Salt Lake Tribune | 1918-02-03 | Page 36 | Expert Advises the use of Thin Oils

EXPERT KESlf USE onu OILS Gives Technical Reason Why Heavy Lubricants Cause Trouble, ' The consult in::; clu-mist of the National Petroleum News answers a. very important impor-tant (Lifhtiou In the Itirtut: of January lu, which has much of inUirtrst. to io-'ui auto-imoIjI auto-imoIjI il?ta, for the i -a:'jn that I i.e it: s colri'i.lc with t hf: t iironoM ad v. iin.fi by V. F. Culmer, local oil expert, in rt.ard to proper oiis for uulomohtit: tiiinc hihri-lal.ion. hihri-lal.ion. Mr. CnUiier has invariably st a t that a ttiin, Uk'ht-colorM oil of htfch urade, like I "Crest a-lif,'ht," will give l-'.-in:r lunriea-llf'ii lunriea-llf'ii the y.-ar around, and had the :onr-a :onr-a -ac of Ills rnn vi'lions. dew pi 1 e adverse opinions, and has ufffl "th"sla-iitf hi" ronllnuously In his Bnii'i car. The expert who conducts Lin; query col-! col-! unin in the National 1'etroleuin News was nskcd the question: ' "Is a heavy hodied ltibric;i t im; oil bet- i'-r Tor automnhil'i lubrlcanon than a thinner oil? Are pale oils better than red oils for automobile fimlnes'"' The answer is considered from the chemical point of view, and the gist of the reply is to the effect that "Two cardinal car-dinal facts must be considered, first, that lubrication takes place under the Influence Influ-ence of a fairly hleh temperature" (which on el usively sets at. naught the misleading mislead-ing statement that an oil which flows fr;ely at zero is an Ideal lubricant); "second . that very viscous oils arc usually usu-ally prepared by adding unrlistilld residual resid-ual stock to less viscous oils which have been prepared by distillation processes. "With this In mind, what happens on the walls of the cylinder? Of course, the exact temperature of the oil there is not Known, and. undoubtedly fluctuates, but as the temperature of expittflhig Gasoline is very bitch, it Is likely that at least the outer surface of the oil film on the cylinder cyl-inder w all becomes hen ted, at least momentarily, mo-mentarily, to a. temperature higher than t hn distillation temperature of the oil. Therefore, some of the more volatile parts of the oil Mill evaporate from Us surface. "This will not ohanpe the viscosity of the straight distilled auto oil very much, because it requires a -relatively larsrft amount of distillation or evaporation to make any substantial ehanfre in its viscosity. vis-cosity. "If. on the other hand, the oil contains added stock (like many cheap oils of the '.inst us tcood' ariety), which Is of Itself not easily volatile, it may easily be heated heat-ed to destructive carbonizing temperature. tempera-ture. Apparently, it would be advisable ! to use the thinnest oil that will accom- : plish the desired lubricating effect. "The use of a pale oil of very great : iscpsity, instead of a red oil of the same , viscosity, will not help matters, because 1 these v o ry viscous pale oils are the red ones decolorized chemically by processes j which do not remove the easily charred constituents. "The thinner pale oils, however, are mostly decolorized by the use of Fuller's ,trth" (this is true of Oresta, the de luxe oil of the Cuhncrs company), "while the .thin red oifs art usually chemically treated treat-ed with sulphonic acids whi-'h are likely to remain in the oil, and tend to char easily and facilitate the. formation of ;.nrbon In the cylinder or explosion enables. en-ables. "Therefore, the pale, thinner bodied oils are better than the corresponding red oils for automobile engines."