" From: Tom Jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx> " " I dunno about this oil stuff... is this one of those things like the lack of " lead causing excessive valve wear? I know there's actual chemistry involved " with the lube business but I've never heard of any of our engines dying from " oil related issues. it's happened. go over to strokers@yahoogroups and ask about cam failures... " The lead/valve wear thing turned out to be a crock and it's hard to get worked " up about this oil thing. http://www.lnengineering.com/oil.html for a start. somewhere in the twisty maze of urls starting at the bottom of that pg i tracked down the '77 sae paper he mentions, and in it they set the old zddp levels by observing cam and lifter wear on production engines. so no, it isn't snake oil. the recent flap was set off by muscle car owners and old car folks like us who've been seeing premature cam lobe failures, ultimately traced to low zddp levels in modern oils. it appears to be a problem only for folks running flat-tappet pushrod engines and has something to do with valve spring pressures. ohc engines and roller lifter engines aren't subject to it. anecdote: mopar went to low-tension 'beehive' valve springs on late-ish 4.0s, presumably to try and cope with low zddp levels, but a local jeep mechanic who's old enough to have a touch of gray and a limp says they're crap and whenever he has a problem with them or traceable to them, he replaces them with the older style springs. i'll have to ask him if he ever has comebacks with cam failures next time i see him. ________________________________________________________________________ Andrew Hay the genius nature internet rambler is to see what all have seen adh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and think what none thought _______________________________________________ Amc-list mailing list Amc-list@xxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.amc-list.com/mailman/listinfo/amc-list