Synthetic or conventional drive lube.

[smittyseng]

I WAS running Royal purple for a few years among other oils I tested and switched to Amsoil this year. I tested additional heat treatments,coatings and various cryo treatments and have been able to extend my gear service life on bravo lower gears with some processes but the amsoil seems to have helped the lower gear life signifigantly over the royal purple so even though it's cheap and convienient for me to get I no longer run it,Smitty

[Mr Gadgets]

All I can say Smitty is that I have not had a failure with my drive. Although I am at much lower hp (700-750hp) than you are. Hopefully that will change this year. With over 300hrs on my drive at this point. I can not knock the RP.
I have a drive ready to go on the boat with a lower set of gears that have a magic coating on them, suppose to be the answer. We'll see. If the coating shows any signs of benifit, I will add the cryo treatment to it and see how that works out. Just have to get the new motor together.
The drive also has my version of external cooling and filtering, so drive temps will be in the 140* range, which is good for any lube to operate it in the recommended temp range.
Dick

[glassdave]

Dick i am curious about the cooler/filter system you have. what kind of temps do they run with and without it? is it inside the drive or outside? pics? Do you do the conversion or offer a kit? Sounds pretty cool i didnt know you had something like this. I run HP Bravos on the Donzi and have had pretty good luck but she is heavy and any things gotta help. I dont baby the boat but i also dont beat it. Had my first drive failure since new but that was kinda my fault. I keep up on service intervals but think i missed the left hand drives cap bolts walking out and she may have ingested some water taking out the upper gears (thats just my thought but i'm no drive guy ). Only wiped a few teeth and the shrapnel was mostly fine pieces.

[Chris]

http://www.drewmarine.com/products/c...coolswirl.html

Drew makes a setup- probably duplicable for a few less bucks.

[Mr Gadgets]

Dave,
My setup is similar to Drew's, except I use a differnt pump, add a filter and remove the oil from a different place and inject it at a different place. I have a list of parts, with all the fittings and hoses and components and drilling the case, it gets real close to the $1k mark. I have not been able to test the setup on my own boat. This year I will and will have some data to share. At this point I do have a couple of drives out there with it installed. One customer told me he wasnt sure it was working. I told him to leave the pump off and see what happend to drive temps.. when they hit around 200* he turned on the pump and the temp dropped to 140* within a min. So it is a work in progress. Drew's system is comparable. I added a filter and when you cut it open, you can see just how much metal a Bravo produces, and all that is circulated thru the preloaded tapered bearing. The main difference is that I pull the oil from the lower and inject it into the upper pointing at the pinion gear. I perfer to do the modification to the case, which needs to be stripped down in order to do it. So I have not been offering a kit, due to the complexity of the case modifications. But if some one has no quams about taking a drill to a $1400 upper case, I could surely include some instructions..
Here is picture of my kit that I have put together. It is all top quality hoses and fittings. Outside is SS and inside is Aeroquip An hose and Fittings..

On another note, the top cap bolts shouldnt be backing out. Most of the time, the gear breaks and pushes them out. I use the XR top cap and a stud kit that I put together to help that LH drive out..

[LAKE EFFECT]

Amsoil severe gear with 10% Lucas heavy duty oil stabilizer(non syn), per Max Machine Worx.

Mr Gadgets,
Is the 100 degree drop with or with out a drive showers? Sounds like a great upgrade.

LE

[Mr Gadgets]

Without the external drive shower.

[Tomas Wallin]

Dave,
My setup is similar to Drew's, except I use a differnt pump, add a filter and remove the oil from a different place and inject it at a different place. I have a list of parts, with all the fittings and hoses and components and drilling the case, it gets real close to the $1k mark. I have not been able to test the setup on my own boat. This year I will and will have some data to share. At this point I do have a couple of drives out there with it installed. One customer told me he wasnt sure it was working. I told him to leave the pump off and see what happend to drive temps.. when they hit around 200* he turned on the pump and the temp dropped to 140* within a min. So it is a work in progress. Drew's system is comparable. I added a filter and when you cut it open, you can see just how much metal a Bravo produces, and all that is circulated thru the preloaded tapered bearing. The main difference is that I pull the oil from the lower and inject it into the upper pointing at the pinion gear. I perfer to do the modification to the case, which needs to be stripped down in order to do it. So I have not been offering a kit, due to the complexity of the case modifications. But if some one has no quams about taking a drill to a $1400 upper case, I could surely include some instructions..
Here is picture of my kit that I have put together. It is all top quality hoses and fittings. Outside is SS and inside is Aeroquip An hose and Fittings..

On another note, the top cap bolts shouldnt be backing out. Most of the time, the gear breaks and pushes them out. I use the XR top cap and a stud kit that I put together to help that LH drive out..

I will also test this system very well next year. So far it's installed and have been running it for 5 hours but my oil temp sender or gauge won't work so I dont have any numbers yet.

Pics of the rigging of the DPM drive and oil system

[Tomas Wallin]

More pics

[phragle]

totally different aplication, but it really sold me on Amsoil, desert atv racing. little aircooled 2 stroke from the factory, made 15 hp. Using yamaha's recom. lube I wasnt getting 24 hours out of a tranny. exploded a gear hear and there but for the most part, the gears were just plain wearing out. few more engine mods and pushing 50 hp, with amsoil and shotpeening gears they are holding up to the added power great. I have the same thing to say about their 2 stroke oil. after the 24 hour race with the motor making about 30 hp using trick 112 and yamalube r the top end was toast, did another 24 hour race with a 35 hp motor ( and this top end was used not new) usuing amsoil and trick the motor had the same compression at the end as it did at the beginning and looked good at tear down.

[Mr Gadgets]

Tomas,
that is one sweet lookin boat!! The setup for the oil cooler looks very nice!

Thanks!
Dick

[07DominatorSS]

What are you running?

AMSOIL marine 75/80w-90 gearlube in my Bravo 1X's!!!

[07DominatorSS]

Amsoil severe gear with 10% Lucas heavy duty oil stabilizer(non syn), per Max Machine Worx.

Mr Gadgets,
Is the 100 degree drop with or with out a drive showers? Sounds like a great upgrade.

LE

In my opinion, you shouldn't add any addtives to the oil. If it was meant to be in there, it would already be in there. Company's spend multi millions of dollars getting the "recipe" perfect, and if some outside agent is added, it can throw that perfect mix of additives off, possibly causing premature wear or shearing of the oil.

Think about your grandmothers famous recipe, whether its a cake or whatnot, if you were to add a little extra of some ingredient, it wouldn't turn out right, now would it? Kind of the same idea.

[Mr Gadgets]

O7 you are correct!! Not good to add things. But, I heard this recipe from a guy 15yrs ago.. been doing it ever since and not found a problem.. cake tastes the same every time..
Do I have enough power to destroy a drive, not sure? Is the mix helping.. not sure till I break my drive. Am I going to leave out the extra till I break it and see if adding it helps.. not!
Sorry.. I just keep doing what I do. I dont have any scientific studies to prove or disprove the combination.

Dick

[LAKE EFFECT]

In my opinion, you shouldn't add any addtives to the oil. If it was meant to be in there, it would already be in there. Company's spend multi millions of dollars getting the "recipe" perfect, and if some outside agent is added, it can throw that perfect mix of additives off, possibly causing premature wear or shearing of the oil.

Think about your grandmothers famous recipe, whether its a cake or whatnot, if you were to add a little extra of some ingredient, it wouldn't turn out right, now would it? Kind of the same idea.

I'm not going to get enough time on my drives to know if the Lucas stabilizer helped or hurt when I break one. But I do trust Aaron at Max, they sell good parts, and run alot of high HP Bravo combos. So if he says they have had good luck with the mix, I'm in. Plus I did test out the Lucas addititive before using it, and it is some sticky clingy stuff, and I'm sure it does add to the cushining affect on the gears.

LE

[07DominatorSS]

I'm not going to get enough time on my drives to know if the Lucas stabilizer helped or hurt when I break one. But I do trust Aaron at Max, they sell good parts, and run alot of high HP Bravo combos. So if he says they have had good luck with the mix, I'm in. Plus I did test out the Lucas addititive before using it, and it is some sticky clingy stuff, and I'm sure it does add to the cushining affect on the gears.

LE

See that is what people think you are supposed to have, clingy gearlube. That is completely false. You do what you want to do, but having, as you call it, "clingy" gearlube, causes a condition known as fluid friction, which causes unnecessary heat and drag. When gearlube gets thick and sticky as you say, it actually has more difficulty getting in between the gears. Think about it. What would get between two tight together pieces of metal easier, syrup or olive oil. Just my .02.

[HotPursuit]

Mineral oil is for lawn mowers and weed eaters!!

Amsoil is the ticket. With twins its easy to do comparisons!!
35 yrs amsoil has been around and has kick as* in independent testing year after year.

[HotPursuit]

totally different aplication, but it really sold me on Amsoil, desert atv racing. little aircooled 2 stroke from the factory, made 15 hp. Using yamaha's recom. lube I wasnt getting 24 hours out of a tranny. exploded a gear hear and there but for the most part, the gears were just plain wearing out. few more engine mods and pushing 50 hp, with amsoil and shotpeening gears they are holding up to the added power great. I have the same thing to say about their 2 stroke oil. after the 24 hour race with the motor making about 30 hp using trick 112 and yamalube r the top end was toast, did another 24 hour race with a 35 hp motor ( and this top end was used not new) usuing amsoil and trick the motor had the same compression at the end as it did at the beginning and looked good at tear down.

My son ran a 28 ft cat with twin 2-stoke V-8s and hated the smoking,He tried the 100:1 mix from amsoil and they ran great stop fouling plugs and no more smoking. Plus picked up some rpms.
The only way we could get #3s to live on the Shadow Cat with 1150 hp was to run Amsoil synthic, we burnt up many gear sets and bearings with factory green crap.

[LAKE EFFECT]

See that is what people think you are supposed to have, clingy gearlube. That is completely false. You do what you want to do, but having, as you call it, "clingy" gearlube, causes a condition known as fluid friction, which causes unnecessary heat and drag. When gearlube gets thick and sticky as you say, it actually has more difficulty getting in between the gears. Think about it. What would get between two tight together pieces of metal easier, syrup or olive oil. Just my .02.

You very well might be right about old thick and worn out gear lube, but I dont think thats the situation with the Lucas. The Lucas gets on a surface and doesnt come off, so its not fighting to get back on the gear, its already there. Plus I'm talking about a 10% mix with the Amsoil, so it shouldnt fight against the engineering of the gear lube. Both products are name brand, and both are advertised in high performance applications.

Believe me I am not a sheep when it comes to my boats and cars high performance setups, I use my common sense, my research, and my experiences, plus others experiences and suggestions, throw it together, and see what happens. Sometimes the turn out is good, sometimes bad. High performance boating(and cars) is not a proven art, there is alot of experimenting, and my wallet is only so deep, I need to trust some people, and believe me, the number is small.

LE

[smittyseng]

I'm not going to get enough time on my drives to know if the Lucas stabilizer helped or hurt when I break one. But I do trust Aaron at Max, they sell good parts, and run alot of high HP Bravo combos. So if he says they have had good luck with the mix, I'm in. Plus I did test out the Lucas addititive before using it, and it is some sticky clingy stuff, and I'm sure it does add to the cushining affect on the gears.

LE

They told me the same thing except aaron made it sound like the mixture was closer to 25%,I switched to amsoil this year and have been using the lucas added to it too and so far haven't came close to burning the gears up the way I used to with royal purple. Max machine worx claims they have tried every kind of gear oil looking for the most gear life/drive life,they even used to sell the alysin stuff and some other exotic stuff,now they say don't waste your money,the best stuff they have seen is amsoil mixed with lucas. I believe them because they are not trying to sell the oil,just sharing what Ive been told and tried,Smitty