Therre is a tech write up in Diesel World Nov.06 pages 124 & 125. I run the Rotella T 15W40 synthetic with good results, intervals of 8000-10000km. Whenever I get a chance or time in that interval to change it. Some guys complain of the smell, but then again I work in the patch so I like the smell of oil.

 

Listen to ARKAPIGDIESEL, he obviously know something about oil, and forget the rest of oil company hype crap. Of course they want you to use their new oil. Of course it is better. Bottom line, just like he said, NO WAY 8 TBN will last as long as 12 TBN. Some smaller companies will probably keep making both, but I bet the big ones won't.

 

I'm not trying to argue here, but Calbrewin posted a Blackstone Lab report of fresh Rotella CJ-4 15w40. It showed a tbn of 10.3, not 8. It also showed that there is not a major difference between CI and CJ. That is not marketing but real world analysis.

I'm no expert, but isn't the important part the differential in tbn between the oil when it is fresh and after xxxx number of miles? There are posts from members here that show the tbn of Rotella 15w40 CI-4 being reduced to 8 at 6000 miles.

I think we need to see a few oil analysis' of the CJ-4 oil after it has been run 5000-7500 miles. What if the tbn holds longer in the CJ oil than the CI oil? Couldn't we say it is a better product, assuming that none of the other wear accumulations are out of whack?

 

FWIW, my last TBN was 9.3 after 4,500 miles and 7 months, also from Blackstone. This was Rotella CI-4 plus.

 

For what it's worth (and not to change the subject), I have a 2007 Mercedes Benz E-320 BlueTec diesel on order and have been reading the maintenance info on it. Mercedes has a oil change frequency on this engine at something like 15,000 miles or once a year. The ultra-low sulphur diesel fuel may be making this possible.

 

I currently have around 1300 mi on this CJ-4 oil that I had Blackstone analyze. I will be doing a UOA on it at 7500 mi w/TBN to see how well it is standing up in the Cummins. I do run dual Frantz bypass filters, so this should help keep oil clean. I am going to try going the whole 7500 mi w/o a TP change if the filters continues to heat up well showing good flow through them. I saw another UOA where the guy went 10,000 mi w/o changing the TP and his analysis looked great! He was running 5W40 Rotella T Syn. I should reach 7500 mi around April with my weekly driving avg.

 

DJ, I pulled up the tech data sheet on the new CJ-4 Rotella T and the TBN is fairly high for a CJ-4 oil. It's a 10.1 TBN oil per Shell's spec sheet. I believe that the Delo 400 15W-40 CJ-4 is at an 8 TBN (couldn't locate the tech data sheet on the new CJ4 formulation), which is what I was initially thinking of. I'm not sure it's at an 8, but I believe that I've seen that somewhere.

I looked at a VOA of the CI-4+ and the CJ-4 Rotella T 15W-40 and shockingly enough the detergent levels weren't that different as you had stated. Now I'm starting to get intrigued by the CJ4 oils
Absolutely.
That very well could be, BUT was there a fuel ingress, excessive silicon reading, high insoluble count, potassium or sodium ingress? What I'm driving at is......if you follow logic a 10 TBN oil should deplete itself faster than a 12 TBN given the same circumstances within the engine.

On the flip side of the coin, an oils chemistry can speed/slow down how fast TBN depletes itself in an oil. What if the new CJ4 oil shows to deplete at a slower pace than the CI-4+ oils? With UOA's on the CJ4 oils time will tell just that.
That very well might happen. As soon as people start testing the CJ4 oils we should be able to see how well they perform and how they will do on extended drains. As I stated earlier....logic makes me believe that a lower TBN oil (CJ4) out of the bottle will deplete faster than a higher TBN (CI-4+) oil. We shall see

 

For those of you using the Rotella CJ, have you found it alot more than the CI? I paid $40 for a case of the CI, now BJ's want's $65 for what I believe is CJ. Sure that comes to only $12.50 more per oil change, but it would be nice if it had some benefits the CI didn't.

 

paid $8.99 gal at Pep Boys, regular everyday price. Avg. $ for around here, I paid the same for previous CI-4+ oil.

 

Absolutely. As we see UOA's on the CJ-4+, a determination can be made whether it will hold better/worse than the CI-4+ oils. All the material/numbers I provided were specific to Rotella T, as that is brand of oil I use.

Thank you to Calbrewin for posting his UOA on the Rotella CJ-4+ 15w40 oil. I think that information is far more valuable than what we see on most manufacturer websites.

Arkapigdiesel - Your initial post got me thinking, so I spent a few hours doing research to get my info. I used member posts for UOA results. What I saw was TBN's between 8-11 after 3k-7500 miles. There are a lot of posts with UOA's on this and other CTD sites. Unbelievably, there is not alot of information on the Rotella website about the makeup of the oil (CI or CJ). I was trying to throw this information out as questions and I'm glad you took the time to answer.