Hey All,What Straight Premix Brand Oil and Ratio available in Australia are people using for 74 MX360 without Autolube?Cheers

Maxima 927 is good stuff, I don't know about availability in your country though.

Any good quality oil at 25:1 should keep that thing going a long time. Something castor based is worth it, best protection you can get and it smells incredible too.

Cheers for confirming, Maxima is the one I was thinking of going with

Caster is best for...
Lube/anti-seize due to polymerization when it gets hot.

Chemical weapons made of the burnt product! Good stuff!

However...
It gums up fast if not burnt.

cliff

I had read a great deal about the drawbacks of castor oil. My primary concern was separation after mixing. I tried a test batch in a glass jar, perhaps a cup of pump gas and a splash of 927. Certainly more oil than 25:1, I don't really measure anything though. That thing sat on a shelf and stayed mixed for six months, at least, with no separation.

Maxima seems to have the chemistry dialed in to perfection with 927, I have no issues with gumming, deposits or carbon buildup. In my 03 KX, with powervalves, everything stays clean and shiny. I think the key is that 927 is a blend, it's not 100% castor oil. Still smells great though, and I've had to do absolutely nothing differently than I do with any other premix oil.

Apples and oranges comment I'm going to make because Maxima 927 is a highly engineered product that is roughly 50% castor oil...  and it's a very good product. 

Back in the late 1970's I used to run Castrol R40...  one of the "legendary" castor oils.   The separation warning from Castrol that I remember was in regard to cold temperatures....  in freezing temps R40 castor oil does not mix and will not stay mixed with gasoline.   The other warning was that R40 would break down in gasoline and it was not advised to use fuel after it had been mixed for a week. 

I always tried to mix only what was needed.  Any leftover fuel was used up by adding it to the tank of my Dad's truck after the race. 

I also heard that Castor would gum up the engine and cause lots of carbon...  I ran a lot of oil...  16:1 mix most of the time and had the jetting near perfect.  After over a year with several races and lots of desert riding it was still running very strong, I pulled the top end for inspection and refresh since I was recovering from an injury...  the top end was clean and the Mahle piston was like new.  Malcolm Smith's shop measured the cylinder and piston and told me both were still at factory specs.  Put it back together with only one new part...  a new base gasket. 

This was during the "quantum leap" motocross era that started around 1976...  manufacturers were making major improvements and if you were a top level racer, you pretty much needed a new bike every six months to stay competitive...  my bike was a dinosaur with several inches less suspension travel than the new bikes when I let my best friend Jeff race it at Corona Raceway since I couldn't ride yet.  Jeff beat the field to the first corner by about 10 bike lengths!  This was right after the "refresh" where the bike only got a base gasket.  (Tracks were getting rougher and my nearly two year old model didn't have the suspension of the 1978 bikes so Jeff didn't stay in the lead long...  but it was still pretty impressive)

To this day, I'm still a believer in Castor oil and "more oil is better" (as long as the oil is safe to mix rich...  some synthetic oils must be mixed lean)  I'm also careful about not using old premix...  but since most bikes I have now have autolube, that's not so much of an issue. 

If I was running Maxima 927 I would ask Maxima how long it's safe to leave it mixed with gasoline...  I'm sure it's much longer than a week. 

Don't do what i do!! but being too tight to buy good stuff i just use the cheapest 20-50 oil @ 20-1 mix. Use it in my chainsaws [have a few] & for chainsaw bar oil too. Also my 360 & 250. As i said, don't do what i do it'll catch up with me eventually.

I actually contacted Maxima about exactly that. My MX bike never gets run to empty ans often sits for weeks with gas in it.

Somewhat surprisingly I got an email back from maxima informing me that 927 will last longer than the fuel itself. Storage of mixed fuel is no problem at all.