Slick 60's

What viscosity oil are you guys with 223 using? I am wanting to do an oil change on my new toy this weekend and wanted to know to use. Does it need the zddp in the oil also?

Any older engine needs the zinc. I use diesel oil in my older cars.

Depending on where you are, I would use the 15W40 diesel. If in cold states then depending on whether you are garaging the truck or not and whether you run it in the winter or not. Lighter weight might be needed.

Rich

I'm assuming you don't have the swings in temperatures that we do up north. And I only drive my old cars during the spring thru fall due to salt on the roads. You could get by with straight 30W with the use of the zddp additive. And I change my oil & filter every fall due to lack of miles put on during the season. There are alot of different opinions out there on this very subject, some based on personal experiance and others on extensive research and reading technical articles on the internet. Most of all maintain it drive it and enjoy it, you won't hurt the value of it if you are the one getting the enjoyment out of it. Come on spring!

I am not that far from you so we get pretty cold here also. I have been doing a little digging and noticed the diesel oils have an detergent in them. I have been told for as long as I can remember not to use detergent oil in an older/higher mileage engine. Due to the fact that it can loosen up deposits in engine. Is this an actual concern or just an automotive myth?

It's a real concern, I haven't seen non-detergent oil in a long long time. Do you know the history on the engine in question? Like approximate miles on it and if it has had routine maintenance done to it and what oil brand and weight the PO used. Sounds anal but it might give you piece of mind as to what you have under the hood. If its a barn find its a crap shoot at best. Take off the valve cover and maybe the side cover to see how much sludge is on the back side of the sheet metal pieces. When you remove the distributor for your upgrade you can see how the lower part looks there. Initial oil change call tell a few things as well. Always change the oil filter too. My preferance is to put on a adapter for the later spin on oil filters because I'm lazy and don't want to search for a replacement canister filter. Also clean the crankcase breather filter at the oil fill and the road draft tube. The mid fifty pickups were a bent pipe with a bolt in the center but the y-block had a horse hair covered screen in the canister that could plug up and cause problems. I'm sure I'm missing something, hopefully some of the other members will share thier experiances.

How do you clean the breather and the road draft tube? I ended up going with the Vavoline racing oil it has more ZZDP than the diesel oils. All they had was 20w50 at the time so I used that but I am going to try to find a little lighter weight the next oil change. From the way the oil looked it has not been changed in a while. I am hoping to put maybe around 1000-1500 miles on it and change it again. Hopefully it will look a little better.