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The cold-cranking simulator (CCS) is a device used to determine the low temperature performance of lubricants, when starting a cold engine (i.e. cold-cranking). In this condition, the only energy available to turn the engine comes from the starter motor and the battery, and it has been widely assumed that the system acts as a constant power viscometer. The use of this device for this purpose is standardized as ASTM D5293. [1]
The cold-cranking simulator was invented [2] developed by Dr. Dae Sik Kim of Esso Research and Engineering Company in 1964. The first prototype was built on his apartment kitchen table with Unimat, a miniature lathe/milling machine, to minimize and avoid proper company procedures. He reported the results of his developmental work, titled: "Results of Cold Cranking Simulator and a Comment" at SAE Fuels and Lubricants Meeting in Palmer house, Chicago on May 18, 1965. Although the device was initially called "Kimometer", he refused to put his name on it and he named it for what it was intended.[ citation needed ]
Cold-cranking simulator simulates rheological process of "an average engine" during cold starting. The engine's starter motor was replaced with a small series wound universal motor, a typical sewing machine motor, and the engine, with a specially designed cold cylinder and an insulated cylindrical rotor with a pair of parallel flats. The sample oil is continuously sheared under a periodically varying shear rate, lower when the flats pass. Oils in real engines are similarly sheared, high in the journal bearings, oscillatory on piston rings and low in galley. Most developmental work went into proper sizing of the flat to simulate relative shear rate distribution in an "average engine". Both an engine and simulator is calibrated with a set of Newtonian standard crank case oils with known viscosities.[ citation needed ]
When SAE and ASTM decided to use the simulator for their future standard instrument, Esso R & E Company gave a free exclusive license to Cannon Instrument Co of State College, PA to avoid conflict of interest.[ citation needed ]
During the past four decades many marginal improvements have been made but the basic design and idea remains the same. Various generations of the CCS have been made over the years, with the latest Cannon CCS-2100 utilising Peltier cooling and an associated chiller to operate essentially the same instrument as the original 1960s design.[ citation needed ]
In the late 1980s Ravenfield Designs, Heywood, England, redesigned the entire system from the ground up, utilising a novel system to accurately model the old instruments and created a new machine offering higher repeatability and reproducibility than former methods. The Ravenfield apparatus, designated Model CS is markedly smaller than the Cannon apparatus, incorporating the cooler, the PC, the instrument and sample pumping in a 600 mm square footprint.[ citation needed ]
The Society of Automotive Engineers adopted the CCS test as part of the J300 [3] specification, and is the subject of ASTM test method D5293. [1]
A lubricant is a substance that helps to reduce friction between surfaces in mutual contact, which ultimately reduces the heat generated when the surfaces move. It may also have the function of transmitting forces, transporting foreign particles, or heating or cooling the surfaces. The property of reducing friction is known as lubricity.
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The viscosity index (VI) is an arbitrary, unit-less measure of a fluid's change in viscosity relative to temperature change. It is mostly used to characterize the viscosity-temperature behavior of lubricating oils. The lower the VI, the more the viscosity is affected by changes in temperature. The higher the VI, the more stable the viscosity remains over some temperature range. The VI was originally measured on a scale from 0 to 100; however, advancements in lubrication science have led to the development of oils with much higher VIs.
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Dexron is the trade name for a group of technical specifications for automatic transmission fluid (ATF) created by General Motors (GM). The name was first registered as a trademark and later evolved into a brand of GM. GM licenses the name and specifications to companies that manufacture the fluid and sell it under their own brand names. Not all Dexron fluids are licensed by GM for reselling under another brand name. To be licensed, the product must have a license number that begins with the letters B through J and include a "Dexron Approved" sticker on its container. Like many automobile manufacturers, GM uses transmissions sourced from other suppliers or transmission manufacturers around the world; many of these may use their own unique fluid.
Zinc dialkyldithiophosphates are a family of coordination compounds developed in the 1940s that feature zinc bound to the anion of a dialkyldithiophosphoric salt. These uncharged compounds are not salts. They are soluble in nonpolar solvents, and the longer-chain derivatives easily dissolve in mineral and synthetic oils used as lubricants. They come under CAS number . In aftermarket oil additives, the percentage of ZDDP ranges approximately between 2 and 15%. Zinc dithiophosphates have many names, including ZDDP, ZnDTP, and ZDP.
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Pour point depressants are used to allow the use of petroleum based mineral oils at lower temperatures. The lowest temperature at which a fuel or oil will pour is called a pour point. Wax crystals, which form at lower temperatures, may interfere with lubrication of mechanical equipment. High-quality pour point depressants can lower a pour point of an oil additive by as much as 40°C.
The mini-rotary viscometer is a device used to measure the pumpability of an engine oil at low temperatures. Engine oils must meet viscometric standards including those determined by the MRV in order to be classifiable within SAE J300 viscosity grades. The requirement was added after the winters of 1980-81 and 1981-82 caused major pumpability field problems in the US and Europe.
SAE J300 is a standard that defines the viscometric properties of mono- and multigrade engine oils, maintained by SAE International. Key parameters for engine oil viscometrics are the oil's kinematic viscosity, its high temperature-high shear viscosity measured by the tapered bearing simulator, and low temperature properties measured by the cold-cranking simulator and mini-rotary viscometer. This standard is commonly used throughout the world, and standards organizations that do so include API and ILSAC, and ACEA.