What base oils does Brad Penn use?

[saaber1]

After seeing this Brad Penn 10w30 used oil analysis on the 2.0 FSI, I'm considering the Brad Penn 10W40 for my next oil change (2.0 FSI).

The used oil analysis showed 5% shear for the 10W30, which is half the viscosity loss of the next best performing oil in the over 50 used oil analysis we have for that engine.

Assuming this one used oil analysis is not a fluke, what makes the Brad Penn so shear stable? Is it the base oils? If so what are they? Thanks for any thoughts.

 

[FusilliJerry82]

Genuine Pennsylvania crude.

 

[addyguy]

The 'Penngrade 1' HP oils are really something special.

They do use PA crude, but they use a lot of PAO, and group III hydro-cracked PA crude - these oils are a strong syn-blend.

They do have MSDS's for each oil on their site, if that helps......

 

[JAG]

The amount of polymeric VIIs used in their 10w30 appears to be very low, judging by the somewhat low VI (considering its base oils) value of 138 and by the low ratio of KV@100C viscosity to HTHS viscosity. HTHS viscosity is 3.54 cP. It may be better to use their 10w30 instead of 10W-40 in your application. There are many things to consider of course - a not-so-obvious one being that the 10w30 may be less volatile than the 10W-40 which is a possible advantage in gas DI engine. The base oils in those grades are different too.

 

[Johnny]

Originally Posted By: addyguy

They do use PA crude, but they use a lot of PAO, and group III hydro-cracked PA crude - these oils are a strong syn-blend.

They do have MSDS's for each oil on their site, if that helps......


Unless they have made some serious upgrades to that refinery, they are not able to make Group III base stocks. If they are using Group III base stocks, it is not from PA crude.

I personally think they make a fine oil, but the over marketing of PA crude is just that, marketing. A better term to use might be PA grade crude which most every Group II on the planet is. Big difference in the wording.

 

[saaber1]

Originally Posted By: JAG
The amount of polymeric VIIs used in their 10w30 appears to be very low, judging by the somewhat low VI (considering its base oils) value of 138 and by the low ratio of KV@100C viscosity to HTHS viscosity. HTHS viscosity is 3.54 cP. It may be better to use their 10w30 instead of 10W-40 in your application. There are many things to consider of course - a not-so-obvious one being that the 10w30 may be less volatile than the 10W-40 which is a possible advantage in gas DI engine. The base oils in those grades are different too.

Very interesting. If the 10W30 does have less VII's I would rather use that. Judging from that one used oil analysis only, the lower HTHS (3.54) of the 10W30 seemed fine as all metals were very low. The 10W40 is very thick, I think kv100 was 15.3 and HTHS was 4.2.

I suppose the best thing to do would be to try both in different runs.

One unknown variable I am dealing with on my car (mine is not the car that ran the Brad Penn referenced above) is I rerouted my pcv bypass on the last oil run in the middle of the run (at the 3000 mile mark), so that it pulls more vacuum. This may have resulted in less shear:

Pre PCV re-route, the oil lost 2% of virgin kv100 in 3000 miles (2700mile mark to 5700 mile mark)

Post PCV re-route, the oil lost 1% of virgin in 5000 miles (2700 mile mark to 7660 mile mark).

I need to do a used oil analysis soon on my redline 5w30/10w40 mix and that may shed some light on the PCV re-route variable (of course the mixing adds another variable as to what virgin kv100 actually was). Also those are both the "with moly and boron" formula vs. previous runs were with the "moly-free" redline 5w40.