I found this interesting article regarding castor oil written by a chemist at Conoco, seems to support the great success of oils like Maxima 927 and Klotz supertechniplate and castrol A727(castor plus esters). Hope I dont get banned for this thread.
I recall reading or hearing a tale (unconfirmed, could be bogus) about WWI aircraft engines.
The Rotary engines of the day were nothing like modern Wankels -- rather, they were built like backwards radial engines. The crank and pistons were stationary, and the cylinders, with the propeller, rotated around the shaft! These were high-torque, low-RPM engines. They were also essentially two-strokes, and were both fueled and lubricated by castor oil.
That said, the tale I heard is that pilots, upon returning to the aerodrome after a dogfight, would jump from the cockpit and make a beeline for the bathroom, as the castor fumes from both the exhaust and poorly-sealed intake would notoriously give them the runs!
Rotary engines of this style disappeared pretty much immediately after the war, replaced by inline and radial engine configurations which are still in use today.
There's no doubt that castor oil has the best film strength at high temps. However the best ester synthetic oils come close, and they burn cleaner. I've ran super techniplate and it's good stuff, and I'd like to try 927 some day just for the fun of it.
OT - the WWI radial aircraft engines were built with a stationary crank and the propeller was mounted to the cylinders. The crank was fixed and the whole engine turned. This was done to cool the cylinders. Another FYI - there was no throttle on these engines, they ran wide open. "Throttle" was turning the ignition off and on momentarily.
And model aircraft engine fuel is nitro, alcohol, and castor oil or Klotz for lubrication.
Well thats good news, I bought 2 quarts of the super techniplate, hope to try it out this weekend...
That stuff smells really cool. Just make sure you run your saws every month or so. SuperTechniplate is good oil, but it doesn't have the best rust inhibitors, so it doesn't make a great storage lube. If I was going to run castor oil everyday I'd have a hard time choosing between Klotz Super and 927, I'm thinking I'd probably choose 927.
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