Hunt to find the best possible oil.
 

What do you guys find is the absolute best in your cars? I had a skyline in the past and I ran just about every kind of oil in it. What weight of oil do you guys typically run? I'm thinking of switching to Royal Purple (ZDDP based) or AMS oil on the Boxster. I know a lot of people say it is over priced, but do you really want to screw with what lubricates your motor?

On my old R33 I had small amounts of oil consumption. I noticed some oils like Castrol ate pretty quickly, where as when I ran AMS and RP there was definitely an improvement. I want to know what you guys are running and possibly deviate from the regular consumer choice and put in some RP for science's sake. Also this may sound odd but in the skyline the RP would also cool down a lot quicker than the Castrol, and when at operating temp the oil was a little bit cooler. I baby my 986 and I mean I don't move it until its at operating temperature lol, at the same time it gets driven how it should be driven. However, I change the oil every 3,000KM, inspect brakes/tire pressure before going out on drives, ect... I basically have a little pilot checklist LOL. :D

What are you guys that are racing in the SPEC class running?

I use Kirkland Supreme Ultra Virgin Organic Olive Oil.
Any extra left over from the oil change I use for a killer vinagerette

PLEASE do a search of the forum. This has been discussed / debated to death, and no one wants to bother rehashing it for the 437,892nd time.

I use Joe Gibbs DT40 and previously Castrol Edge 5W40, great results with both.

Ditto on "topic done before" but what the hey..
Castrol 5w40 or 0w40 fan. I think the best advice is to do oil analysis (Blackstone Labs) and figure out how long your intervals should be and decide based on data about your oil choice.

Kirkland Balsamic Vinegar works pretty well

I use that for brake fluid

Hey Lucas..... For 12 years I used Mobil One 0w-40. Last year I switched to Joe Gibbs DT40 5w-40. I just completed my second oil change with Joe Gibbs and I am awaiting the Blackstone report on it. I understand that it takes two oil changes to derive the results when changing oil brands.

The things we do to try and compensate for poor engineering....

Tribology -the band aid, Lobotomy for the engineers -the 'cure' !
For Geeks only:
SECTION 1 – MOTOR OIL

what weight? 😄

i'm a big believer in 5w40 - the thicker cold weight (over 0w40) helped my start-up rattle. impossible to find mobil 5w40 in Canada, however, so I've been running mobil delvac. it's a diesel oil but also listed for high compression euro cars. has a great detergent pack but slightly lower flash temp than a high performance car-only oil. it's inexpensive and lots of it available up here in big truck land.

I am about to make the move to motul (finally found a reliable distributor - try motorcycle shops if you are having difficulty finding a vendor); i'm a fan of their rbf600 brake fluid and have heard great things about their gear oil and motor oil. my next fill is 5w40 8100 x-cess, then possibly try their 300v.

"I'm a big believer" .... so I won't challenge faith based feelings about oil. If you would like some science and technology the link provided would give you fact on which to base your beliefs :-).
BTW -You are technically correct.Here are the Cliff Notes from 540RAT;
Lower viscosity oils with the right 'package' and shear strength are generally better - with caveats -see link.Lower viscosity oils also reduce foaming- see below.
For the M96 we have some particular challenges.
1. The shear strength/temperature issue is often mentioned. That is easy to optimize if you read the oil rankings. There are some good, inexpensive options among the widely available non-synthetic oils (see link).
2. I am intrigued by the foaming problems in the M96. Porsche obviously had technical problems controlling this issue(worthy of a whole separate thread). The higher silicone/lower detergent values in some oils clearly help.
It is surprising that Valvoline VR1 10w/30 conventional is not frequently recommended for the M96 - high ZDDP,very good anti-foam/low detergent. It would need more frequent changing than some other oils .But if you are interested in this subject you are probably changing at 3k miles anyway?

Plain ol' Mobil 1 5W30 ranks 10th out of 143!

Here are the top 10 for ease of reading;

1. Prolong Engine Treatment added to 5W30 Pennzoil Ultra
2. Prolong Engine Treatment added to 5W30 Castrol GTX
3. Prolong Engine Treatment added to 5W30 Pennzoil
4. 5W30 Motul 300V Ester Core 4T Racing Oil
5. “Oil Extreme concentrate” added to 5W30 Pennzoil Ultra
6. “Oil Extreme concentrate” added to 10W30 Brad Penn, Penn Grade 1
7. Oil Extreme Motor Oil 5W30
8. 10W30 Lucas Racing Only
9. CFS 0W30 NT Millers Nanodrive Racing Oil
10. 5W30 Mobil 1

Agreed, great Synthetic pick from the list and readily available at a reasonable price.

well, I could remove my 'faith based statement' regarding viscosity and counter with a list of Porsche-approved oils which has a lot of 5w40 in it:

Porsche-Approved Oils

but, if we take the self-published blog approach (the one that starts with three pages of credentials and brings the statement "methinks thou doest protest too much" to mind) then viscosity is moot, replaced only with wear performance. I can't help but think that this analysis is more geared towards tappet and solid lifter engines, however (ie, should I worry about cam lobe wear or keeping my hydraulic lifters from gumming up?)? similarly foaming - as much of an issue with our 9 litre capacity integrated dry sump engine as it is with a 6 litre capacity wet sump American lump (m96 starvation issues more associated with oil pickup location, sump baffle design and banked high-speed corners?)? in the end I really know nothing about oil; I base my decisions on availability, change my oil every 5k miles and check my filter after every track weekend.

regarding some of the other posts in this thread; only a fool would use olive oil in their engine; that is to be used in transmissions only.

BTW, thanks for the link, it was good reading. :cheers:

I laughed so hard soda came out of my nose bahahaha

There is a very similar ranking available from Molekule on "Bob is the oil Guy". I have some of the tech/acedemic credentials for tribology -just enough to concede I am way under qualified to dispute anything 540RAT or Molakule write.
This exam humbled me:
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/motor-oil-final-exam/

Porsche don't rank their approved oils for specific performance criteria. It would be interesting to read anything Porsche write about shear/temperature/foaming for street cars. I mention this because the O.P. want the absolute 'best' oil.