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[Beemer]

I've been using Royal Purple for years in everything I own...from my 04 Road King Custom to my John Deere Lawn Tractor.  Has anyone changed to the RP Max Cycle 20/50?  I'm interested if they've noticed better performance in seat of the pants & Dyno #s.  I had no problems running it in all three holes on the RK and the bike ran quite a bit cooler...so much so, that it took much longer to even get the thermostat to open up on the Super Premium Oil cooler...I thought it might even plugged at first!  I'm planning on switching at my 1K service but the stuff in the owner's hand book about substituting Diesel oil has me scratching my head...what gives

[UFO_HOG]

I think the Diesel oil thing is you can use it in a pinch. I have ran Royal Purple in everything I have owned also. When I made the switch on my 02 RG I recorded a 30 degree loss in head temp. The stuff is amazing. When I get to my 1K service, I will switch over the entire bike. 20/50 in the engine and transmission, and 10/30 in the primary.

[RickC]

Hmmm... never used Royal Purple.

I'm not a fan of H-D lubricants. I hear they award the contract based on lowest bid. Not sure I want the low-bid winner's products in my HD.

I'm a BIG fan of AMSOIL. Have it in everything I own -- two- and four-wheel. I run their V-Twin 20W50 in the motor and primary and their gear oil in the tranny. My CruiseDrive 6 is much quieter with AMSOIL than Syn3. I have also used Bel-Ray in the tranny with similar results.

AMSOIL has been doing synthetics longer than most anybody. The only name-brand synthetic that comes close to AMSOIL in the studies I've seen is Mobile One. Every other oil in the studies pales in comparison, particularly when it comes to protection over the lifetime of the engine. Don't remember whether Royal Purple was in those studies.

So, where do I find more info on Royal Purple?

[UFO_HOG]

So, where do I find more info on Royal Purple?

www.royalpurple.com

I have found that running gear oil in the transmission seems to make it shift a little harder. Running the 20/50 motoroil makes it shift like butter...

Amsoil is a good product, but my engine builder likes Royal Purple. It gives a noticable increase in power on a dyno, and dyno runs are more consistant.

[Beemer]

GOOGLE it...its been used in the racing community for years and only went to the public about 5 or 7 years ago.

[screem]

i see max cycle oils listed at $16.00 a quart...thats about $96 + filter for an oil change...how many miles are you running this stuff in your bikes? Is
$16.00 a quart what your paying? Who has the best prices on theses products?

[grc]

In an oil test with several brands of motorcycle specific oils, Royal Purple came in dead last (16th of 16) in the wear test, and 8th out of 16 in overall ranking.  For comparison, SYN 3 came in at 6th of 16 overall. 

Jerry

[porthole]

I used Royal Purple until I read the above mentioned report. Apparently all their hype about engine temp reduction and protection is just that.

Now it is Mobil 1 and Red Line for the trans and has been for about 3 years

[RickC]

In an oil test with several brands of motorcycle specific oils, Royal Purple came in dead last (16th of 16) in the wear test, and 8th out of 16 in overall ranking.  For comparison, SYN 3 came in at 6th of 16 overall.

And AMSOIL, Mobile One and BMW tied for first. This is the study I saw... just didn't remember that Royal Purple was included, prolly cause they finished dead last.

[Beemer]

WOW...That has me concerned.   Do you have a link to the entire article?  Enquiring minds want to know

[UFO_HOG]

In an oil test with several brands of motorcycle specific oils, Royal Purple came in dead last (16th of 16) in the wear test, and 8th out of 16 in overall ranking.  For comparison, SYN 3 came in at 6th of 16 overall. 

Jerry

That test is only based on straight 50 wt oil. Awfully hard to make a judgement on that. And those results came off of an Amsoil highly sponsered web page...Now we know why they finished first.

[grc]

That test is only based on straight 50 wt oil. Awfully hard to make a judgement on that. And those results came off of an Amsoil highly sponsered web page...Now we know why they finished first.

The test uses the various multi-weight oils listed in the attachment.  The grouping in the test results was broken out by 40 weight and 50 weight, but that doesn't mean they were straight weight oils.  The rating is for the high temp viscosity, not the low temp flow rating.

Yes, Amsoil published the test results.  If you go through each of the individual tests in the complete report, you will notice that they did not finish first in all categories.  So if they fudged this test at least they were smart enough to not make it too obvious.

Jerry

[hard10]

I was talking to a parts "guy" the other day that was trying to explain to me that most synthetic oils are not 100% synthetic. Not to open a can of worms, but what's the truth here?

[hard10]

This is what he was trying to sell me on:

[grc]

I was talking to a parts "guy" the other day that was trying to explain to me that most synthetic oils are not 100% synthetic. Not to open a can of worms, but what's the truth here?

Part of the problem is that there is no hard and fast rule about what can be called synthetic and what can't.  If you define fully synthetic as a product that contains only Group IV base stock, there will be a lot of so-called synthetics that would have to be renamed semi-synthetic.  In fact, Amsoil took Castrol to court over that issue a few years back because the Syntec stuff had more Group III highly refined mineral oil than it did Group IV PAO non-mineral "synthetic" oil.  The court sided with Castrol, and as a result we don't have an enforceable definition of a "true" synthetic motor oil.

My personal definition, not enforceable by anyone, is that a full synthetic contains only Group IV base stock, and a semi-synthetic contains a mixture of Group III and Group IV.  Since the Group III oils are very highly refined/modified mineral oils, they have many performance characteristics that are fairly similar to the true synthetics.  However, they cost less.  If the end product is priced below a true synthetic and labeled as a semi-synthetic, there is no harm and no foul IMHO.  Where the rub comes is when the product is advertised as synthetic and priced the same as the full synthetics, but doesn't perform quite as well. 

Here is a short description of the various API Group classifications for oil base stocks:

Group 1 - Conventional - Mineral oil derived from crude oil
Group 2 - Hydroprocessed - Highly refined mineral oil
Group 3 – Severe hydroprocessed - Ultra refined mineral oil
Group 4 – Full synthetics (chemically derived) - Chemically built Polyalphaolefins (PAO).

Groups 1 – 3 basestocks are derived from crude oil pumped from the ground whereas Group 4 basestocks are chemically derived, most often from ethylene gas, and contain none of the contaminants present in mineral oils. 

In my opinion, stick with Amsoil or Mobil 1.

Jerry