Have a new (less than 300 miles ) 302 Ford Racing engine in my '53 F-100 truck. I bought truck from widow lady who has no idea of the truck build done by her late husband. What oil and filter do you recommend when I change it.
Drive it less than 3000 annual. Shows and club events only.


I'm thinking Mobil 1 10W-30 ??
What is best filter for this engine?


Thanks for all your input.

 

Is it a roller engine?

 

One of the best filters you can use is a Baldwin B253. It's the filter Baldwin supplies to its sponsored racing teams with Ford engines. It has 175 sq in more filter material and is rated at three times the burst pressure of their standard B2 filter. The original application is for a Ferrari and the only downside is that they aren't exactly cheap but they do have racing flags on it.

 

How do I tell if it is a roller engine?

 

It is highly likely a Ford Racing brand engine is a roller block engine. It's tough to verify without pulling the intake. We all have our favorite oils. Mobil 1 is very good IMO. I run it in my 302 rollerblock stang and absolutely flog it at the track. 7000rpms, nitrous, etc. It's good oil and 10-30 is what I would run since internal engine clearances are unknown.

 

i'd think the Baldwin is a little over kill for a street truck. Also hard to find. I run WIX filters that you can get almost everywhere.

If it's a roller cam, almost any good quality oil should be fine (Mobil, Castor oil etc.). 10W30 in the summer is good but you might want to drop to 5W30 in winter if you get cold weather.

If it's not a roller cam it opens the Zinc can of worms as far as the oil. I run high mileage Castor oil with STP Zinc additive in a old flat cam MOPAR. Do a search on-line and you will find more information you can ever read regarding Zinc additives.....

 

Whether its right or wrong, I've been told its best to break in a new engine on conventional oil and switch to synthetic later if you want. 10w30 is recommended by the manufacturer. I use Motorcraft filters on all my engines.

 

Manufacturers of synthetic oils recommend this procedure and there is no money in it for them to say so. Must be true. Worthy of mention is this is because you want the rings to wear just a bit and seat. Modern moly rings break in almost instantly on startup. Last 302 block I built had 210# of compression 30 minutes after startup and it never got better after a few thousand miles. That's pretty fast break-in IMO. And while the zinc issue is very real for flat tappet cams, there is very little zinc in anything other than expensive racing specific oils now due to EPA REGS. Even oils like Shell Rotella that used to be zinc rich have a small fraction of the zinc content now. A zinc additive is highly recommended during cam break-in, even roller cams. After that, it has a lot to do with your cam profile and valve spring pressure. Flat tappet failures definitely do occur, but it is usually in a high performance application with aggressive cam lift profiles and wild valve spring pressures. Ford is obviously well aware of this and I'd bet the cam in the OPs Ford Racing engine is reasonable for street use without spending 10 bucks a quart for racing oil containing high levels of zinc. My Effie engine is a 302 with a Edelbrock Performer flat tappet cam. It has lived 10 years with Mobil Conventional oil that doesn't have any zinc to my knowledge. I used additives during initial break-in though.

 

Fatfenders nailed it. Excellent advise in his reply. I have seen "oil" questions get pretty lively on other forums. It is great to see everyone is nice and mature here.
For everything you every wanted to know about any kind of oil and perhaps more visit
bobistheoilguy.com great site.


B

 

Thanks for the input. Very helpful.

 

Here is what I used to break in the new flathead for Edith
Lucas Engine Break-In Oil 10631-1 - Free Shipping on Orders Over $99 at Summit Racing It's supposed to have a very high zinc content and is a lot lower price than 'racing' oils.

 

Oil is a very personal choice so just use a quality oil. If you have a flat tappet cam and are worried about wear Lucas makes a Hot Rod & Classic oil with high levels of Zinc. When it comes to filters you get what you pay for, use a quality filter. I use Wix, NAPA Gold or one of our marine filters off the shelf. Do yourself a favor and stay away from those orange a black filters. I have cut a few open and the difference between them a a quality filter is astonishing.

 

And while you are figuring out what a quality oil is, just know that the house brand labeled oil at the convenience store or Wal-Mart is rated at least five SAE standards than what Ford, GM, Chrysler recommended for their coveted 400+ HP muscle car engines. (the SAE standards have increased every 3 or 5 years since I have been playing with cars). I think it was SB then, what is it up to now? SG or something? I truly think flatheads were lubed with something similar to thinned out roofing tar.

I am not saying anyone is foolish for being loyal to their brand. I don't run 7-11 house brand oil either, and I have one engine with a wild cam that I beat without mercy. I feel I might need an additive so I use a Redline product since the zinc is gone. Point is for 95% of engines this is pretty hard to screw up as long as you change your oil when you should and use a decent filter. Very few of us have any need for something special. We just do it to make ourselves feel all warm and fuzzy and that's cool IMO.

 

High zinc oil are consistently equaled or out-performed by modern lower-zinc oils in realistic wear tests. Walmart's oil actually tests very well. One oil sold by Summit for break-in turned in some really bad numbers, despite huge zinc content.

 

My new 351W is running on Royal Purple break-in oil, later I'll switch over to a regular synthetic. I do not have a flat tappet setup so zinc is not an issue.