ChevronTexaco Products Co. announced last month the launch of a website designed to offer online training about lubrication and maintenance. The website, LubricantsUniversity.com, is also being used as a platform to reintroduce Lubrication magazine. ChevronTexaco said the training offered by the website will be aimed at the commercial, construction, mining and industrial segments of the lubes market. Currently, one course is available – Fundamentals of Lubrication – but the company s...

Beijing Tongyi Petroleum Chemical Co. became Chinas largest privately owned lubricant supplier largely thanks to aggressive advertising. Now the company says it will ramp up research and development spending in order to continue its remarkable rate of growth. Officials say the investments in know-how will allow the company to introduce more than 100 new products this year as it strives to break out of the prevalent practice of supplying generic lubes. Established as a start-up in 1993, Tongyi ha...

Installation of a new catalyst appears now to have been the secret behind a capacity expansion last year at S-Oil Corp.s giant base oil plant in Onsan, South Korea. A boost in output kept the facility neck-and-neck with Motivas base oil plant in Port Arthur, Texas, as the two largest base oil plants in the world. S-Oil officials yesterday confirmed an April 14 announcement by ExxonMobil Research and Engineering Co. that S-Oil installed ExxonMobils MSDW catalytic dewaxing technology on one of thr...

DETROIT – Fuel economy in GF-5 is not locked in concrete yet and is still debatable, said Afton Chemicals Dewey Szemenyeiof an Open Forum at SAEs Fuelsand Lubricants Council here April 12. Industry experts aired proposals at the forum for altering SAE J-300, theindustry standard that is used for classifying engine oil viscosity, to address fuel economy requirements for the next passenger car engine oil specification. General Motors Mike McMillan and Savants Ted Selby coauthored a proposal ...

The Royal Dutch/Shell Group and leading Chinese automaker Shanghai Automotive Group Co. said Monday that they are moving forward with plans to create a chain of Jiffy Lube oil change outlets across China. The companies claimed that the venture will be the first of its kind in China. Their plan, first announced in October 2003, calls for construction of 600 outlets within 10 years. Automotive service provider Shanghai Automotive Industry Sales Corp., a subsidiary of SAGC, already operates busines...