FE, "friction modifiers", and additives.

[DracoFelis]

I agree that the vast majority of oil (and gas, for that matter) additives are junk (a distressingly large group being "worse then useless", in that you are worse off with the additive, then without it). However, after hanging out in the http://www.bobistheoilguy.com forums, reading, and (carefully) trying a few of the (better recommended) additives, I'm coming to the conclusion that there are some good/useful additives out there, and sometimes they even help FE.

After all, some of these chemical cocktails are useful for what they do, if you know how to use them, and use them in a reasonable dose. And really, what is an "additive", other than a bottle full of the (concentrated) stuff you might want to use? So I am now coming to the conclusion that while many additives are "snake oil", there are a few "good ones" out there. You just need a decent source to find them, and some way to "test the claims". And you also need to pay attention to how they are used (as some of them are good "in small doses", but cause harm when you use "too much").

Take "Friction Modifiers" for example ( http://theoildrop.server101.com/ubb/...;f=56;t=000002 ). While you can easily "over do it" with them (dosage is key), when CAREFULLY used they can lower overall drag in a car and thereby help FE (not to mention, helping keep down wear).

For example, I little before finding this forum, I put about 4oz (about 1/4 of the maker's IMHO "overly high" recommended dosage) of VSOT ( Valvoline Synpower Oil Treatment; ) in my car's oil (already Mobil-1 full synthetic), and that was the 1st 47 mpg tankful I had ever recorded (before that, my highest recorded tankful was 43 mpg. And I've also repeated the 47 in one of the 2 gas tanks since that (so that wasn't a one time occurrence). And what do I attribute the FE boost to? The lower drag I noticed due to VSOT's FMs (mostly "Moly"):
http://theoildrop.server101.com/ubb/...;f=56;t=000002
http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/...1;t=000297;p=1
http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/...c;f=5;t=004779
http://theoildrop.server101.com/cgi/...;f=42;t=002488
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/moly.html

NOTE: It would be a little hard to do an A-B-A test on this, as some additives (including Moly) will stick around (at least partially), even after changing the oil. And with the quality oil and extra high filtration (including "bypass filters) we are using in the family cars, we have started using 10k+ oil changes (which means it will be a little while before we remove the additive containing oil the first time). However, I did clearly feel the lower drag, as the additive (used at only 1/4 of the maker's recommended dosage, as you don't want to over do these sorts of things) slowly worked it's way into the engine parts (seemed to take aprox 200 miles to fully work in).