Ferrari Mailing List: Re: All about oil????

[Hans E. Hansen (FList]

Peter:

I see what you're saying.  But it certainly is difficult to second guess
the Ferrari engineers.  However, charts that I've seen on actual oil
viscosity measurements seem to converge a bit at elevated temps.
ie: at room temp there is a big difference between the flow rates
of a single weight 20w oil and a single weight 50w.  But at high temps
the difference isn't as great.  Other than efficiency issues, tho, I can't
see what the harm is in using the thicker oil, as long as the 1st number
is low enough to allow decent flow at cold temps.  Ferrari's 10w50
recommendation would seem to have that covered.

Jeff, Matt:  Wasn't the zinc/phosphorus issue tossed around here
just a while back?  Or maybe it was on another car forum.  Anyway,
I have kicking about an excellent article about that, and some suggestions
for additives.  There is a company distributing the pure ZDDP additive.
Seems the real issue is cam wear with flat tappets (ie, not roller lifters),
however, I suspect that the additive is a good thing to have for cold
starts for those of us with carb'd engines, as there is considerable
raw gas washing the cylinder walls.  I'll dig around and attach the
article and product sources.

Paul:  Sounds like your car runs  (temp-wise) like mine.  In winter,
the water only gets to about 150ish, and the oil doesn't (or just
barely) moves off of the peg.  I've thought about replacing the oil
temp sensor, but I'm not sure it is faulty.  In hot weather or on the
occasional track day I do see temps like what you would expect.


Hans.


On 3/25/08, Peter Pless <ferrarilist [at] pless.com.au> wrote:
> That all makes sense Hans...BUT...what if ferrari wasn't really concerned
> with what happened at 212 deg, but more what happened at 260 deg on a very
> hot day or on the track? Which if the reality is that the 50 mineral oil
> drops to the same thickness at that temp as a 40 synthetic? That's really my
> question. Is it possible that 50 is thicker than ferrari would like in a
> perfect world because they had to protect the engine at 250+?
>
> Does that make sense?
>