MCN is kindof like consumer reports, they dont take advertizing dollars. For some reason the articles are very hard to find online, and the one place i found it... the link no longer works.

oil links

The link between moly and clutch slippage, isnt absolute. Its not a garrentee, that if you use oil with moly, you will get slippage. But there is a good posibility. Some clutches can tolerate moly, and some cant.
One of the points made, was that its improtant to use SF or SG oil, because of the extreme pressure additives, which were phased out after SG oil. Seems the phosphorus and the sulpher shorten the life of converters on cars and trucks, so they severly reduced those extreme pressure additives, after SG oil. And because there isnt any meshing gears, in a car motor, it isnt a bigie, but most atvs and motorcycles, use crank oil in the tranny, and need the extreme pressure additives.
Their basic conclusion, is SF or SG, regular or synthetic, with out the star burst symbol, ...and even the Autozone, old car oil, which is SF oil, and costs 69 cents a quart is ok.

1994 article

Its pretty easy to find the older articles, from 1994 and 1998, but the recent 2003 articles are hard to find. Keep in mind, the problems with clutch slippage , rose in that time period, and the articles from 1994 referr to sg oil, as the auto oil, ...not the SJ and SL oil which is the norm today.
Ill keep looking.

 

On the recommendation of others, I recently switched my Rincon over to the Rotella "T" 5w-40 synthetic that Wal-Mart sells for $12.88 a gallon. It meets all the recommendation in the owners manual and does not contain friction modifiers. The owners manual RECOMMENDS Honda GN4, but does not require it. I don't know exactly who makes the GN4 for Honda, but I know Honda is not in the oil business. They simply slap their label on it and jack the prices up.

My machine runs cooler (fan kicks on less) and it shifts a whole lot smoother. There's nothing wrong with using GN4, just a simple matter of economics for me, and before anyone spouts off about future repair costs caused by not using GN4, I ran Castrol GTX in my previous machine ('02 Rubicon) for 2000 miles and never had a problem. It's really not that complicated; MAKE SURE THE OIL DOESN'T HAVE FRICTION MODIFIERS AND MEETS THE STANDARD SPELLED OUT IN THE OWNERS MANUAL and you'll be fine. I suppose some of you also only use the "factory" oil filters that the dealer sells for $8.00-$10.00 apiece? Well, for the past four years I've been buying Emgo filters off Ebay where I can get five for $10.00, and I've never had a problem.

Just my $.02

 

Castrol GTX is very good oil. I've been using it for years in all my cars and trucks. I started putting it in my Ozark (10w40) and it seemed to do just fine............until 1 hot day when we were riding long and hard and it started smoking (burning oil). I couldn't believe it, this bike was only a few months old! I did some research on many oil mfr's web sites and learned why this was happening. I was relieved to find out it was the oil I was using and not my new bike. Made the change to 4 stroke motorcycle oil and never had a smoking problem again.........[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]
Most people probably won't have this happen to them but I'm hard on my toys and need them to last as long as they can.

 

Why was it burning oil? Those 2000 miles I put on my Rubicon were as hard as any and I never once had a problem and the new owner reports it's running like a top.

 

You'll probably never have that problem on a Rincon cause its water cooled. The Ozark is air cooled without even an oil cooler so on a hot day its gonna run hotter. As for the oil, motorcycle oil is made to protect better than car oil at higher temps. I'm guessing the oil I had in there got so hot it dissappated as soon as it hit the cylinder walls causing smoke to blow right pass the rings. The oil manufactures call it oil Velosity (thats not the word for it but its close to that) burnoff. I'd have to look it up again.

 

Utah-I'm not sure how your comments are helpfull here? We are talking about Honda manual transmission, autoclutch bikes. Both the bikes you mention are automatics, and both very different from a 250EX (and each other)! All the Honda utilities share similar engine design, but not transmissions. If you only had to lube the engine, the slicker the oil the better! Trouble is, everybody who doesn't own a 450R, has to lube a transmission along with their engine, and that limits the number of oil choices that are acceptable. Just out of interest, does your owners manual on the automatic transmission bikes even mention HP4 as an acceptable oil???

In another post, there was a guy who claimed to have worked for an oil company, formulating oils. As I recall, he said HP4 IS MOBILE-1, with Honda's own package of additives! Anybody remember that one????

Ozark-You mean you were running CAR OIL in your ATV???

 

Yeah! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img] LOL! My bad! First quad, you know how it is........[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

Take a guess what machine I owned before the Rubicon and now the Rincon, you guessed it, an '02 Rancher ES 4x4, hence the name UtahRancherRider. My Rancher had 2800+ miles on it when I traded it in, and guess what oil I ran after the initial 100 mile break-in period, you guessed it again, Castrol GTX 10w-40. I'm not gonna go digging for my owners manual because it's pointless. I've read it enough to know that the Rotella "T" I currently use, and the Castrol GTX I've used in the past, both meet and/or exceed the recommendations from Honda. If you want to spend $4.00 a quart on oil that is simply a relabeled product, feel free.

Again, it's not rocket science; MAKE SURE WHATEVER OIL YOU CHOOSE DOES NOT CONTAIN FRICTION MODIFIERS (doesn't matter if it's an automatic or an auto clutch machine) and that it falls within the viscosity range as outlined in your owners manual for the temps you'll be riding in, and you'll be fine.

 

it seems everyone has their own opinion and will continue doing what their doing. i run mobil 1 15w-50 in my 426. TC racing, one of the top 400ex builders, says to run 20-w50 year round. NO questions asked!! Curtis sparks says to run 20w-50 in my bike too. however, TC mentioned that i shouldn't run synthetic but didn't mention why. he did mention that 10-40 or similar will trash my cam in no time. not that this helps any, but i figured i would mention it.


back to the point. i went ahead and swapped clutches in my 400ex. i took out the stock one 3 years ago and put in a sparks clutch. i have been using mobil 1 ever since i broke in the bike (which i had to break it in 3 different times since i had is when it was stock, a 406, and a 426). i ended up selling my stock clutch for $50 because it was in excellent condition. my sparks clutch i just had out and looked new. so, i know the mobil 1 is not ruining my clutch. if it is, it it doing it so slow that it would take years to do so. my clutch doesn't slip with the mobil in but i do know the bike shifts much smoother. if i knew it was a problem running synthetic, i would change. until then, i will continue to do so. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

cals-You have a full manual hand clutch in your 400EX, and I don't think anybody has said here that full synth is any problem in that bike, as long as it doesn't contain moly! Dragonfires original post regards a 250EX which has an autoclutch. Not at all the same thing! But, do tell us what you run in your old 300. Now that will be relevant!

The Honda automatics seem like they would be a special case. In those transmissions, the oil doesn't see the shearing action of the teeth in a gear driven transmission. Seems like you could use a very slick JASO MB oil in them, but I doubt that is what Honda recommends?