Do you remember Marvel Mystery Oil? Did they have that when you were growing up? I know it is still around and many people think it is great. Any comments, recollections, anecdotes, questions, suggestions, interrogatives, declaratives, fussin'and discussin', are welcome.

 

I remember it. I still have some at work. I use it to oil my air tools.

 

Where do you get that "old" stuff, TxDoc2?

Marvel Mystery Oil, YES! I remember it well.

This was the infomercial wonder lubricant, BEFORE THERE WERE INFOMERCIALS! In fact, before television criss-crossed the country.

Here's a couple of marketing things: They had a trademark logo, sort of, a bunch of concentric circles; an optical illusion; you'd look at these things and somehow they'd appear to be spinning at great angular velocity . . . enhancing the Mystery in Marvel Mystery Oil, no doubt.

Also, demos! I first saw the now-famous and commonplace bearing load demo, courtesy of Marvel Mystery Oil, in a speed shop, not later than the early 1950's. In this "test," a bearing, driven by an electric motor, spins in lubricant; a beam applies a load to the bearing. Other oils were compared with Marvel Mystery Oil; always, the bearing spun with higher weight applied when running in its Marvel Mystery Oil bath. I've recently seen the exact same demonstration with Militech firearms lubricant; if you stay up late enough, you may see the procedure re-enacted on an infomercial on cable TV.

Anecdotes: Little changed from the current infomercial versions; basically, a car's crankcase is filled with Marvel Mystery Oil and the motor run for awhile. Then, all the oil is drained from the engine. The car then proceed to set out on a journey, say in the middle of July, from San Antonio to Eagle Pass or Brownsville, or someplace; or maybe from El Centro to Gila Bend. Anyway, you guessed it--the cars run just fine in 120-degree desert heat, no engine oil at all, just the residual lubrication from Marvel Mystery Oil.

I wish I'd seen your post earlier; a lubricants engineer friend called earlier; I'd have asked him about the composition of Marvel Mystery Oil; my guess--chlorinated paraffin, pure conjecture on my part; however, the stuff's been around long before teflon and all that new-fangled stuff.

I think the stuff was sold as an additive or enhancer; one quart to an oil change or something like that; although, you could run the pure-dee stuff, too.

Anyone else remember this joy juice?

Tree Farmer

P.S. What was I doing in the speed shop? Buying a dual-point distributor breaker plate kit for my Ford flathead V-8. Didn't make my car run any faster, but boy--it was cool!

T.F.

 

Mystery oil brings back fond memories for me. My grandpa swore by it. He was a mechanic over 50 years. He insisted on using it for everything. He used to put it in the gas tank too. Told me it kept the top end clean of deposits. He had cars with big miles on them way back when it was a big deal to turn 100,000 miles. I dont know if it was the oil or him but something worked right.
I still have 2 original (the old red design) cans of it from when we cleaned out his garage after he passed away. And like 350ex says It works great for air tools.
Thanks for the memories!!

 

just smelling the stuff brings back memories

 

Doc, I had a friend of mine had is jeep vandalized one night. The ash-hole removed the drain plug from the oil pan. My friend drove the jeep the next morning and the engine locked up. His dad put the mystery oil in all 8 cylinders and keep trying to turn it over by hand. Little by little it would turn. After about a week of that,he was driving that same jeep again. He drove it for 6 months then he sold it.

 

TreeFarmer and Cobb,

I was going to defend you and beat on the Doc about calling you "old timers" but I didn't see this post in time. Now TreeFarmer has gone and proven that he was born long before my parents , well you know, did the dance.

TreeFarmer, your story about the engine being drained of oil and run cross country is a familiar one. It is still done today with some of the new "mystery" oils. It begs the question - how?? I understand that there is certainly a film of oil on all internal components after the oil is drained but:

1 - The film is thin and would certainly break down with heat and no new oil source. I would think galling, and ultimately seizing, would occur very quickly.

2 - Engines rely heavily on the oil to draw heat away from the components through the flow of the oil. Typically when you run dry on oil the first thing you notice is overheating, the second is seizing.

Don't give me the mystery oil sales line, I don't buy it!

If the mystery oils of the past, or even today, were/are so good then infomercials wouldn't be used to sell them. They would likely come in the sump when we bought our cars.

DJ

 

Guess every thing been answered,at least we're still good for something. DOC I'll have to get you some PIC's I got chickenman stickers on today looks cool.CM

 

I remember that stuff. My Pops swore by it and ive used it. Good stuff.Guess that means im a old timer.NOT BOB

 

Heres a little interseting note on the "Demonstrations" that you see of some of these "mystery" Snake oils". I know everyone is getting tired of hearing me say I've seen just about everything but the fact is. I get around when it comes to mechanical things. About 12 years back when I did a lot of Automotive mechanic work to suppliment my farm income. My self and my partner were working one day and this "salesman" stops by the shop pulling a trailer. He was selling one of the popular additives that you see in Wal-mart every day now ,back then you could only buy it from the salesmen. In the trailer he had a 4 cylinder engine which would crank up and run and had a side cover on it that you could see through.
Well he proceeds to demostrate the oil with the old fill and drain technique. It ran like a top.(another note, the drain the oil trick will not work on engines with Hydraulic valve trains).
Curiosity got the best of myself and my gearhead friend after the engine ran so well with no oil in it. After a ton of pressure from us the guy finally let us pull the oil pan off the engine to look at a rod bearing and when we got into it we discovered much to the salesmans surprise that the engine had been fitted with ROLLER bearings on the crankpins. We gave this poor guy a fit and had a good laugh about it. He had no idea that the engine had been set up to run with Roller bearings instead of the standard babbit type crank bearings. It was a hoot. On other note ;Virtually All Atvs and motor cycles have roller bearings on the crankshafts this is why bottom end failures are so rare on them. Doc ; I remember the Marvel oil well , Folks here used it for everything from gas treatments to freeing up siezed parts and bolts. I just saw it in our local Wal-Mart this week ,I didn't even know it still existed til then. I'll have to pick some up next trip.
Say...... You wouldn't be a salesman for then now would you?????