[kwikit356]

RockCrusher said "Molybdenum level in virgin sample low (58ppm) while the factory fill oil has 504 (ppm). This suggests Molybdenum might have been added at the factory. (As an aside, for additional wear protection Porsche techs recommended I add a Molybdenum additive to my Porsche engines. Specifically SWEPCO 502 Engine Oil Improver with 200ppm Molybdenum (I had a sample analyzed))."


Thanks for doing this analysis for all of us! I'm curious about your Porsche tech friends recommending the SWEPCO oil additive. Logically, what they told you makes sense to me, but the Owner's Manual for my '16 981 3.8L NA Spyder seems quite insistent that no oil additives be used.

I help out at an indy Porsche shop (mostly providing entertainment as an old cantankerous curmudgeon, and it's less than 30 feet from where I live!) so I've had some long discussions with our long-term Amsoil rep about this issue. He believes in Liqui-Moly and Amsoil oil additives (and here I am specifically referring to the OIL FLUSH type), but his concern is that many people do not use these properly. They are supposed to be poured into the car's oil just before an oil/filter change, and then the engine should be left idling for a mfr-indicated period of time, the engine oil drained and the filter changed immediately. The car should NOT be driven at all with the oil-flush additive.

Of course, your point is not about an oil-flush additive, which has at least the potential to be more of a risk to the engine, but rather to an additive that essentially adds additional Molybdenum disulfide as a lubrication enhancement.

As to the differing Magnesium levels, I too am perplexed. I don't want to go down a rabbit hole on the properties of Magnesium (mainly because I'm neither chemist nor metallurgist). But it is interesting that Molybdenum has a very high melting point, while Magnesium's is quite low. I think I recall that Moly is often used to make steel alloys harder, while Mag is often combined with Aluminum to make it (Mag) less brittle.

Maybe somebody here can better explain the reasons for these oil additives and why the levels are so different in your two oil samples. Another thing of note is that every motor oil manufacturer likes their own additive formulas, like they do with gasoline.

I like your idea of adding the SWEPCO 502 to the engine oil at changes. I also have trouble with BMW NA wanting us to use 0w20 oil in our B58 engines, especially when 0w30 is allowed in Europe. I went to 0w30 at 1,200 miles. I plan to do another oil/filter change at about 5,000 miles. I think I'll send a sample to Blackstone.