interesting reading.

so when is a synthetic not a synthetic

http://www.1st-in-synthetics.com/articles60.htm

 

Mobil 1 is going to get my vote in that case.

Nonsynthetic oils use a paraffin mineral oil base stock. This is what is used in Group I-III oils. Group III is what Castrol Syntec now is. A Group III oil is nothing more than an oil that uses a more highly filtered base stock than a Group I or II. That's the biggest difference in these oils. The base stocks of these groups can have anywhere from 10-30% contaminants in them! How a little more filtering make it a synthetic? This is what Castrol is claiming. A Group III is still a better oil than a conventional Group I-II oil but it is still not up to what a Group IV-V oil is.

"Synthetics" do not use a paraffin base stock. They use PAO's (poly alpha olefins) or any other base stock that is not a PAO or paraffin base. Synthetics are Group IV and Group V oils. Castrol Syntec used to be based on a PAO base stock. PAO's are better than paraffin bases. They resist breakdown better. The additives are what make any oil a motor oil but the base stock is what is important when it comes to breakdown and longevity. Mobil 1 does use a PAO base stock in their synthetic oil which makes it a Group IV.

Castrol is correct in that their Group III Syntec is a better oil than a typical Group I-II oil but it is ludicrous to say it is equal to or better a true synthetic Group IV-V. There would be one exception to this though. If you have a Group IV-V oil that does not have the necessary additive package to make it a viable oil and you do have the proper additives to make a Group III oil a good oil then you could have a better Group III product. Remember without the additives, you don't have motor oil. It can't do it's job without the additives. If Castrol used a PAO base stock in the past but did the bare minimum of additives and then switched to a Group III base but is using a much better additive package, then of course it would be a better oil now than what it was. It will probably still breakdown faster in the long run but it's protection could be higher. Either way Castrol is misleading people somewhere whether it be with how good their old formulation really was or with the fact that they no longer make Synthetic and don't tell you that.

 

From the article:
This is ancient news!

At any rate - Castrol does actually produce a couple of genuine PAO synthetics - the made-in-Germany Syntec 0W30 is a PAO, and one of the very best synthetics on the market; and the made-in-Belgium Syntec 5W40 is also a PAO synthetic.

 

it might be ancient to you but I 've never done so much oil reading as I have since this whole 'synthetic or not' issue came up for me with my purchase of the rx-8. I think it's too bad what's happened here. How they can call that synthetic, what a dirty rotten scheme. And then call it SYNtec.
and to think I may have bought it instead of mobil 1 for my miata, thinking I was getting a similar product.

I'll never buy it even though it might be great oil , just for the fact that it's dishonest.

 

Just more another for Mazda (and everyone else) to avoid the whole "Synthetics good/ Synthetics bad" argument.

 

It's old for everybody - the press release is dated 1999 - even if you're hearing about it for the first time, you have to consider it in context of the date. Castrol might have been the first oil company to market a non-PAO oil as synthetic in 1999, but do you still think that's their exclusive domain? No way - quite a few of the other synthetic oils on the market now, 6 years later, are also non-PAO based. In fact, there's more non-PAO synthetics on the market than there are PAO synthetics!

Secondly - you ARE getting a similar product. As Castrol has proved, their Syntec oil does have very similar properties and characteristics to a PAO synthetic - since it acts like a synthetic oil chemically, why would you think it's inferior just because it's source stock is different? The end result - it's chemical properties and behavior - is basically indistinguishable from a PAO synthetic.

Thirdly - have you read RotaryGod's thread on synthetics and his discussions with Mazda engineers? They suggested that one of the very few synthetic oils that might not be completely compatible with the Renesis engine (due to immiscibility with gasoline) was Mobil1! If you place any weight on that statement, then Syntec is a better oil than Mobil1 for your Renesis engine.

 

I think your missing the point. Syntec is not a pure synthetic. Most people think synthetic means not based upon petrolem. So those that want to help the world through enviromentalism are being decieved.

I for one think that if I were to use a synthetic oil it wouldn't be based on petrolem and I would be saving our oil reserves.

Worse case you should be pissed because of the marketing hype that makes you pay more for a good old oil.

 

Want to hear something real funny here. Synthetic oil is still a petroleum based product. The poly olefins are by-products of crude oil & natural gas. We just combine it with a catalyst under temperature to create a man-made polymer.

Sorry to burst bubbles, but PAO's cannot exist without using the original supply the dinosaurs left us.

 

And to muddy the waters even further, Syncrude, the oil sands company as well as the other oil sands companies here in Alberta Canada call the oil they extract from the oil sands "synthetic crude". There is really nothing synthetic about it. It's crude oil separated from sand. They do have to adjust the components to get it to flow, but that's about it.

 

poly olefins might be by products of crude, but they are NOT crude. true synthetics are far purer , cleaner, and hold up better under stress than do oils made from crude.

any manufacturer calling type 3 oil 'synthetic' is lying.

 

That was one thing that was brought up when I visited Royal Purple. David Canitz asked me, "what makes it truly synthetic?" I couldn't answer that. He said that every oil contains byproducts of the petroleum industry. It's what you do to it that determines what it "is".

 

FWIW, i was just at the auto parts store, getting some oil and other stuff, the current Castrol SynTec is rated as Group 4 and says 'excedes Group 4 requirements...ect. Cant remeber the API raiting.

 

When something says "exceeds or meets requirements" it simply means that it either meets or exceeds the minimum standard to be approved in that category. It doesn't tell you a whole lot and certainly not how it compares to other oils. You could get through school on all D's and pass. It doesn't mean you couldn't have done better and gotten an A,B, or C. All of those kids exceeded the passing requirement. If they'd have used that statement, no one would know who did better. Not saying Castrol has a bad oil. I used to use them. Just take any claims or statements with a grain of salt. It's very possible that Casrol now has Group IV oil again here. That article is almost 7 years old. There are many oil formulations that were new in the 90's that aren't even used anymore. The last 10 years has seen some big oil improvements. The important aspect of that article isn't who was involved but rather to shed light on what people consider synthetic or not.

 

I thought Mobil 1 was similarly reformulated following the ruling as a direct result of it