Will the pennzoil tcw 3 oil be good to run in a mercury optimax? Is anyone else using this oil?

pennzoil is a great oil for your optimax, I know alot of guys that are using it in their optimax motors and I am using it in my 115 two stroke, so is my son
it is great oil. I was introduced to it by Dan Gies from team Starcraft and have used it ever since and introduced it to a bunch of my friends and now we all use it
We all get it at walmart, they have the best price and it is a lot less expensive then Mercury oil and is every bit as good if not better

According to my Opti manual it says Mercury or Quicksilver Optimax/DFI 2 cycle oil is recommended. I would stick with the recommendation unless you do not have access to it.

Pal

According to my Opti manual it says Mercury or Quicksilver Optimax/DFI 2 cycle oil is recommended. I would stick with the recommendation unless you do not have access to it.

Pal

OE manufacturers may well have high quality lubricants with their name on them. However, I haven't seen independent confirmation that their (OEM) lubricants are better than the lubricants made by companies that are in the business of making lubricants. There are a number of outstanding products available for your Optimax. Just make sure you use one that meets the Merc specifications. I have a personal preferance, but will leave the name out of this discussion.

As long as mercury will back your warranty, your good to go. I'm kinda of optimistic on what if you blow your opti up. I think I'll stick to what they recommend. Alot of money on the line.

I'm not saying a **** thing on oil issues anymore. Everyone can do whatever the heck they want! ;)

As long as mercury will back your warranty, your good to go. I'm kinda of optimistic on what if you blow your opti up. I think I'll stick to what they recommend. Alot of money on the line.

The Federal government dealt with this back in 1975 with the Magnuson-Moss Act. The following explains the act and the impact it has on consumers and warranties.

"While the Magnuson-Moss Act does not require manufacturers to provide a written warranty, it provides specific rules when one is provided. Among those provisions, FTC regulations state: (c) No warrantor of a consumer product may condition his written or implied warranty of such product on the consumers using, in connection with such product, any article or service (other than article or service provided without charge under the terms of the warranty) which is identified by brand, trade, or corporate name; except that the prohibition of this subsection may be waived by the Commission if (1) the warrantor satisfies the Commission that the warranted product will function properly only if the article or service so identified is used in connection with the warranted product, and (2) the Commission finds that such a waiver is in the public interest. (15 U.S.C.2302(C))"

To paraphrase the act and tie it back to this thread, it says that Merc cannot require you to use Mercury lubricants to keep your warranty valid, only that you must use the viscosity grade and service specification as provided by Mercury. Merc would love it if you believed you have to use their oil to maintain your warranty...it's good for their sales. If Mercury is going to tie their warranty to your use of their brand of lubricants, then they have to provide it to you at no cost. To the best of my knowledge, no manufacturer has deemed it important enough to use their private label lubricant to give it away.

I'm not saying a **** thing on oil issues anymore. Everyone can do whatever the heck they want! ;)

Terroreyes,

You and I have had our differences on this topic in the past. I was thinking of you and our past discussions when I wrote my initial response on this thread...hoping not to start anything personal. :)

The Federal government dealt with this back in 1975 with the Magnuson-Moss Act.

To paraphrase the act and tie it back to this thread, it says that Merc cannot require you to use Mercury lubricants to keep your warranty valid, only that you must use the viscosity grade and service specification as provided by Mercury.



If that is really true, how come after all these years that Mercury specifically states that you must use thier own brand of lower unit oil and they do not give a substitute specification?

Has anyone gotten free gear oil from Mercury?

Johnson and Evinrude are guilty of this also, there is no factory recommended substitute for their lower unit oils.


How do these companies get away with such a blatant disregard of this Federal Law?

According to my Opti manual it says Mercury or Quicksilver Optimax/DFI 2 cycle oil is recommended. I would stick with the recommendation unless you do not have access to it.

Pal

exactly, they recommend it but they do not say you must use their oil and cannot void your warantee if you use another brand. TCW-3 is the spec and as long as you use oil that meets the TCW-3 spec you are fine.
Pennzoil warantees your motor if you use their oil

If that is really true, how come after all these years that Mercury specifically states that you must use thier own brand of lower unit oil and they do not give a substitute specification?

Has anyone gotten free gear oil from Mercury?

Johnson and Evinrude are guilty of this also, there is no factory recommended substitute for their lower unit oils.


How do these companies get away with such a blatant disregard of this Federal Law?


My Expedition differential lube is the same way. It specs a wierd grade Ford brand lube, PLUS a special anti-friction additive only available at a Ford dealership.

Terroreyes,

You and I have had our differences on this topic in the past. I was thinking of you and our past discussions when I wrote my initial response on this thread...hoping not to start anything personal. :)

That's why I'm keeping my opinion to myself about lubes for now on. It used to get way too personal. LOL

Soooo, I'll let the good people at Yamaha speak for me. I found this in a link from another post. Very well said.

<The Yamalube Story
When Yamaha started making engines the engineers followed the common practice of recommending “off-the-shelf” oils. Experience began showing that conventional oils didn't always offer the level of protection against wear and tear the customer paid for. Unfortunately, that sometimes resulted in significantly shorter engine life. It became clear that our customers needed and deserved an exceptional oil product. The same engineering team began searching for lubricants that met Yamaha’s high standards. They insisted on the finest ingredients in precise formulations that would give dependable protection and enable the engine to deliver the high performance it was designed to give. This search eventually led to the development of our own premium oils – Yamalube.

What is Yamalube?
Each Yamalube oil is made from base oils, additives, and solvents in combinations specific for the application. For example, the additive package for Yamalube 2M is outboard oil is very different from our Yamalube 2R for motocross motorcycles, even though both are liquid-cooled 2-stroke engines. These two engine types have different stress loads, with the outboard often operating for extended periods under heavy load while the motocross engine is subjected to frequent bursts of throttle under extreme conditions. Consequently, the oils developed for these engines have different lubrication formulas.>

Last year or so, Bass And walleye mag ran a report where they tested all the top oils. If I remember correctly, Pennzoil came out on top.

you can't beat pennzoil for performance, quality and dependability. they have been around along time and know their buisness.

As long as mercury will back your warranty, your good to go. I'm kinda of optimistic on what if you blow your opti up. I think I'll stick to what they recommend. Alot of money on the line.
I just dont understand how they can tell what brand of tcw3 you are running,?taste,ya..right.:stirthepot:

would you really expect mercury or evinrude or yamaha to recommend anyone elses oil or lubricant ? think about it !

Last year or so, Bass And walleye mag ran a report where they tested all the top oils. If I remember correctly, Pennzoil came out on top.


Wasn't that report for 4-stroke outboard oils, and not the TC-W3 oils being discussed here?

I just dont understand how they can tell what brand of tcw3 you are running,?taste,ya..right.:stirthepot:

Move over, let me stir. LOL

Very, very easy! We do it almost every day at work. Easiest way is that some manufacturers use a certail color UV dye in the oil. To be certain, we run what's called an FT-IR infrared scan that tells us the basic composition by light wavelength. If it's going to be a court or warranty case, we do an elemental analysis and/or send it out for a gas chromatagraph that tells us every percentage of every ingredient in there. And no two lubricants are exactly the same, so it's pretty easy and conclusive.

Rebs mentioned the Penzoil warranty. Don't count on it! We do independent failure analysis for stuff like that, AND my technical director is an "Expert witness" used in court cases for Castrol and such. Unless it wasn't manufactured correctly or the wrong grade was in that bottle, and YOU can prove it by having it tested against the TCW spec, tooooooooo bad. Case closed. Your engine can blow in 200 hours, and as long as their oil meets the TCW spec, on the two motors specified in the test, ............no claim. Remember, the burden of proof is on you, and that burden would probably cost $20,000+ to prove.

that'll buy alot of yamilube!!!:bigsmile:let say motor is blown,brought in for warranty and they refill w/man spec oil prior and ran engine long enough to blow out non spec oil.Could it be told by exhast debris in the motor what type of oil was used prior?

that'll buy alot of yamilube!!!:bigsmile:let say motor is blown,brought in for warranty and they refill w/man spec oil prior and ran engine long enough to blow out non spec oil.Could it be told by exhast debris in the motor what type of oil was used prior?

Doubtful. Someone would probably get away with that one. I've heard of the UV dyes leaving a marker on the cylinder walls and other areas, but can't tell you if that's true or tale.

I will continue to use pennzoil, everyone else should continue to use the oil of their choice

nuff said

Terroreyes, Thanks for the insight on elemental analysis. I agree with what you are saying and I only use the special opti oil. One less thing to worry/wonder/guess about. My former boat dealer (retired after 40 years) kept one piston from everyone motor that he rebuilt on a shelf. He stated that about 1/2 were because they burned the generic cheap oil. He had a LOT of pistons! He said that there is a reason the other oil cost much less, he said it's because it's worth much less. For the price I paid for this motor, whatever merc tells me to do, I'll do, even if they tell me to stand on my head when putting the oil in... :)

JR

Terroreyes, Thanks for the insight on elemental analysis. I agree with what you are saying and I only use the special opti oil. One less thing to worry/wonder/guess about. My former boat dealer (retired after 40 years) kept one piston from everyone motor that he rebuilt on a shelf. He stated that about 1/2 were because they burned the generic cheap oil. He had a LOT of pistons! He said that there is a reason the other oil cost much less, he said it's because it's worth much less. For the price I paid for this motor, whatever merc tells me to do, I'll do, even if they tell me to stand on my head when putting the oil in... :)

JR

Thanks. Your dealer is exactly right. A specification and actual real life performance are two different animals. I work for a lubricant manufacturer and can tell you that we can submit 10 different lubricants that meet an automotive or marine spec on paper, and we'll be lucky if 2 survive durability testing in the actual application, and even after that, it requires some tweaking. The TCW or automotive spec may be, say 500 hours durability, or what ever, but the manufacturers spec could be 2000 hours. There's the difference. No doubt or argument that you're paying more money for that label, but there's allot of specific engineering to back it up.


Put it this way. One of our big lines of business is lubricants for car door latches. Simple thing you'd think huh? Well, we probably have 20 different lubes for the various latches by the different auto manufactures and designs. Imagine the variations in a complex boat motor!

Before people start swinging, I'm not saying Penzoil is any better or worse in an Optimax oil. They don't know, and I don't know for sure. They developed that lube to the TCW-3 spec, which doesn't call for it to be tested on an Opti, and therefore they probably didn't. Merc helped develop the oil for their Optis hand in hand with a lubricant manufacuter specifically for that engine. There's the facts. You make your own choice. I will say that the choice is probably more critical on the older Optis that called for DFI oil. The newer Pro XS models should be much more tolerant to brand of oil .

does anyone know what company makes the mercury oil or do they put it out for bids ?

Terror - I'm still going to just use grease for my car door latch. Although I will use low temp grease in the winter.

Really - a large customer, to use the right door latch lub?

I never envisioned the need for someone with those skills, although it would be neat-o.

I'm the one that introduced Rebs to Pennzoil Marine tcw3 oil. Myself and my fishing partner have been running this oil in our Opti's for 3 years. We have had no problems with our motors what so ever. I don't have a Mercury manual in front of me but if I remember right it states it recommends opti oil but if that is not available than use premiun plus or any tcw3 certified oil. Pennzoil stated that if your motor fails and the reason is because of the oil and Mercury refuses to repair it, Pennzoil will fix or replace the motor. The last I was told, they have never had to follow through with a repair or replace. Hope this helps in your decision.

Dan

According to my Opti owners manual, Mercury recommends Merc or Quicksilver DFI oil and if not available, Merc or Quicksilver TC-W3 Premium Plus. No mention of using any TC-W3 oil.
For what my boat and motors cost, $26 per gallon for Merc oil is peanuts. It simply is not worth the aggravation of who pays, if a problem does come up especially with a 5 year warranty.

does anyone know what company makes the mercury oil or do they put it out for bids ?


Mercury, as well as Yamaha and Evinrude, do not buy their oil from a company and just put their name on it. Actually no one oil company even makes the oil for them.

Each outboard manufacturer formulates and tests their own lubes then has bottling companies mix the base oils, bright stock, dyes, solvents, and additives to their specifications. The bottling companies order in the ingredients needed, blend them, then fill the containers and drums, apply labels and ship them to the motor manufacturer.

Mercury, as well as Yamaha and Evinrude, do not buy their oil from a company and just put their name on it. Actually no one oil company even makes the oil for them.

Each outboard manufacturer formulates and tests their own lubes then has bottling companies mix the base oils, bright stock, dyes, solvents, and additives to their specifications. The bottling companies order in the ingredients needed, blend them, then fill the containers and drums, apply labels and ship them to the motor manufacturer.

if they have the facilities to do this then why not just blend it themselves, bottle it themselves and cut out the middle man and save money thus being able to sell it to their cherished customers at a reasonable price ? Mercury lost a court case where they were trying to force everyone to use their oil or loose their warrante. The court decided that this was wrong and ordered that Mercury could not require people to use only Mercury oil in Mercury motors. As an owner of a Mercury motor you have the right to use any oil that meets the standard specs for your motor

According to my Opti owners manual, Mercury recommends Merc or Quicksilver DFI oil and if not available, Merc or Quicksilver TC-W3 Premium Plus. No mention of using any TC-W3 oil.
For what my boat and motors cost, $26 per gallon for Merc oil is peanuts. It simply is not worth the aggravation of who pays, if a problem does come up especially with a 5 year warranty.

Mercury lost a court case where they were trying to force everyone to use their oil or loose their warrante. The court decided that this was wrong and ordered that Mercury could not require people to use only Mercury oil in Mercury motors. As an owner of a Mercury motor you have the right to use any oil that meets the standard specs for your motor.

"Mercury "recommends" Merc or Quicksilver DFI oil and if not available, Merc or Quicksilver TC-W3 Premium Plus."

the key word there is "recommends" not requires. It is only natural they reecomnd their own brand of oil, however by a court decision they cannot refuse your warrante for using another brand as long as you use an oil that is TC-W3 spec

if they have the facilities to do this then why not just blend it themselves, bottle it themselves and cut out the middle man and save money thus being able to sell it to their cherished customers at a reasonable price ?

Bottling companies specialize in mixing, bottling, and distributing and work around the clock with high speed machinery for efficiency and low cost per unit. They bottle for a number of companies as none have enough volume to justify a multi-million dollar plant, equipment, or employees.


As an owner of a Mercury motor you have the right to use any oil that meets the standard specs for your motor

That is because they list the specification as a substitute (TC-W3)

How come they can get by (Evinrude, too) by saying you MUST use their own lower unit oils, and they do NOT publish a substitute spec?

I'm switching my oil to Yamalube, to put in my opti. Finish that out, then I'm gonna try some Evinrude oil in the spring. Should be alright. They all are TC-W3 rated oils. I'm gonna call mercury and ask if this is alright under warranty. I found some cheaper one day. I hope some of you yamaha owners are not using yamalube. Should be using Premium/Plus Mercury oil. My point is that if you have good luck with a brand of oil you are using fine and dandy. But the cost of the motor oil and what the amount of oil that is used in these engines is minimal from the past engines. So the big question is, whats the cost difference. 1 or 2 bucks a gallon. I've seen greases, tested and failed. I've seen spray lubricants fail. Niether can stand up to pressure or heat. It just seems that if you had your own business you would want everybody using your own oil or would you cover them under warranty. Its good to talk about all these issues on oil or grease. We can learn from our mistakes. Again, motors are not cheap.

Each outboard manufacturer formulates and tests their own lubes then has bottling companies mix the base oils, bright stock, dyes, solvents, and additives to their specifications. The bottling companies order in the ingredients needed, blend them, then fill the containers and drums, apply labels and ship them to the motor manufacturer.


That's not true. What happens is that Merc and the others usualy do have lubrication engineers on staff. They work with possible lubricant manufacturers, hand in hand to develop a lubricant. Usually a couple of companies are involved. When formultion is complete, the engine manufacturer can either have the "winning" company keep the formulation and be the manufacturer of the lubricant, or the engine manufacturer keeps the formula and is able to shop it around. The latter is generally true for a large company like Merc.

Now to why "bottlers" aren't just mixing and bottling. I have NEVER heard of that in the lubrication industry. NEVER EVER, for a finished lubricant. If the motor manufacturer does shop the formula out, it is to true lubricant manufacturers! Not bottlers! You don't just blend base oils and additives, then stick the mix in a bottle. First off, blending base oils isn't just pouring them together, then adding other ingredients. For something like that oil, the base oils are blended(bright stock is also a base oil, not something different by the way), then their viscosity is checked at ususally 40c and 100c, along with the viscosity index. If the oil blend is within spec, then you continue on. Many solid lubricant additives are just that, solid. The oil is heated in a large jacketed vessel, generally to 100c, then solid lubricant addives are melted in. If it has polymer additives, those have to be heated on the side and added hot. Liquid additives can usually go in anytime. When the blend is complete, the viscosity is checked again, adjustments are made if necessary, and then a whole battery of wear tests and corrosion tests are done as basic quality control. Much more involved then you led these people to believe. No bottler is going to pour a couple of million $$$, maybe 10 or more, into blending and testing equipment and keep lubrication engineers on staff. They would be a lubricant manufacturer then and probably do nothing else. The only realm of possibility I see in your claim, is that you are mistaken. Many times the lubricant manufacturer makes the oil in bulk, THEN the fininshed product is shipped off to a packager to be put in the appropriate containers. Just like engine manufacturers don't blend their own lubricants, packagers don't manufacturer and test lubricants, lubricant manufacturers generally don't so small packaging.

I formulate, manufacture, and test lubricants for a living, and work with engineers from all areas of lubrication from oils to greases to dry film lubricants, and none of them or myself have ever heard of any scenario as you claim. And some engineers have been in the business for over 40 years.

Terroreyes,

You are correct that there is much more to blending a lubricant than my post let on. It is not like mixing paint colors at Home Depot.

The answer was to simplify the procedures so it would be understandable and easy to read.

The biggest thing I tried to convey was that one company does not pump the crude out of the ground, magically convert it to an additive enriched lubricant, bottle and label it, ship it, then put it on the dealer's shelf.

Its kinda funny, the subject that will never die. Do a google on this subject and see what comes up. Ya got the group that says you have to use what the manufacturer recommends and then you got the group that says you can use what you want. You read posts occasionally from mechanics that say I work on engines every day that failed because of lubrication issues, blaming the oil. In reality the vast majority of these failures were caused by machanical issues, improper breakin or just plain old abuse. The reasons powerheads fail goes way beyond the oil, although it is easier to simply blame whatever lubricant is being put into whatever engine. Would people be as passionate about this subject were it not for the problems Mercury marine had with there early optimax engines? Of coarse we all know that was a mechanical issue with those engines and not an oil quality issue. There is one thing that is always lacking in these oil vs. oil debates, and that would be statistics. As long as DFI's have been around and with all the worry that people have about what oil will work in what engine, no manufacturer has provided us with any statistical evidense to prove that if you use X brand of oil in X brand of engine you will be X% more likely after X number of hours to have a decrease in performance or a complete failure. The powerhead problems that people have experienced over the years, how many of those occured with and while having the manufacturers recommended oil in that engine during the life of that engine. Who knows?

I'll buy all I can get for $26 Its $36 here in Walker Minnesota

Its kinda funny, the subject that will never die. Do a google on this subject and see what comes up. Ya got the group that says you have to use what the manufacturer recommends and then you got the group that says you can use what you want. You read posts occasionally from mechanics that say I work on engines every day that failed because of lubrication issues, blaming the oil. In reality the vast majority of these failures were caused by machanical issues, improper breakin or just plain old abuse. The reasons powerheads fail goes way beyond the oil, although it is easier to simply blame whatever lubricant is being put into whatever engine. Would people be as passionate about this subject were it not for the problems Mercury marine had with there early optimax engines? Of coarse we all know that was a mechanical issue with those engines and not an oil quality issue. There is one thing that is always lacking in these oil vs. oil debates, and that would be statistics. As long as DFI's have been around and with all the worry that people have about what oil will work in what engine, no manufacturer has provided us with any statistical evidense to prove that if you use X brand of oil in X brand of engine you will be X% more likely after X number of hours to have a decrease in performance or a complete failure. The powerhead problems that people have experienced over the years, how many of those occured with and while having the manufacturers recommended oil in that engine during the life of that engine. Who knows?


You're right on both areas. I'd love to also see some side by side data from ANY manufacturer to prove their oil. That would be a **** of a selling point, but I'll bet the marketing a-holes, I mean guinesses, say otherwise because of the $$$ to do it. As for catostrophic failures like the early Optis, that's what I've been posting here for years. Your engine isn't going to blow up if you use just any TCW-3 oil, the engine just won't last as long. Mechanical failures are one thing, but generally lubricants DON'T fail if they meet spec, the engines just wear differently with different lubes in them.

Here's a copy and paste of a reply to someone who Pm'd me about oil. If this doesn't sum it up, then I don't know what to say.

<I have an 04 Opti and only use their DFI oil. Never anything else. I scanned some at work and it looks like the additive levels are sky high, so there's definitely some justification for the higher price. I truly believe in what I post about oils. I see the differences every day at work. 99% of the lubes we make are application specific. It's VERY rare that one lube will meet the specifications of two different manufacturers, even when the designs are very close. Most manufacturers of auto or marine parts demand durability of 2x-5x expected life of the part. General specs(like TCW-3) are considered 1 life! It's not a matter of using Penzoil, Amzoil, or whatever and your motor is going to blow up. Most oils will work great for what could be considered a normal or average life of the motor. There will be a difference in smoking and sludging. Some oils may even exceed performance of the manufactures oil, but there's no way to tell for sure. The difference you should almost be guaranteed to see by using the recommended oil is probably longer than expected life of the motor. Most of the motor manufacturers used to just relabel major brand oils, but that's not the case any more. The performance competition is so high that they were forced to have oils engineered specifically for their motors, especially for DFI's. >