I have tried the search feature, and either it is not working, or am I not smart enough to use it.

I was trying to search to see what oil I need to use in the 440. I know zinc is needed with the flat tappet cams. Do yall run shelf motor oil and use a zinc additive, or go with an oil that comes with high zinc levels?

I use either Shell Rotella or Mobil Delvac 15w40 diesel rated oil.

In my still original 383 I just started using full synthetic Royal Purple with added zinc and am very happy with it!

Me too. 15W40 Rotella has worked well in a moderately aggressive mech flat tappet application for me.

bradd penn joe gibbs & others. you might read the bobistheoilguy article. plenty of zinc/correct weight/to some extent correct additives for your app (good oil has good additives). just me I prefer non synthetic/frequent changes (synthetic I'm sure is a much better lube but its the suspended metal particles that cause wear in addition to acids etc & an oil change elims that which is the opposite of the synthetic/extended oil ch intervals school. 2cents

You may want to look at this: https://540ratblog.wordpress.com/2013/06/20/motor-oil-wear-test-ranking/

Interesting reading about resistance to wear in PSI and how some oils that are supposed to be better than others don't really rank well.

Use the Google custom search at the very top of each page. Works good. Put in 'oil for 440', and you'll get lots of Moparts hits.

The EPA has been after the diesel oils also. I'm not sure to what extent.

I have been using Valvoline VR1 racing oil since my engine was rebuilt.. Easy to find at most Auto parts stores

Valvoline VR1 race oil here too. The Rotella and some other diesel oils don't have near the zinc and other additives that they used to. Haven't for some time now...years. Not saying it isn't good oil or that it won't work, just doesn't have what it used to.

Castrol GTX 10W30 Or 10W40 has worked fine for me... Daily driver Hot Rod...

Sorry I'm just now getting on to check replies, work has been crazy. I'm thinking about sticking to conventional and adding some zinc additive, or going with the Valvoline VR1 as I have heard good things. I am leary of the synthetic, only because I used it in an older vehicle before and developed a few leaks that I did not have with conventional.

If I used conventional, how much zinc additive would I need to put with each oil change? Half a bottle, a whole?

check out renegade racing for oil and fuel. 3000ppm zinc content works great for me.

This article has changed everything I thought I knew about oil.I'd like to hear what smarter people than myself think about his findings and conclusions.

You'll never get anything remotely resembling reality on this or any other board.

Plain and simple, most all the people who share their opinions here know less than nothing about what's really going on in the oil. And that's the same on pretty much every enthusiast board you can find.

Here's an example - the assumption that oil out of the can is clean. In the industrial world we have come to understand that there are literally millions of particles in that "new" quart of oil. We filter oil out of the container into the application because oil sampling will show that the oil isn't as clean as is necessary.

Another thing - the assumption that it is the zinc that protects. It isn't quite that simple, the zinc is just an easily identifiable component of the molecules that are put into the oil for anti-scuff properties.

There's a dozen other sacred cows out there in the blogosphere, all of them deserving to be butchered. But oil, like filters and a few other things, have become a religion to the true believers. And they go on jihad against the infidels who dare to suggest that their ideas of the Oil God could possibly be wrong. Ignorance will shout down the truth every time.

Bah!

R.

Right. It's actually the phosphorus that provides the antiwear protection.

We tested some oils a while back using neutron activation analysis. Our results can be found here:
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1502/1502.07261.pdf

I've commented on the 540ratblog article in a previous post:
The guy seems to know what he's doing. As he points out, a "Mechanical Engineer is clearly the most qualified Engineer to test motor oil" (but evidently not the most qualified engineer to know the difference between proper nouns and regular ol' nouns ). The only problems I have with his data:
1. He doesn't provide any uncertainties anywhere. Seriously, numbers without uncertainties are meaningless. If you don't believe me, I'll sell you my 100,000,000 hp 2002 Ram for $100,000 cash (note: +/- 99,999,775 hp). You never know, it could have 199,999,775 hp and be a good deal...
2. The other problem is this statement:
"The ppm (parts per million) quantities of zinc, phosphorus, moly and in some cases titanium, shown in the ranking list below, are taken directly from the Lab Reports that came back from the Professional Lab 'ALS Tribology' in Sparks, Nevada. Some oils have MORE ZINC than phosphorus, while other oils have MORE PHOSPHORUS than zinc. It just depends on the particular oil's formulation. Either way, the numbers below are correct and are NOT typos."
The ppm data are mass fractions. Because zinc is ONLY added to oils in the form of ZDDPs (while the phosphorus in oils can be from a variety of molecules) and because ZDDPs always have a 2:1 phosphorus atom to zinc atom ratio, the phosphorus to zinc ppm ratios should never be less than [(30.97*2)/65.39]=0.947. It's pretty basic chemistry. If you take a look at his measurements for "5W30 Joe Gibbs Driven LS30 Performance Motor Oil, synthetic," for example, you can see that the ratio is 1496/1610=0.929. What does this mean? That his data (or the data that he got from ALS Tribology) has some really high uncertainties.
That said, there's a lot more to a good motor oil than ZDDP-content. The best way to measure the quality of a motor oil is through mechanical tests, which is exactly what the guy who wrote the 540 Rat blog article does.

Hey Dog ya got any left

VR1 has worked for nearly 15 years on my duel spring solid flat tappet engine. I like the 10/30 VR1

Yeah, I've seen that. Next time you pour out new oil, inspect what's left in the bottom of the container...

I've seen the stuff at the bottom, doesn't look like solids to me. More like a thicker goo if you will.