best two cycle oil for running 580 westbend

[kyle moody]

Any recommendation on a good oil to use, and what ratio to mix to one gallon of fuel?

I'm not running alcohol, just gas. I have some of the Redline synthetic oil.

[steveohara]

castor oil is the best, I use Burris at 16 to 1 for most applications but sometimes I'll increase the oil to 12to1.
Steve O'Hara

[ted johnson]

Kyle, I like castor for its lubricating properties, but even the best de-gummed castor still gums things up unless you run a lot. A good synthetic for gas that seems to have no bad properties is Klotz R-50. It's pricey, but the high performance motorcycle guys seem to use it, and it does well in karts. TJ

[Terry Bentley]

Any of the synthetic and blends available for outboards works great. Basically what a lot of the weedeater oils are. The blue, not green oils. Even Amsoil is fantastic. I ride Seadoos almost year round. The cheap Super Tech 2 cycle motor oils from Wally World, is all I have been using for over 12 years. I do build all of my own motors for the skis, including all machine work required. See first hand any signs of wear from long term extended use. Works well in gasoline. Redline is another exceptional oil I would highly recommend. For alky, I would have to go with castor tho. Hard to break old habits and the smell is definately a bonus. On the outboard oils and Redline, you can run 32:1 and even 40:1 without any failures. The Seadoo motors are just big twin cylinder kart engines, producing nearly 150 HP stock. They run piston clearances at 0.005", 10:1 compression ratio and setup for racing they will turn upward of 9000 rpm. That is a lot considering how large these motors are. When there was not a spec oil at races when I raced Yamahas, it was either outboard motor oil or Redline.

[Rob Voska]

The early bushing motors recomend using a lot of oil so I stick with the 16:1 ratio heck I have run 12:1 a lot. I don't even want to tell you how much oil I used to force through my long track engines. The tolerances were not what they are today & I would rather change a few plugs than "fry" an engine.

One question I have always thougth about....... I like running lots of oil but if I'm running gas at 16:1 or Alky at 16:1 I'm really running around 2.38 times more oil with alky (@ 6.7:1) because of pushing more fuel through the engine. So if you think about it alky could / should be run at a leaner ratio. Even though alky is a "dry" fuel & gas has some lubrication properties & the old gas even had lead. Am I thinking right or am I crazy?

[ted johnson]

Well, Rob, you're crazy, of course, but what's that got to do with lubricating your engine? TJ

[Terry Bentley]

Who said the 580 was a bushing motor?

[steveohara]

Rob,

Maybe a better question is... if I can run run 2.38 times as much oil through my engine when running alky without fouling plugs or other problems why not double the amount of oil in the gas?
All of the good two cycle tuners know they run faster and last longer with more oil whether you are running gas or alky. All of my Duffys were won running alky based fuel with 10% oil... yep, 10 to 1 ratio.
I have never understood the reasoning of folks promoting running high fuel to oil ratios in racing two strokes. If you are running a machine that is going to be run at idle and very low loads a good percentage of the time there is merit in keeping the fuel/oil ratio high but in a karting application, especially with a low powered motor like a 580, the engine is going to be run a full throttle close to 100% of the time and oil is the only protection you can provide to prevent damage and wear.
Steve O'Hara

[Rob Voska]

That was the basis of my question..... Good film strength, I have always believed lots of oil cushioned the parts & kept everything cool & happy. I was never one to shy away from running oil.

I figured out by time we put on our equipment that Friday practice Sat & Sunday morning warm up & two 30 minute races I figured we went @ 3 million revolutions per race weekend. So the spark plug we used 3 million times the crank bearings turned, seals slid, the piston started & stopped twice that many times, wrist pin & bearings stressed, belt turned, axle & wheel bearings @ 5:1 ratio less. Never really had any problems with carbon or oil buildup inside pipes, headers or flex. Rod bearings both top & bottom always looked good with no signs of heat & even if we ran a engine two weekends there was no noticible difference or wear. Pistons had normal thrust wear but always looked great. Rings were fine. I always felt like I was replacing good parts with new parts. I always wondered how many events we could have ran a engine before failure or a fall off in performance. Happily we never found out. I believe rebuilds cost less than loosing a great engine. I've had some of my stuff around for well over 10 years & there is nothing wrong with it to this day & would even go so far as to put it up against brand new stuff.

I think that is the big difference between long track where your at WOT almost 100% of the time in a narrow RPM range vs sprint racing where the RPM is more up & down & on and off the throttle a lot more. You can stuff a lot more oil than you think through an engine at WOT.

Ted I knew I should have not said that!

[ted johnson]

Happy Easter, Rob and everyone else!
Ron C. and I both have no issues with running fairly high oil to fuel ratios. I'd rather risk fouling a plug than roasting a rare engine. I run 10 sometimes 12 Oz./Gal. and have been doing so for over fifty years. It's been about thirty years since I've stuck an engine. NGK plugs handle high oil concentrations well with no fouling. Ted