Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums General Tech Shell Rotella Reformulation question?

Well I was reading a post on another board and a member brought this up about the Shell Rotella T in the blue Jug.

Posted this in "General", but thot I'd do so here too, since I'm running it in all my vehicles (including Honda VTX with wet clutch). Went to store and found old and new blue jugs...new was no longer SJ, and it had a disclaimer about running in 2007 engines???
Has any other Rotella users herd of this being an issue?? I've been using this for a while but not sure if I should continue. Not trying to start another "oil thread" but knowing there are others besides me using this I wanted to bring it up. I guess I should e-mail Shell.

What did they do? Anybody got details?

I have not looked into it yet - I knew they had a new Rotella product - white jug, "Triple Protection".....

I did not know they reformulated the blue jug synthetic Rotella-T.

"WE" need to be checking out the Shell Rotella Motorcycle Forum here:

SHELL ROTELLA-T MOTORCYCLE FORUM

I can't right now, but you can bet I will be reading more in that forum tonight!

Diesel engine oil makers had to change up for the on-highway large truck engines built in the US on or after 01/01/2007, (aka '07 engines) due to the challenges presented by these very clean running engines, hence the new spec. I don't recall all the requirements that caused the need of a spec change, but truck under the hood temps have spiked way up over the past few years in the quest for a cleaner burn. The advent of EGR based engines was part of this. For instance, one truck maker had problems with the windshield washer fluid boiling out of the under hood reservoir.

Is the new Rotella safe for use in a Triumph? I dunno. Probably. A 3 to 5 thousand mile duty cycle followed by an oil analysis should tell the tale. If wear & contaminant parameters come back OK, there you go. Blackstone Labs has built up a database of Triumph oil analysis results, and can report if our oil samples meet average numbers or not.

I don't have any high mileage trip agendas, so I'm thinking to go back to the Triumph spec'd Mobil synth once the weather here warms up. I know it's pricey, but an extra $50 a year won't kill me. I spend that on gee gaws without blinking.

From what I saw on the Rotella Forum last night, it looks like it only makes the reformulated synthetic 5w-40 Jaso/MA compliant now, where it was not before.

If anything, that is good news at the least. Though viscocity may still not be what our manuals say to use, it would now meet every other spec required.

I'm still waiting for some evidence that the 5w-40 weight oil has caused a mechanical failure in one of our bikes. Regardless of climate or temperature extremes.

Mercy me that was a lot of reading. I had no idea so many different bike riders where using Rotella under such a variety of conditions. Bears some serious consideration now.

I believe Shell repackaged Rotella "synth" to assure their major market [the trucking industry] that they are supplying the newly required API CJ-4 spec. New spec, new jug? This new formulation for the '07 ULSD engines is also backward compatible with the older LSD engines, which is likely a lube industry wide standard practice, so fleets don't need to inventory multiple lube stocks or create maintenance practices to prohibit cross contamination of lube oils.

http://www.apicj-4.org/faqs.html

http://www.shell.com/home/PlainPageServl...nding_cj-4.html

http://www.shell.com/home/Framework?site...riple_1006.html

The fact that it's widely reported to meet our required JASO MA spec is a great bonus for us.

I'm wondering if they are stamping the jugs with JASO MA? My guess would be they aren't and won't any time soon until they are confident of product acceptance. Why I believe this is a long [yawn] story.

A site search indicates that Shell fairly ignores any reference whatsoever to JASO (or parent entity JSAE) anywhere on their web site.

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I love the smell of a good oil discussion early in the morning

Many of my Harley buddies have switched to Rotella 5W-40. From what they tell me it's getting a reputation of reducing wear at start-up and they say their engines seem to run cooler with Rotella. I guess this is a big deal for Harley's engine design because it takes a bit for the oil to pour through those large jugs. It's high pourability makes it better at start-up. I've been using it in my bike for a couple of years now and it seems to make my bike run cooler but that might be my imagination. I used to run about 200 degrees on a hot summer day. Now my temp gauge seems to run 190 to 195. Just my impression though.

What does the new bottle look like?

I know, I know... digging up an old thread here....

So the conclusion - the reformulated Rotella T is good?

Well ....some highly regarded knowledgeable wrenchers use Rotells T. Namely Pat (Dinqua) has been running it exclusively and he has experienced no problems of any nature. His bike is highly modded from stock and to me that says a lot.

Based on his and the recommendations of others I have been using it in my Speedy and I am comfortable with it. My bike sees extreme hot temps from Late April to October and she does not complain nor do I feel like any undue issues would result from running Shell Rotella T.

According to the friction tests it isn't nearly as good as Amsoil or Mobile and I mean not even close unless the reformulation has done wonders to it.Oil is one place I won't skimp to save money. I wonder how longevity will compare in the long run. Will the Amsoil bike out last the Rotella bike or vise versa? Or will it make no real difference? Only time will tell but I'll go with the better oil and err on the side of caution.

Is there actually a test of amsoil out there that wasn't performed by somebody trying to sell it?

Well the Amsoil test rates Mobile right with it almost no difference, I doubt that would be the case if the resutls were skewed to Amsoils favor. Amsoil is just better oil and the other companies don't do the tests because they don't compare and don't want to advertise it.