Countdown to GM's dexos Specification:
Harbinger of Doom or Potential Money-Maker?

by Garrett McKinnon
NOLN Staff Writer

In the history of the fast lube industry, few things have been met with quite the sense of reluctance, fear and downright vitriol as the announcement by General Motors that it would introduce a new proprietary specification for motor oil beginning with 2011-model-year vehicles.

That specification, in case you haven’t heard, is trademarked under the “dexos” (the lowercase is, oddly enough, correct) name, and beginning in the third quarter of this year, GM will start pouring products meeting the specification into the crankcases of the majority of its new vehicles.

But what, exactly, is dexos? “First of all, dexos is a specification, not a recipe,” noted Eric Johnson, senior project engineer with GM Powertrain-North America’s Fuels & Lubricants division, during a presentation on dexos at the recent International Fast Lube Expo (iFLEX) presented by the Automotive Oil Change Association. “It’s the first common engine oil specification General Motors has ever developed that will encompass all our companies in all our markets.”

The dexos specification was first conceived in 2006 and developed in 2007. Motor oil marketers were apprised of the specifics in 2008 and 2009, and informed that in order to meet factory warranty requirements, products meeting the dexos spec would need to be licensed by GM beginning this year.

There are actually two dexos specifications: dexos-1 for gasoline engines, and dexos-2 for diesel engines.

According to Johnson, GM had several goals in developing the specification. In addition to creating a common specification that would work across all brands in all markets, GM also wanted a product with improved fuel economy and fuel economy retention when compared with existing products. The dexos spec was also designed with improved aeration performance, so the motor oil can function as a hydraulic fluid, an increasingly common design element in GM engines that use variable valve timing.

GM also sought to reduce emissions through the dexos specification by increasing catalyst life. And, in the part that most worries lube operators, the company explicitly seeks to optimize drain intervals by increasing motor oil robustness through the dexos spec.

“When used with the Engine Oil Life System (EOLS), we will be able to increase drain intervals and reduce the amount of oil used during the lifetime of a vehicle. This increases the perceived value with customers,” Johnson said, adding that in the end, GM’s core business is selling vehicles, and increased drain intervals should help the company do just that. “The EOLS will take into account the better quality of dexos products, though we will wait a couple of years before upgrading maximum intervals as determined by the EOLS.”

Johnson said the dexos-1 specification will be superior to the soon-to-be-launched ILSAC GF-5/API SN specification in most categories, and dexos-2 will be superior to the API CJ-4 diesel specification in most categories.

At least initially, most factory-fill products meeting the dexos-1 spec will be 5W-30 grades, though Johnson said that in coming years GM will also include grades like 5W-20, 0W-30 and 0W-20. Factory-fill products meeting the dexos-2 spec will be in 5W-30 grades, with 0W-40 grades also possible.

For lube operators and others in the installed market, the dexos specification poses several challenges, the first of which is its very nature. Motor oil marketers have said that meeting the dexos specification will not be difficult; what it will require, however, is a product likely made with high concentrations of Group III or Group IV base oils, which will technically make dexos products synthetic motor oils.

“The main challenge in meeting the dexos specification is that it requires improvements in both fuel economy and fuel economy retention, as well as in oil robustness,” said Clarence McCollum, director of Automotive Products for ConocoPhillips Lubricants. “The dexos specification requires a piston deposit test limit of 5.5, compared to 4.0 on GF-5, but it also has a substantial fuel economy requirement, and fuel economy is difficult to achieve. GM didn’t design the specification specifically so it would require a synthetic motor oil, but the volatility requirements are so high — and GM put those requirements in there to limit oil consumption over extended drain intervals — that you cannot use any Group I, Group I-plus or low Group II base stocks. I expect all marketers will design products to meet the dexos specification with full-synthetic base stocks.”

Johnson said the use of a synthetic motor oil to meet dexos standards is not mandatory, and took issue with the very term. “The word ‘synthetic’ is a marketing term that has no technical meaning,” he said. “A marketer can call a product ‘synthetic’ when it uses a certain percentage of Group III or Group IV base oil.”

Not only that, but Group III isn’t technically a “synthetic” base oil at all; it’s simply a very highly refined petroleum base oil, meaning many “synthetic” motor oils on the market are, in fact, made from petroleum rather than man-made sources.

Still, the fact that most marketers will likely use a synthetic product to meet dexos requirements means GM drivers may soon find themselves paying far more for an oil change than they are used to, something that could cause headaches for lube operators and managers attempting to explain the reasons why.

While Johnson said he doesn’t expect a product meeting the dexos specification to cost “substantially more” than a product meeting the GF-5 specification, the simple fact is that higher-quality base oils like Group III or Group IV are more expensive than medium-quality base oils like Group II or even Group II+. Johnson, however, contends that sufficient quantities of Group II+ and Group III base oils exist to bring the cost of dexos products more in line with the current ILSAC-licensed GF products. Further, with production of Group III base oils expected to nearly triple in coming years, the price of that high-quality base oil may well decline.

The long and short of GM’s decision is that motor oil marketers have a choice to make: create a (likely more expensive) motor oil that meets both dexos and GF-5, or create two products, in essence a “GM oil” and a “non-GM oil.” McCollum said he can see only one outcome.

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