Which engine oil to use on BMW D12 marine diesel engine

[Sailorbob8599]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

With a splash lubricated engine, I'd go with a premium brand of straight grade oil and change it frequently. The oil will never be close to being broken down, but with no oil filter your changing it out for clean oil.


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Comment: I beg to differ; The BMW D-12 certainly does have an engine oil filter ... otherwise, I've purchased an additional half dozen for no good reason.

[a64pilot]

I was going solely off of that web site that said they were splash lubricated and someone else posted to be sure it stayed full of oil due to it being splash lubricated.
Now if it is splash lubricated, then that means no oil filter, but as I have never seen this engine, I wouldn't know.
I guess that was you that posted it was splash lubricated and had no oil pump, so how is the oil filtered?

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[leftbrainstuff]

Originally Posted by gawie

Hello forum

I have an old BMW D12 (Hatz) diesel engine due for an oil change.

The online manual found on the net shows the following:
Engine oil: HD-API CC/CD

CC/CD is old specs and discontinued. Will normal mutligrade 15W-40 be ok or should I look at something like a monograde SAE30?

I'm lost...

Any of the current diesel multigrades will exceed the cc/cd spec.

+1 for the delo 400. A 15 or 20W/40 or 50 is always a safe bet.

Avoid any synthetics. They are intended to minimise oil blowby and hence emissions. Think modern high revving car diesels.

Avoid monogrades. They're for static diesels. Think bore pump engines.

I never use synthetics on 'classical' diesels.

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[a64pilot]

I can almost guarantee that when this engine was designed, single grade oils were what was available
There is no reason to avoid synthetics, but also there is probably no advantage to them in this application either
What is a bore pump engine?

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[newhaul]

BTW the hatz aka bmw d12 engine was originally used to run irrigation pumps in remote locations and hasn't been actually manufactured for many many years ( 40 + ) and if you can actually get it in south Africa the delo 100 is actually the preferred for heavy industrial and marine use in small diesels.