Everything about it's benefits, but nothing mentioned about flat tappet cams. "Zinc", it's not just for cams anymore! makes sense about the ring to bore wear on high mileage engines like diesels. There's been diesels with upwards of amillion miles on em before a rebuild was needed.What's really hard to figure is how that happens with that black assed oil lubricating those parts.
Being a tech I dont go much for the mechanic in a can stuff but Lucas has a great product line up. I swear by the oil and trans additives and trust the products they sell. If the Zinc product is half as good as the trans additive I'll buy it. Trans additive has saved more than one overhaul for us at the shop on our own vehicles. (seal issues)
This might sound dumb, but I have thought long and hard about it. Many consumer items made of metal, most notably coffins, have zinc incorporated inconspicously as "sacrificial material". When zinc is bonded to steel/iron, it draws all the corrosion into itself and out of the ferrous material. Make sense? I don't know how to describe it other than the zinc rots, and the steel doesn't... until the zinc is gone of course. Coffins have something like 40-80 lbs of zinc built into the bottoms to keep the steel coffin pristine for a couple hundred of years. So my thought is first off, why not use zinc around the body for rust protection... But that is not the topic. On topic... since 1983 Pennies have been pure zinc with only a copper electroplating. The plating is easily removed, leaving pure zinc. You could braze a few of these into your oil pan, or even just drop them into your oil filter, and let them dissolve into your oil. Just a thought. I will probably do it just for giggles when I ever build another engine.
Well you all embarissed me into digging thru the dust in my closet to find the the real paper copy of the June 2006 Hot Rod article. The link I posted just got you to the most recent post on the subject and unfortunately I don't know how to find a link to the origional article on line. Direct Quote from Mark Ferner, team leader for Quaker State Oil Research and Developement on page 126. "To prevent excessive wear, traditional motor oil included a generous dose of antiwear additives, primarily zinc dialkyl dithiophosphate (ZDDP)." ... "The zinc reacts with the cam lobe's iron surface. That creates a sacrificial chemical coating strong enough to keep parts separated to reduce wear." On page 130 there is a chart that shows the decline in zinc from API SH in 1996 at 0.130% to SM in 2005 with 0.087% but Shell Rotella Diesel 2006 still had 0.14%. It also showed Penzoil & Quaker State Racing oils at about 0.2% so even better.
Nobody's disputing the role ZDDP plays in flat tappet cam wear. You previously posted that it was there to protect the flat tappet cams in diesels. 99% of diesel engines also run roller cams and have for decades. The zinc is there for other reasons, like controling ring wear at the top and bottom of the stroke.
