Just thought I would share my thoughts on my break in service and change to Amsoil Synthetic 20w-50 in the engine & primary with Redline Shockproof Heavy in the tranny.

This is not intended to be a scientific study but my findings of the difference in performance, temps & noise produced by my bike with the factory oils vs. Amsoil & Redline. Guess I decided to do this based on all the reviews and posts I have heard from both sides of the fence and was curious if there really was a noticeable change.

Before I changed the fluids I took the bike for a five mile ride. The route I took allows me to get up to fifth gear for a short distance with most spent in fourth at about 2700 rpm's. When I returned to my garage I immediately used my infrared temp gun and shot at five locations. Those being the block, jugs (front & rear), transmission (I know it will receive heat transfer from engine but did it anyway) and the primary. I also took into account the outside temperature so that both were equal. I also started out each run on a cold engine. I tried to run the bike virtually the same way with each run.

These are my personal findings (your results may differ). First is temperatures. Outside temp on first run was 60 and second after oil change was 59.


As you can see no big difference in heat reduction that I was hoping for. I really thought that the synthetic would run cooler.

Secondly noise- I noticed no difference in the noise coming from the valvetrain in the engine. Was hoping it would quite it down some, no luck there.

Third shifting with Redline- The only time I notice a difference in the clunk noise is upon initial take off before the trans has a chance to warm up. Within 5 minutes it's back to the same old clunk (which doesn't bother me) and sometimes wonder if it is louder. But all the talk about Redline I expected more.

The only change that I did notice after my fluid change was the mpg I was getting. I rode 172 miles on Saturday between fill ups and used 4.152 gallons which equals out to a rounded mpg of 41.43. My fill up prior to the oil change I was getting right at 37 mpg. Did it increase because of the synthetic or the engine just loosening up during break in? I'm not sure but was happy to see the increase.

As I said this was for my own piece of mind as to what if anything I was going to gain by changing to Amsoil & Redline. My guess would be that the synthetic will hold to internals longer than conventional and would think the Redline would as well, as it is thick as snot. So does it really matter what synthetic you use? I'm not convinced that either one are miracle oils.

 

I run amsoil because syn doesn't brake down like dino oil does with heat. The lubrication is supossed to be better too. My top end seems louder with amsoil.

 

myglide,

Breakdown was another reason for using syn. I knew I would overlook a point or few, lol! When talking to one of the local Amsoil reps he was pretty convinced that it would run a noticably cooler temp. Even said if I did this and gave him the results about temp and wrote a testemonial he would give me 10% off all future purchases (I had already told him I was going to do this before he offered up the 10%). Wonder if he will still do it without it having great results in regards to temps, lol!

 

Bagger71, nice job on your research, and a well written post. I am a big fan of synthetic oil. Been using them for years in my cars and trucks. I run Mobil 1 Extended Life syn in my 2011 Silverado. My mechanic (auto) is old school, builds race car motors, says it's about the best for my Chevy, and I can easily go with a 10,000 mile change interval for the truck. I use the engine oil life monitor to keep within the warranty requirements, which gives me about 8,500 miles on an oil change.

The chief advantage of synthetic seems to be that it resists breakdown better than petroleum based oil, and oil life is greatly increased. More technically savvy members will probably post and give a more intelligent explanation.

I used Amsoil for the motor on my '04 Ultra, but just changed over to Redline for all 3 eng/primary/trans. Did a lot of research on HDF, followed some oil threads and PM'd some members who really knew their stuff. My main interest was in long term wear protection for my power train, with secondary considerations being fuel economy and quieting the gearbox "clunk" we all know and love from the HD 5 sp. It's too soon to tell for me, since I just had it done.

Hope to hear more from you in the future on this topic. Feel free to PM me with any results or impressions you have on this subject.

Mike

 

BTW-while you are under warranty, stick to the HD recommended oil change intervals. This is to keep your warranty protection intact. Keep using the synthetic for the long term wear prevention. Once the warranty is up, you may consider increasing your fluid change intervals as I did.

 

Thanks, I do plan to keep withing service intervals for warranty purposes. I have put about 250 miles on mine since I changed fluids on Friday.

When it comes to noise I could not tell a difference. Especially in the trans other than for the first 5 minutes or so it was very quiet & smooth shifting. Once it was warmed up back to the same clunk. Which like I said is not a big deal to me. I would have to say the Redline was my biggest dissapointment based on what I have heard people saying about this product.

I would be interested to know what others would come up with in similar unscientific tests.

 

I think you might have seen a better temp comparison between the oils if you had done the same test in the summer when the air temp is 90*. 60* air does a pretty good job of cooling things off.

Just my .02˘

 

I thought I would still see a difference in engine temps no matter the tepm outside. I would think it would be relative. Maybe I'm wrong but just made sense to me.

If you will buy me a new bike in the middle of summer I would do it again with factory oil in that one too, lol!

 

U prob did, but I didn't read it in Ur post.!

Did U wait till the next day to do the second temp checks with the new oils? That way the motor was completely cooled down.

First thing I did to help the heat issue was at the 1k service I added pipes, SE a/c, sert, syn3 in all 3 and dyno.
Doing the above showed an average of 10-12* drop on my oil temp dipstick.

She ran between 240*-250* first K, then 230*-240* after changes.

Each thousand miles I put on her she did run a little cooler and around 10k she felt like she was still breaking in and sometimes on the road she'd run 225*-230*.

At 15k I did the cam's, IMO that helped the oil drop as much as doing all the stg1 stuff.

After the cams she'd run between 215*-225* all the time except when stuck in slow moving traffic or a lot of stop lights.

One thing that got me was the motor felt like it was getting stronger and running freer the more miles I put on her. It seemed that way till I got about 20 K on her.

Nice job of checking the temps.



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I'd say with your attention to detail you are ahead of the game already. You have the 103ci, right? My '08 FLHTP police bike runs a lot hotter than my '04 Ultra with the 88ci, and you have a cat also if I read your post correctly. You are going to get some heat regardless of the lubricant you use. Keep your numbers and repeat your tests in the summer. Ambient temperatures play a bigger role than you realize with these air cooled engines. This is anecdotal evidence on my part, based on 14 years of running police motors in an urban enviroment.

You are definitely on the right track (IMO) with the Redline.