"Store" Brand oil?

[yohy]

Folks,

 

Some words of wisdom from Blackstone Labs (they have a great oil analysis program): from their Feb. 03 newletter (http://blackstone-labs.com/feb_03_eng.html)

 

Many people have very strong loyalties to certain brands of oil. They’ll swear by their favorite brand and assure you that anything else is bound to ruin your engine. But we’re here to dispel that myth. After nearly 20 years of testing oils from thousands of different engines and industrial machines, we have discovered a simple fact: it doesn’t really matter what brand of oil you use.

But wait! Before you dismiss us as heretical, listen to what we do recommend. We always suggest using an oil grade recommended for your engine by the manufacturer and a brand that fits your budget. The grade of oil is much more important to performance than the brand of oil.

In fact, here’s another little secret. The oil you can find at any mass retailer is actually name-brand oil, but with the store’s label on it. Think about it. A retail store is not in the business of manufacturing oil. They buy their oil from the big oil companies and put their name on the bottle. The only difference between the “generic” brand and the name-brand oil is the name on the bottle and about 50 cents per quart.

[3eyedwagon]

^^^^^

Kinda sounds like exactly what I said, but in slightly fancier words.

 

I'll repeat what I thought was the most important part of my post;

 

As long as you are doing the maintenance. That is the important part!

 

It's better to use the cheap stuff, and actually change your oil than to hold off because you have to get the super top notch synthetic.

[Rooster2]

My testimonial on using "store" brand motor oil. My daughter owned an 87 Jeep Wrangler with the 4.2 American Motors motor. During 10 years of ownership, I religiously changed the oil and filter four times per year regardless of milage between changes. My oil change schedule was March, June, September, November. For the first five years I used Autozone house brand, then switched to Walmart house brand the last five years. I never had any trouble with the motor. Finally sold the Jeep with about 175K miles on the odo. The new owner had a compression test done before buying. I don't think he ever told me the compression test numbers per cylinder, but he did tell me that compression report was excellent on all cylinders. I told him how often I changed oil during ownership, and that info along with the excellent compression test numbers convinced him to buy the high milage Jeep. That's my testimonial that "store" brands are excellent. Frequent oil and filter changes are the best way to get any engine to last a lot of miles

[unverviking]

I've been using Napa GOLD Filters and Oil for years. No problems with any of the cars I've had. Learned from the NAPA guy years ago that the NAPA oil has been Ashland for years, and it was a better grade than the best Valvoline.

 

I change about 4.5k till 5.0k intervals. Checked the the oil in the Sube tonight, it has about 3500 on it, and still golden...

[howards11]

I picked up at Auto Zone FORD brand oil; synthetic blend 5W30. I think it was something like $2.75/qt. Just a quart to keep around.

Now we all know Ford does not refine oil. But it meets all the specs so who cares what the bottle says.

 

~Howard

[howards11]

I haven't hardly even been inside a NAPA in a year or 3. A poster up the thread a ways claimed NAPA's house brand was now Chevron/Havoline; that was the basis for my statement of 'used to be.' I have no clue but it wouldn't surprise me if Ashland was still the supplier, nor even to find that they have different suppliers in different parts of the country.

 

They probably use different suppliers depending on the location of their distrbution centers to the refiner. They want a closer ones to cut down on the shipping cost.

 

~Howard