintains this number as far as my understanding, correct? I guess all in all, I also would have expected the AP to be higher in numbers as well, as I mentioned it didn't differ too much from the regular GTX 5W-20 that I ran a VOA on, except for the sulfur being markedly higher. This being a sample this is a couple years old as well makes me wonder how much of a difference.

 

[JAG]

Yes it's true that what counts is how long the TBN can stay in the "good" zone but starting at 6.3 puts it at a big disadvantage. I don't expect this oil to have the high-tech modern additives needed to do long drains while starting with low TBN. That's because when making a long drain oil, one doesn't make it out of non-synthetic basestocks because even if the TBN was good, the basestocks wouldn't be stable enough. I'm digressing now...

I do wonder if some additive settling occurred from the bottle sitting so long.

 

[G-MAN]

Something wrong here. The GTX HM 5w30 I ran in my van had a higher TBN than this after a year of use and 5000 miles.

 

[NissanFan]

Quote:

---

I do wonder if some additive settling occurred from the bottle sitting so long.

---

I wondered the same thing....I have another bottle out in the garage of the same stuff that is not opened yet, as well as just a bit left of the stuff I sampled from. I'm thinking about having another one done. Maybe one of each.

 

[NissanFan]

Ok, update on this sample, I know it's old, but I was still curious so I popped open the other left over quart I had of this in the garage and had it run as well. As you will see almost everything was repeated in the elemental analysis and the physical properties tested as well as TBN. Addressing the gentleman who mentioned that his 5w30 version had a higher TBN after a year of service, I do not know what to make of that, other than you do know that diff grades of oils even in the same "line" will probably have diff starting base numbers due to differences in additive levels in the blend, but it is puzzling to hear that still. Take a look below the quote of the original post to see the numbers of the 2nd sampling.


Originally Posted By: NissanFan
Note: This analysis was done on the leftovers on an old open quart for poops and giggles. I believe the quart might have been at least 2 years old.

Castrol GTX HM 10w30

V40 79.04
V100 11.98
VI 148
TBN 6.31

Ag 0
Al 1
Ca 2538
Cd 0
Cr 0
Cu 0
Fe 1
K 1
Mg 9
Mn 0
Mo 2
Na 4
Ni 0
P 749
Pb 0
S 3330
Sb 1
Sn 0
Ti 0
V 0
Zn 819

Questions on this come to mind, The additive package seems pretty unextraordinary. Also seems to be on the higher end of a 30 weight for viscosity, no? Wouldn't this be a good thing? I was trying to find a newer VOA on the same oil from Castrol for comparison sake to see if the formula changed, but couldn't find one. I might consider having one done. One thing I found interesting though, is that this older HM oil is very similar in elemental analysis to the regular GTX 5w30 VOA I posted earlier except that S is higher by about 1000 ppm. And, yes, probably a stupid comparison to make, but just something noticed.



V40 79.19
V100 11.97
VI
TBN 6.54

Ag 0
Al 3
Ca 2546
Cd 0
Cr 0
Cu 0
Fe 1
K 2
Mg 10
Mn 0
Mo 2
Na 3
Ni 0
P 744
Pb 0
S 2920
Sb 2
Si 12
Sn 1
Ti 0
V 0
Zn 814

Well, there it is..as you can see everything is pretty much identical, except the sulfur being slightly lower. Is that still w/in the margin of error? Also I don't know why I didn't include the Si level in the original sample, I must have just missed it when typing it in and did the same thing when I was entering it into my Word file. What say y'all?

 

[NissanFan]

Another thing, I don't know if it matters anyway, since this is an old bottle, and it might or probably has been reformulated since these were bottled.

 

[daman]

did you shake up the bottle good before the sample was pulled??

 

[shanneba]

Is this some of the post Katrina oil? Didn't API allow a period of lower specs for a while after that?